[stonedef]

i wonder if the diff is that being a laptop, theres no cards instaled internally.

On my G5 i start from the dock icon as you say, with the 192 turned off just the 002 console on, but it always comes up with this message "you need to choose the Audio Interface(s) you're using with your Digidesign system. Click OK to proceed to the Hardware Setup dialog"

So by clicking OK i get to "Unable to find an Audio Interface attached to the first HD card. Please check power, Digilink cables and that a peripheral is connected to the firat card"
The two boxes are "quit" or "re-scan"

Of course rescanning finds nothing unless you power up the 192, quitting exits the launch.
If you do power up the 192 and then go to the hardware setup it selects the 192 as the interfce and the 002 for SPDIF and you can't change anything.
i was told today that you can apparently disable PCI slots in the OSX partition but dont know how to do that. That could work by disabling them only from my LE partition

Still exploring.........................