Dear friends: Well, I have some good news to report: I removed the middle module from my Soyo motherboard. My friend Bill, who originally installed the memory modules, suggested that either one of the PNY modules was defective or the socket might have been corroded (it is after all two and a half years old). I think it may be the socket. After repeated attempts to install LM 8.0 with 384 megs of memory on board (3 memory modules), I removed the middle module and found, to my surprise, that a) Windows was now working fine in every respect and b) that I could no install LM 8.0. Installation of packages is now in progress. My thanks to everyone who was so kind to offer advice and suggestions. I hope this reinstallation solves my problems. I guess Lm 8.0 with 256 megs of RAM (and 512 megs of swap file ram) isn't such a bad deal. Maybe I was being greedy. When I split that in half, I'll stil have 128 for LM8.0 and 128 for Windows/VMware (as raw disk). Of coruse, I won't try the VMware business until I am absolutely certain of how it is done. Thanks so much, folks. Benjamin -- Sher's Russian Web http://www.websher.net Benjamin and Anna Sher [EMAIL PROTECTED]
