Problem getting PS3 and XAMPP working

I have had PS3 working on my mac with the apache server and php that comes preinstalled on the mac, but as is often pointed out here, cURL and GD Library don't exist in the mac based php. So, based on all the info here stating that PS3 works best on a testing server with the likes of xampp installed, I decided to bite the bullet and wipe my mac to get rid of any of the pre-existing mysql, mac's own php and apache server etc to ensure I had a clean install... wish I hadn't!

I loaded xampp and have tested the install, and I am getting the phpinfo fine and it's telling me everything required is enabled, however, I am now getting errors in the store when I try to test it.

xampp states to put any site files in one of two places; either in applications/xampp/htdocs, or in my ~username/sites which I have done in both, but I am getting an error from both locations saying:

Warning: require_once(../../Connections/PowerStoreConnection.php) [function.require-once]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /Users/macusername/Sites/getit-online/CSSMenuWriter/cssmw_home/menu.php on line 23

Basically, the first error, the cssmenu is failing to load. I guess the whole thing is broken in someway, so I'd appreciate some advice on this. I have not moved file locations in relation to each other. Within the connections file I had to change localhost to 127.0.0.1 as it had a database error on line 9 of the connections file. That has gone and has left me with a partially loaded page.

I didn't do an install of this on my testing server, I just copied the files from my previous system disk as they were working on that (with the exception of cURL and GD library).

ALSO... when I place any file in the applications/xampp/htdocs/ directory, I have to verify my administrator password before it does anything, however, dreamweaver has total access to that folder... why is this?

Thanks.

Mat