hello everyone, I am back. And guess what, my MAIN computer froze again. So I replaced the 2 daisy-chained switches with ONE 16-port switch. I was hoping that the problem will go away. Dream on...haha. And yes, I still have the Vista machine (by the way, its the Home Premium edition of Vista) Ok, so I am going to take that machine out of the loop, period. :-D And thanks for everybody's advice. much appreciated!!! Will keep you posted soon...