Enabling .htaccess

Hi all, I've been having the same problem as the first post in this thread. I believe I have followed the subsequent advice but I am getting nowhere.

I am basically trying to setup a virtual host, and have created a share for this called /gbdev

I have created an individual conf file for this and placed it within the /etc/frontview/apache/addons directory

The contents of which are:

<VirtualHost *:80>
        ServerName <sub_domain+my_domain_here>
        SSLEngine off

        DocumentRoot /gbdev

        <Directory />
               Options All
               AllowOverride All
               Order allow,deny
               Allow from all
        </Directory>
</VirtualHost>

The site works fine as long as I don't have "RewriteEngine on" in the .htaccess file. As soon as I turn it on I get a 403 Fobidden error. The following appears in the apache error log:

[error] [client <my_ip>] Options FollowSymLinks or SymLinksIfOwnerMatch is off which implies that RewriteRule directive is forbidden: /gbdev/

Firstly, to even get this close to working I had to comment out the existing VirtualHost in the /etc/frontview/apache/Virtual.conf file otherwise I would get redirected to the /shares folder everytime I accessed the domain... not helpful. This may be where I started to go wrong but it doesn't seem to be the problem to me.

I also checked the /etc/frontview/apache/Shares.conf file but found mine is empty... So surely nothing is being overridden?

Right now I'd appreaciate a little help/advice and would be happy to provide more info if needed.

Thanks in advance,
Wazz