pinecloud

I am using Avast 4.8 and I find it very efficient as anti-virus. They update virus database almost every day and have saved me from critical situation numbers of times already particularly on Windows XP. I have not had any active virus got active into memory on Windows NT 4.0 for almost 8 years. But I also need a Spyware killer just in case since I download DOS and Windows 9X games profusely using Windows NT 4.0. I have downloaded a couple of testware from Download.com but none of them installs on Windows NT 4.0. Does anyone know a program that works with Windows NT 4.0? Thank you for the time and advise.

I am so glad to acknowledge here that there are at least some peers at MSFN.org who want to give new life into legacy Windows born with altruistic mind in contrast to XP or Vista. Resurrection of Legacy OS – not so easy as Linux / Unix Throughout the time I have known M$ Network OS. It always had horrible manner and rather aggressive behaviour wanting to try getting into root on every partition in the system and network. It always showed that the they always produced software and products to show that they are in business only to make money and great fortune. They succeeded it for the past decades. In contrast, I really like by far well mannered Windows 3.1, 9X and NT 4.0 because they are less aggressive but still effective to get jobs done. Windows NT 4.0 is even a bit shy and needed protection when sharing boot disk in the same system. Windows 9X and Some DOS games are rather careless about MBR and PBR of pre-existing OS. It was mandating to save and restore these boot records into 512 byte files using either disksave.exe or Norton Disk Editor and like. Today, I may use another OS such as Solaris 10 or Novel/Suse Linux 11 to perform Internet shopping and ticket reservation and like since I see lesser advertisements and no VM stall/lock up (with Java, Adobe Acrobat and like) on Solaris or even plain Linux. But, I want to keep these legacy Windows OS running as longer as my machines can load them. I am so glad to acknowledge here that there are at least some peers at MSFN.org. Modification of Default File Locations Aggressiveness and thoughtlessness got worse in their Windows OS after every release. Their file system structure are inviting for fragmentation, cross linking, virus attack. Unix does not need defragmentation. Unix always use /tmp /var /export on other slice (subpartition) , partition or even on third disk. Always kept System files, User Applications, User Data and Temporary files on separate space or often separate disk. It naturally prevent file fragmentation and elongate the service life of disk. After Windows 9X, M$ and developers put your system root files (Windows/system32), user applications (Program Files) and temporary files (Windows/temp) User App-default (Profile/Application Data), Browser Cache files (Profile/Application Data/Mozzilla/Cache) all in the same partition if you do not learn to designate custom partition space in registry. It is against its up-bringing from M$, Windows NT really likes that separation and shows at least 50% or more speed gain when editing sound files or digital picture files. I never lost system root and application files for 10 or more years of time this way. Not even a lost cluster. I run defragmenter only before installing updates. That is enough. I learnt to do this file system separation when I first saw Windows 95 back in 1995. Because I thought it was like putting swage ditch and fresh water aqueduct next to each other without even a fence (slice or partition boundary). Temp file can spill over onto the system files or application files if you abruptly shut down the system (about 1 % of chance but it is bad enough). You do not hear too much about need of anti-virus nor defragmenter programme amongst Linux/Unix/Solaris users because files are kept in separate room so to speak by groups that they belong to. When virus attacks the damage is only to a part of file system not enough to shut system down. Resurrection of Windows NT 4.0 I have always wanted to give Windows NT 4.0 a new life. It now resides on SATA II (I know NT is not so happy as it was on SCSI), 32 bit full colour on nVidia 6600GT on PCI-E, Dual Core 3GHz Processor (NT was fastest and happiest on twin Tualatin 1.4 GHz PIII CPU though) Have mastered to work with USB 2.0 hub, automatically mount USB memory stick. When I need DVD services I just go to XP or Linux partition for that. It would be nice to have it on Windows NT 4.0 as symbol a of new life and mission. Windows NT 4.0 still needs new kernel extensions by community efforts so that newer application continue to work. Everybody gave up writing software updates for Windows NT. It can no longer able to run Adobe Acrobat Reader. Next in waiting list is Windows 98 SE that needs new life but such effort are already going very strong on Windows 9X rather than on Windows NT 4.0. There are only few DOS games that Windows 98 can not run but it is still a best gaming platform. Why so many OS necessary on one system? It keeps international library of resources so to speak. I often download game files from China and Japan or other part of Europe. Except Windows NT 4.0 and 3.1, system crushes or locks up or gives up and abort being not capable handling decompressed output from RAR, ZIP, LZH and like when Windows encounters some coded characters combination of foreign languages, particularly of Japanese and Russian. I have to depend on Solaris to edit game scripts and take out what seem to cause fatal error in Windows. Solaris has extended support on Japanese and Chinese that can write on FAT and FAT32 partitions. Such as BVE train simulator files from Japan, China, Eastern Europe and like. There are more software written for Solaris and Debian Linux than Windows NT or Windows 98 SE nowadays and they are often free at FTP hosted by many universities all over the world. Of course I naturally have to understand their languages and I happened to do so except for Arabic, Indian and Spanish. My final word here is that I truly appreciate this MSFN forum where I can learn more than reading any book and keep the pace with the new ideas and developments opening ways to get the best out of OS and applications I already have. Resurrected Old OS Windows NT 4.0 (Completed November 2008) Caldera-SCO Open Linux3.1.1 (Still needs USB Printer port interface device file) It was a nightmare when I first started back in October. But it at least was built on glib C 2.2.4. I downloaded source code set for X Window XF86 4.7.0 of 11/2007 Luckily all unix/linux are capable of suggesting needed file name and version when the compiler complains. With additional downloads, I succeeded to save this OS to make X-Window working with full multimedia support on 14/12/2008 Pinecloud

