One word: Don't ####### even try or you will waste a half day to a full day. What a #*$&#&*#+ nightmare. I eventually got it up and running thanks to the following resources: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/bethmassi/archive/2009/12/02/setting-up-windows-7-for-office-sharepoint-2010-beta-development.aspx http://www.sharepointings.com/installing-sharepoint-2010-in-single-server-mode-on-windows-7/ http://blogs.msdn.com/b/sowmyancs/archive/2010/04/01/psconfig-error-at-step-2-microsoft-sharepoint-spexception-user-cannot-be-found.aspxhttp://myspexp.com/2010/05/31/configuration-failed-when-installing-sp-2010-on-windows-7-failed-big-time-3/ All in all I probably visited over 50 pages in four hours. I had...