I wander if someone else has the same issue:

On Win2kpro (SP3) I was installed desktop edition of SQL7 server for
development purposes. Server works fine and has good performance with
application however Enterprize Manager is extremely slow in opening
databases, creating tables, etc. There is also a red wavy mark next to the
server icon in manager. SQL logs do not reveal that there is any problem.
One of knowledge base articles tackle the issue but what they suggest is
that after installing SQL7 SP2 the problem disappears. After installing
(SQL7) SP4 I cannot obviously install SP2....

Tried fixing the problem with: reinstalled SQL7 - no improvement,
reinstalled SP4 - no improvement, tried with different MDAC versions
installation - no improvement, w2k SP4 (recently published) - no
improvement. (Wander if different MDAC may cause the issue)

Any suggestion ?