NTFS Kernel Mode Extension Module Loaders Winternals (Year 2003) NTFSWindows98.exe (Install Programme) 1164KB Compressed Archive Supports NT 3.5 4.0, Win 2000, 2003 and XP You have to make a subdirectory i.e., "NTFSDrvr" in Windows 98 directory and place the 7 files from your NT (it tells the name of files when you decompress the installer programme. Since it uses part of true NT kernel driver, reliability is excellent It adds Windows 98 Explorer an ability to manage NTFS partitions just like own FAT32 partition Paragon (Year 2006) PNTFS.exe (Install Programme) 2034KB Compressed Enhanced kernel mode extension driver included that enables support for Vista, XP, Win 2000, 2003 and NT4.0 FAT32 Kernel Mode Extension for Windows NT 4.0 Winternals (Year 1999) FAT32.exe (Install Programme) 781KB Compressed Since it uses part of true FAT32 Kernel mode extension driver from true Win2000, reliability is excellent Universal FASTFAT (Year 1998) Prepared for service pack to NT but withdrawn for some reason FASTFAT.sys 134KB FS_REC.sys 7.5KB Replace existing Kernel mode FAT drivers of the same name to gain native access to FAT32 pinecloud,

Entered by an error - by pressing tab key

Windows NT 4.0 and Windows 98 SE have been particularly difficult to install in an USB2.0 and PCI-E system such as this Dell Dimension Dual Core on 945 chipset. These two OS are most difficult to install on SATA. I had to temporarily set a SCSI card 39160 and put SCSI disk in channel A bus and CDROM in Channel B bus, start with 640x480 old 4 bit VGA colour. Then I transferred on to SATA II Drives. I have succeeded making Nvidia PCI-E card and USB Hub to work successfully both on Windows NT and 98 SE. I still have disk access problem only on Windows 98. Phoenix BIOS is dated 2007 and has no problem on any other operating system except Windows 98. My problem is particularly deeper since I have to protect other partitions where Windows NT 4.0, Windows XP, BSD Unix 4.3, Solaris 10, Debian Linux and SUSE 11 already installed and working and some of them are sharing applications and data quite competently. Intel seem to be influenced by at least one of software giants not to provide legacy OS drivers for their newer motherboard/chipset. You can still build up ground work manually to make PCI-E video and USB Hub to install even on 900 Series Chipset using still available 800 Series driver. You do need a Windows 2000 or XP to make screen capture shots of memory address port maps and IRQ displayed on device manager and then PCI/VEN device port codes from Hkey Local Machine Enum MF and PCI branches of registry taken from working Windows 2000 and then manually enter by hand on Windows 98 SE whose ground work already built by lower class drivers (i.e., 845 and 915 classes) gradually moving up to 945 or 965 class bay manual entries. You also have to disassemble 965 class driver so that you can get PCI/VEN port information such as North 244XX South 27XX. With Brute Force effort, I have succeeded on Video and USB Hub. I can use USB memory disk both on NT 4.0 and Windows 98 SE. Dell Dimension Minitower Intel 945, Socket 775, Dual Core, XP installed at factory 82801GB/GH/GR ATA/SATA II/RAID (I do not care for this kind of fake RAID) nvidia 6600GT PCI-E WD VelociRapror 300GB (298GiB) x 2 Seagate Barracuda ES2 1.0TB (954GiB) Philips DVD-R x 1, SB Audigy PCI pinecloud

Really looking forward to use UNIATA 9X – Universal ATA & SATA driver Windows 9X version. I know it is much more work than writing a kernel mode driver. I am very much puzzled by disk controller driver scheme that Windows 9X uses. I am just a photographer/graphic artist and I do not have background and knowledge to solve my problem. I really wonder what I am doing wrong? Maybe I have incompatible ios.vxd? There are few disk/controller drivers posted in MSFN here but none of them seems to bail my Dell system out from DOS compatibility mode disk access nor can I access DVD Rom either. I thought that I had to have upgrade files by pair when it