Thanks Michael
Done both of those no difference
the file I am opening is 12.8mb and works fine on my work pc which is 1/2 as powerful as this one, I have tons of ram and spare hard drive space and an 3.ogh processer running win xp sp3

I have attached screen shots of my graphics card set up for 3d
does directx or explorer affect how it displays ?
I downloaded latest internet explorere 9last week but its been freezing for months

cheers
shayne