Dear List, as a long-time linux user I typically am able to solve most of my linux-related problems on my own and with the help of google. However, this is way over my head, and googling it did not open up any leads for me. I am running openSuSE 10.3 within vmware (latest version 6.0.3 build 80004) on my wife's vista ultimate (patched up-to-date) PC. The openSuSE is up to date with the 2.6.22.17-0.1-default kernel. As additional repositories I have packman and the "Main Update" as well as the various kde3, gnome, videolan, and openoffice repositories selected. Lately (unfortunately, I can't pinpoint when this behavior started exactly and what had happened around that time) we have experienced problems when starting up opensuse in the virtual machine: Every other boot the kde desktop is messed up. Instead of the eight desktops we receive only one and the frames on any window are non-existent. These problems can not be corrected with the kde desktop configuration tool. The problem is repeatable and shows up every second time the virtual machine is booted. I have attached the startx logs for the alternating behaviors. What I noticed in these are the following differences: When kde fails to start up correctly there are several instances of the following error message: `Could not find '' executable.' early on. There are only three times the `KNotify::playTimeout' shows up early on vs. 10 times when kde comes up correctly. Finally, there are two XSMP errors listed that are not severe enough to cancel starting up X. I am suspecting that the XSMP errors are the ones I should follow up on but have no clue as to where to even begin trouble shooting. Any help would be very much appreciated. Thanks in advance, Alex.