I'll answer 2 first - I'm on xl2000

As for the first item - the two arrays that I'm trying to compare - my
array5 and my array6 are of 20,000-30,000 elmenets in array6 and
30,000-40,000 elements in array5. To make sure that it was even moving
- I set up an Application.StatusBar line that would show me increments
of 1% complete. After about 30 minutes, it was about 8-10% complete. I
ended up letting it run over night and it did complete, but I'm willing
to bet based on scaling up what I was willing to watch that it took 5
hours.