>>>>If I issue FOPEN("somefile",1) - write only, unbuffered - it waits a long time - because the file was deliberately opened by me earlier. Is there a way to make it fail faster?
>>>
>>>What's your OS?
>>
>>Windows XP or Windows 2000
>
>Is file on network share or local?

During dev it's local. In production it will be on network share accessed by UNC.