[Pete D]

Ok - Now I know how you came by your screen name!
Firstly I want to say a really big THANK YOU to Doctor Sunshine.

For the benifit of other users I have listed a detailed description of how to cure the problem.

1. Borrow another MAC which has Panther
2. Load a new copy of Panther onto an external HD by inserting the installation CD into the borrowed MAC and setting the destination drive to the external HD.
3. Boot up by holding the ALT key whilst powering up to choose to boot from the external drive.
4. Then update to 10.3.9 using software update from the Apple menu on the borrowed MAC.
5. Remove the external HD and connect to your new MAC.
6. Power up with the Alt key down again to boot from the external HD on the new MAC and install Protools onto the external drive.
7: It should now work, the external drive will be your system drive, holding OSX (10.3.9) and Pro Tools & the internal HD will be your audio Drive. Remember to hold ALT every time you power up so you can boot from the external HD, this should do at least till the tiger update is available...Good Luck!

If anyone wants more detailed info on what we did send us a private message and we will contact you off list.

I am still very disappointed with the response from Digidesign - basiclly all they have told us is that they have not received our faxed registration and that they told us it would not work and that we should wait for the Tiger update.

It would not have taken them much effort to post the above information somewhere so all their new customers would not find themselves in the extremely frustrating position that we found ourselves in.

The fact remains that you cannot buy a new MAC with anything other than Tiger so if anyone is considering buying a new Digi system and they do not have access to an old MAC ..... DONT DO IT.
Wait 12 - 16 weeks for the patch to be released and sorted before you part with your money.

Jerome I owe you a beer at the very least.

Pete