Thanks, John, that makes it much clearer. Also for the tip about running Disk Check.

Just wondering -- do you have to take programming courses to know this sort of thing, or is there a manual available somewhere (in Idiot Book format, preferably)? I still can't figure out what Nick meant by "TAKE A BACK UP FIRST OF YOUR EXISTING FILES IN YOUR BACK UP"? It's all caps so it must be important, but what's my backup?

BTW, I'm switching to XP, not Vista. I invite comments.

Cheers,
Michael