Hi again:

Sorry about that earlier incompleted post.

I believe I finally ascertained what had been preventing the regular
creation of System Checkpoints in my System Restore. I had posted to this NG
about this problem on June 25. I'm posting about this now because this might
be of interest to others in the ME groups, though this might well be an
already known issue...

I had explored several possibilities prior to discovering this SR point
snatcher, all to no avail.

Although I'm not signed in to MSN Mesenger when not online, it's presence in
the system tray indicates that it's somehow running in Windows, though I'm
not clear as to what exactly its function then is.

If I simply exit the MSN Mesenger when I go offline, SR points are created
at their regular schedule. Alternatively, I can disable it from running. I
use this program only as an Email notifier for MSN email. So I can simply
toggle it on and off from the Quick Launch Toolbar as needed.  It default
option is to run  when Windows is started.

I hadn't initially thought of MSN Messenger as a possible culprit since I
had this icon in my System Tray for years with no perceived impact on SR.
Furthermore, I perhaps naively assumed that Microsoft wouldn't make a
program that interfered with SR. in retrospect, there was a program update
to this a few months ago, at about the time I noted lack of regular SR
points, when it was updated to Version 7.0.0813. Perhaps something in this
new version elicits a background activity which shows the system as not
idle?

My personal thanks to Mike Matby and  Jack Martinelli for pointing out the
possibility of background programs interference with SR even when they may
be of low-activity.

-Ira