My mach_kernel file is visible and at 14.8 MB,

Thats'a about the right size. Mine's 15,6 MB. Launch the Terminal.app in Utilities, copy & paste this command into the window that pops up, hit the return key, carefully enter your admins password at the Password: prompt (since nothing displays on the screen), hit the return key again, and restart:

chflags hidden /mach_kernel

27" i7 iMac 10.6.8 , Mac OS X (10.7.2), G4 450 MP 1.5 GB RAM w/(10.5.8/10.4.11/9.2.2)

That is probably supposed to read

sudo chflags hidden /mach_kernel

Only then will it ask for your (admin) password; without sudo, it will fail due to lack of permissions.

Thanks for clarifying. I did leave off the sudo.😟

I have this error:

chflags: /mach_kernel: No such file or directory