It's fixed. I'd like to think I'm smart but as usual I just kept screwing it up until I failed to do even that. Anyway, during the PdaNet+ install on the PC side a popup asks you to choose your phone's manufacturer. I've been correctly choosing HTC which has always worked, but I finally chose the 'not sure' option to allow the software to decide. That did it. The option to replace the existing driver or use it seems to be irrelevant to the problem. Whether you choose to replace it or not, everything installs correctly and there have been no issues or surprises since. Not sure how many folks are as ignorant as I am but I bet someone would appreciate this being a sticky or something somewhere (like June Fabric's website, duh). Thanks a...