Loosing settings

I've converted a lathe to CNC. My computer is new, fast, and running XP. When I punch in all the numbers, everything works fine, and I do hit apply with every entry, I'm a little paranoid now. The trouble is, that when I restart the computer, almost everything is gone, or back to a default setting. I have to dig out my list, and start all over. I/O for port #1 is through a PMDX-122 as recommended. Port #2 is fed direct from the MPG units, and give no trouble, except Mach3 seems to forget them too. The only thing stranger, is that now, the program doesn't seem to forget port #2's address. Before it would loose just the first digit of the E480h address. My extra parallel port card is actually seen by my computer as port #3. Mach3 doesn't seem to care though. Any ideas about this strange behavior? Thanks,Otis