Butt in any time Jerry
Harry is using an Arduino board, I'm not sure if the same applies - it may do. That said, when programming xbees I always use a dedicated breakout board (like the sparkfun one mentioned in an earlier post) and leave the xbee shields to do what they were primarily designed to do - that is, communicate with other wireless modules. When used like this they work as expected on both Firewing and Arduino boards...