At last - success! I installed 221 and the english patch again and by turning off steam I then started the configuration tool from the game folder. This did the auto detect run and then I stared the game from that. I then logged on to the game server and upgraded the game to 2.2.3 patch as suggested. This now not only runs perfectly it also runs using steam. Many thanks Mitra and I hope no-one else has the same problems. Follow the guidance on this thread and you should crack it eventually.
