Well,

I got a bit further that time. I now have a folder called "system" on the 98se machine but it just says "default" and "no values"...............as the default is to allow registry editing, is that right?

I don't quite understand the significance of this with the 9x systems as there are lots of registry editing tools out there that don't use regedit.exe? You might have a chance at reasonable remote security, but I cannot see it if someone has physical access to a fully configured (CD & floppy) machine.

Cheers