Thanks Tim. It all sorted itself out when I removed te second SATA drive and left just one it the machine. I formatted it and installed Win XP Home original and then applied all the 100s of MB of updates including SP2.

This machine behaves itself now most of the time. I say most as its HSF is not very good and if the room ambient exceeds 28°C this PC shuts itself down.

That being said it really enjoys the pauses when eOn is trying to connect :!: