Worry that South Florida could once again keep the nation waiting to see who captures the Oval Office resurfaced Wednesday when Broward County officials took 21 hours to count all the precincts from Tuesday's woefully light primary.

The delay not only kept three hot-button races in limbo for nearly a day, it instantly rekindled memories of 2000, when hanging chads and ballot problems in Palm Beach County kept the nation on edge in Bush v. Gore.

This November, the heavily Democratic Broward County is expected to turn out in droves for nominee Barack Obama.

''Based on what you're seeing now, it's a good bet it will take even longer to count the ballots in November,'' said County Commissioner John Rodstrom, who didn't find out until late Wednesday afternoon that he had edged Fort Lauderdale Commissioner Carlton Moore by 144 votes.

The county said the new optical scan voting equipment worked fine, blaming the delay on a breakdown in transmitting results to election headquarters.

Elections Supervisor Brenda Snipes also blamed confusion on a software problem that caused her office to underreport election results to the public on Tuesday night and Wednesday morning.

She said her office tallied 98 percent of the vote election night -- about 771 of 779 precincts -- but announced results for only 725 precincts.

''What you guys were seeing on the Web was different than what we had in our office here,'' Snipes said. ``I'm pretty annoyed about it.''

She promised, ``Broward will not keep the country waiting in November.''

Elsewhere in Florida, Jennifer Krell Davis, spokeswoman for the Florida Division of Elections, said Hillsborough and Sarasota counties had some trouble transmitting absentee ballot results to the state.

But the problem had been resolved Wednesday, Davis said, and ``we certainly haven't seen any widespread or systematic issues.

''For the sheer number of new machines that were deployed, it was a really good day,'' she said. ``So we're really, really optimistic about November.''

Some voters weren't as confident.

''I'm quite upset about why the results aren't in,'' said Isadore Nachimson, a voter from Century Village in Pembroke Pines. ``These machines were supposed to be so much better. I thought these machines were all checked out and in perfect shape.''

INSTANT FLASHBACKS

Some voters had instant flashbacks to previous Florida election horror stories.

''All I can say is they better start working tomorrow getting things fixed up so it won't take this long,'' Nachimson said. ``It's a shameful situation -- especially since they spent that much money.''

Broward spent about $8.3 million to replace touch-screen machines -- with much of the funding from the state -- yet encountered snags in a primary with just 11 percent turnout.

''Almost every year counties throughout Florida spend millions upon millions of dollars for new electioneering technology that continues not to work,'' said Pembroke Pines Commissioner Angelo Castillo. ``It seems every other state in America can get this right but Florida -- and it's an embarrassment.''

Mary Cooney, a spokeswoman for Snipes, said the overnight delay followed trouble with phone lines at one or two of the dozen regional election offices.

She said most vote data was transmitted and received without a hitch at the county's voting equipment center, 1501 NW 40th Ave. But data gathered from 54 precincts wasn't received and had to be located and resent later from computer drives taken to headquarters.

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