In attempting to fix the annoying “iTunes won’t start cleanly” problem I performed a standard upgrade of Windows XP, basically running the install on top of the old installation.  It went swimmingly until it asked me to confirm the loading of the video driver that was unsigned.  At this point I could not click OK in any way as the mouse and keyboard were disabled.

In trying to fix this (including power downs to reinitialise the setup, and putting the disk in a different machine) I managed to trash the XP installation.  I have access to the files but the little XP server is dead.  Another iTunes Authentication down the tube.

After much swearing and gnashing of teeth I decided that this was the time to start playing with FreeNAS.  I started the installation on my laptop and on the reboot put it back in to the fit-PC.  This worked perfectly.  With a little fiddling I got slimnas (squeezeserver) working beautifully (much faster than under Windows).  A lot of fiddling (and learning) later I had a print server working.

For PPTP (allowing the squeezeserver to appear to be in the UK to the BBC for cricket commentary) I appear to be out of luck.  I’ll have to cope for the last ten weeks until I get home.  I can run a squeezeserver on the main laptop if I can’t find a free to air commentary in New Zealand.

I’ll also have to use the laptop for iTunes syncs but that is not so bad; I’d already been doing that really.