Hi Thanks for the reply

yes it was off but I have enabled it now and when i go to setup replication i am getting the following error message

SQL Server Replication requires the actual server name to make a connection to the server.

connections through a server alias,ip address or any alternate name are not supported.

Specify the actual server name, "servername" replication utilities

I am using servername.domain.local to connect, i can browse the server fine by going to start run servername.domain.local.

so i am alittle confused as to why i would be recieving this message when i am using the right server name etc

by the way as you can tell i am very new to sql server

thanks again