Okay. I think we've gone as far as we can with our naked eyeballs and it's time to bring in the heavy artillery.

What I'd like to do next is make a special build for you that will create a file containing a record of the program's internal activity as it starts up. Then you can email me that file and (hopefully!) I'll be able to see exactly where in the code the problem is occurring. How's that sound?

In case you're feeling like your work was wasted and I could have done this earlier, I couldn't, because I needed to get a sense of the general location of the problem. I'm not sure I have enough of a sense even now but there doesn't seem to be any alternative.