comes to disk controller under Windows 9x. User driver core like xxxx.mpd or xxxx.pdr and a modified interrupt hook like ios.vxd or ios.386. Universal ATA kernel mode driver for Windows NT (a.k.a., UNIATA.SYS) really has been a greatest saviour. It solved my problem on Windows NT immediately on my Dell. You do not need *.vxd files for Windows NT that does not have to load from real mode once passed stage 1.5 (ntdetect.com) and stage 2 (ntldr.bin). This Dell is the first system in my life that come with SATA II/ATA133 bus. I have built at least 25 systems in the past 20 years for myself and friends but always with SCSI bus after 1995. I did use ESDI controllers and disks built by Control Data Corporation until 1995 because ESDI bus was already 16 bit (about 12MB/sec in 1990) whereas SCSI remained 8 bit bus (about 3 - 5MB/sec). Transition from ESDI to Wide SCSI (20MB/sec in 1996) was nothing difficult since both relied on physical jumper pins. I understand that “You get what you pay for”. SATA and ATA133 controllers comes almost free when you buy a system or motherboard since they are just some “bonus multifunction controller segments” built into south bridge i82801G, GB, GH so called multifunction port 27xx devices compared to hundreds of dollars invest in SCSI HBA. When I built a computer in the past, typically I used two SCSI controllers per system. One GDT86xx series with an Intel i80303 from Germany and an Adaptec 39160. This type of set-up, you can browse internet, print a digital photo, burn CDR all at the same time without interfering each operation on Solaris or Linux or Windows NT (sometimes have infamous JAVA stall happens on NT just like on Windows XP). You can not do this with Windows XP even on newer Dell with dual core mini-tower machine. The drawback of home built system is very costly, heavy and creates a lot of heat in the summer. Windows NT 4.0 and Windows 98 SE have been particularly difficult to install in an USB2.0 and PCI-E system such as this Dell Dimension Dual Core on 945 chipset. These two OS are most difficult to install on SATA. I had to temporarily set a SCSI card 39160 and put SCSI disk in channel A bus and CDROM in Channel B bus, start with 640x480 old 4 bit VGA colour. Then I transferred on to SATA II Drives. I have succeeded making Nvidia PCI-E card and USB Hub to work successfully both on Windows NT and 98 SE. I still have disk access problem only on Windows 98. Phoenix BIOS is dated 2007 and has no problem on any other operating system except Windows 98. My problem is particularly deeper since I have to protect other partitions where Windows NT 4.0, Windows XP, BSD Unix 4.3, Solaris 10, Debian Linux and SUSE 11 already installed and working and some of them are sharing applications and data quite competently. Intel seem to be influenced by at least one of software giants not to provide legacy OS drivers for their newer motherboard/chipset. You can still build up ground work manually to make PCI-E video and USB Hub to install even on 900 Series Chipset using still available 800 Series driver. You do need a Windows 2000 or XP to make screen capture shots of memory address port maps and IRQ displayed on device manager and then PCI/VEN device port codes from Hkey Local Machine Enum MF and PCI branches of registry taken from working Windows 2000 and then manually enter by hand on Windows 98 SE whose ground work already built by lower class drivers (i.e., 845 and 915 classes) up to 945 or 965 class. You also have to disassemble 965 class driver so that you can get PCI/VEN port information such as North 244XX South 27XX. With Brute Force effort, I succeed on Video and USB Hub. I can use USB memory disk both on NT 4.0 and Windows 98 SE. Dell Dimension Minitower Intel 945, Socket 775, Dual Core, XP installed at factory 82801GB/GH/GR ATA/SATA II/RAID (I do not care for this kind of fake RAID) nvidia 6600GT PCI-E WD VelociRapror 300GB (278GiB) x 2 Seagate Barracuda ES2 1.0TB (954GiB) Philips DVD-R x 1, SB Audigy PCI pinecloud

