I was able to find an equivalant for
select *
from master.dbo.SYSREMOTE_TABLES (
'lnkservername',
NULL,
NULL,
NULL,
NULL )
this returns the same dataset in 2005 and 2000.
sp_tables_ex 'lnkservername'
It returns the listing of tables from the link server.
thanks again everyone.
This has helped me get back to coding and getting my project back on track...