to answer your first question. i recorded the tracks on a mac remotely and emailed the mp3's back. That is not the problem as those tracks seem to import fine into pt, but any wav created in reaper crashes immediately. Also, the exported wavs do play fine in media player. number in test audio is 1851 - for mono tracks. less if effects are used.
my current problem which i reported separately is that my main music track is stereo, but when i import a stereo mp3, it changes track number 1 to mono!! (wtf) I guess i can play with this and move it to another track number. because all the other tracks are stereo and they don't get changed.