My pleasure, Solar384... Oh, yes... I'm still working on it! As I had a nice fresh XP installation and everything backed up, I turned off ALL unnecessary sevices. No change. I also have tried different logon settings as you suggest. If you have only one login, it has admin status by default. The knowledge base is massive... I've perused it at length! The trouble is... if a piece of software can disable any of the security features, they ain't very secure!!! Any old virus could be written to do it! And that's exactly why MSoft have changed things the way they have. If anyone finds a solution to this... Well daresay some boot licking may be in order!!!!! grumble... retreats back into pile of scary code... Thanks... Howard:)