Hey guys,
Thanks for the feedback. I'll get into the bitdefender settings a bit deeper and see what I can see. I wanted to get it up and running on my laptop (I use it day to day for a variety of things) so I could get used to using Mach4, connecting it to the controller etc in my office and generally familiarising myself with it as per the manual . I have 2 dedicated PC in my workshop for Mach3, so yes, I do not have anything other than the bear bones of WindowsXP, Mach3, SheetCAM and LazyCAM installed.
I was interested to see that I had no problems installing and launching Mach3 with no tweeks to BitDefender, but Mach4 is being held back with nothing in the bitdefender log suggesting that it was blocking it... but I'll get another look at it. Two computers with the same set up showing the same ailment points to the antivirus.
Cheers guys.. I'll report back what ever the case.
Shuey