When the DX crashed ( as you so rightly point out ) I think the quick save stack just got dumped. I did find 5 File****.chk on my raid drive which I have never seen before on this set-up of mine. That told me something had gotten lost and my guess of the quicksave was right. ( Gained a bit of experience on this matter playing Morrowind which crashes more times than I would care to recall) But !

I'm interested to know your thoughts as to why the DX might crash when going 3D - if you feel so inclined to share the knowledge that is. BTW .. thanks for being the only one to offer any help at all.