I have an issue which will shortly be important to me, though in past it has not been a problem. It appears to me that it may be a general problem in some ways. I have for some time used an external USB hard drive. I find that sometimes it must be mounted as /dev/sda1 and sometimes /dev/sde1, and have consequently made two entries in my /etc/fstab, and just live with what I have. This occurs even though the disc is always plugged into the same USB port. I now have a USB FLASH drive, and so this is going to be more of a problem, as I have different file systems on those, and have a need to specify the mount NOT to be "auto" to ascertain the fs type, since I am overriding the default for the FLASH drive. In any case, the FLASH drive is also not always appearing as the same device. I don't want to have to become root and fiddle /etc/fstab every time I try to mount the FLASH drive. I've seen others here with what appears to be a similar problem with running two ethernet ports, and not being able to know which will be eth0. I wonder whether this be related. In any case, would some please give me advice on how to handle the "floating" USB devices? Thanks very muchly for your time. Mike -- p="p=%c%s%c;main(){printf(p,34,p,34);}";main(){printf(p,34,p,34);} This message made from 100% recycled bits. You have found the bank of Larn. I can explain it for you, but I can't understand it for you. I speak only for myself, and I am unanimous in that!