Dave, Yes I did follow the HSP HOWTO. David Jolley wrote: "Am I correct in assuming that when you load the mod= ule=20 manually that > it won't crash at all, and that it'll power down correctly?" Yes this does avoid the crash but it has never powered down correctly as = it=20 always hangs.=20 The term signal is sent to all proccesses but stops at the line "splash=20 personal firewall UNUSED. Cheers Mark.