Solved, it seems. NLA for 3ds Max Design 2009 - and presumably other 2009 products, does not work on Windows 2000. It installs OK but won't run. (I know, the products require XP or higher, but I expected the NLA to continue to work on Win2K, or if not it should refuse to install.) We still have some Win2K PCs, and that's what I tried first. It worked fine on an XP PC.