was attempting an ftp install of 7.3 last night from ftp.suse.com, or 202.58.118.12, as i've coem to think of it. all was going swimmingly until it came to smbclient, when it began complaining that user and group "" and "roo" were missing, then that it was unable to install the archive on account of something called "bad magic." here, in fact, is the end of the log. 150 Opening BINARY mode data connection for /pub/suse/i386/7.3/suse/n1/samba-client.rpm (4797662 bytes). samba-client #user does not exist - using root group does not exist - using root group roo does not exist - using root unpacking of archive failed: cpio: Bad magic ... With error Closed connection to [202.58.118.12] Totally installed: 231 (2 noted for installation) With error: 1 Base system: SuSE-Linux-FTP-i386 7.3.0-0 ABORTED this happened, not once, but twice. dare i go on? should i look for a mirror, or would the mirror simply mirror the files i tried to install last night? well, i'm gonna go slog some mail. thanks, bobby cossum -- "If I had known it was harmless, I would have killed it myself." Phillip K Dick A Scanner Darkly