I'm blaming a totally screwed HD
I got it to work for a short time but alas the system wont even switch on now. Nothing to do with vista or win7 but I think I may have done some damage moving HD's about during the install process. Ther worst is that now I cant get at any of my data on my desktop; I think I'll have to get a disk caddy and read the HD's that way. Good news is that my replacement laptop arrived to day.
Thanks for the support guys
Richard