Thanks for the input.

I edited the registry as per suggestion by tech support email, but it was evidently not enough to overcome the memory required for all the 897 patterns. It is working fine now that I have all patterns I am not using outside of the CW folders, and I will delete my pattern file (or at least unused patterns on the list) on a regular basis. Which makes Designer work well, but kind of defeats the advantages of having a pattern list. It would be great to be able to list and categorize all the patterns for easy access.