Well... mysql does have its limitations... perhaps it belongs in the "you get what you pay for" category. Seems to me that an UPDATE statement shouldn't have to interfere with a SELECT statement, especially if the SELECT is only creating a cursor set. A SELECT statement should be able to operate outside of record locks. But I don't play around in mysql so I don't know, and perhaps I completely misunderstand the problem. My only experiences in sql are with MS SQL server, Oracle SQL, and a little bit of some others...