Thanks Dennis and sorry for my late reply. I think my list subscription has gone askew as I've received no list mail and have had to check the archives for replies. Anyway, Bastille is just what I was looking for. It appears very good and provides whats seems comprehensive security for many areas of the system which I hadn't considered. Do you suppose there is any value in using portsentry, now that I have installed Bastille ? As far as the my other problems go, I have my wheel mouse working, and my hard disk hasn't crashed, so I'm feeling pretty hopeful. Thanks for your help, regards, Charlie.