Thank you for a great news! Yes, I have already been using his Uniata on Windows NT 4.0 and working great since version 0.39g. I am using this disk driver with USB keyboard and mouse through very basic support from Phoenix BIOS on Dell which claims that USB keyboard and mouse are not supported in Windows NT 4.0. However they also work after version 0.39g. USB port branch and SATA ports share the same trunk port 27XX group on 82801G and close together in chip segment layout. Perhaps it has something to do with keyboard and mouse lock up experienced on version 0.39d. Pinecloud

Intel 900 Series with socket 775 MOB no longer supports Windows 98/ME/SE Intel infinst_autol.exe or intelata_enu.exe did work winth Win 9X until 2006 When you try to install newer 9XX chipset.inf file today “infinst_autol.exe or intelata_enu.exe”, they refuse with “Operating System not supported” or even “rundll32 export failure” messages. If you carefully extract the file content to many of *.cat file level and examine them carefully. I see the $chicago$ headers and ‘donothing’ instructions within them. I am not even a coder but just a photographer and graphic artist, I can still see that Intel was influenced by somebody in the background. Perhaps one of software giants stopped Intel’s driver development team from releasing drivers suspected detrimental to the sales of new software campaign. The time and motivations seem to co-incide with discontinuation of innovative and altruistic Winternals projects from Texas. The Winternals was well capable of providing add-on component pack for Windows NT and Windows 9X at $29 (meaning such pack can appear on eBay for $4.99 range p&p inclusive) per seat to perform the today’s role of Windows XP platform (application compatibility wise) aside from ADS (alternative data stream) which I do not care for in any means. Games of software giants play are not as devastating as oil price schemes detrimental to the future economy of our country but it’s really something. Question of morale of the country strived on philosophy of freedom. Pinecloud Economic interest was not build into hardware enumeration hierarchy until 486 or even early P5. Pci/ven code started to appear in Windows registry after P5 era. Windows block device mapping has no logical relation to physical device mapping e.g., c0t0d0p0s:b (hba ID, target ID, disk ID, partition ID, slice ID) which makes more sense over Windows device vendor signature based mapping perhaps arising from its economic interests. Playing with pci/ven codes cut and paste using established models already running on Windows 9X and XP as reference guide at “Brutal Force Locksmith Method” eventually works because it has worked on setting up PCI-E video card. for me. Doing it on disk enumeration has much more threat of losing data. That is why I have not tried as hard.

The following Chipsets have Windows 9x Support: Intel Chipsets: 910 915 925 (mobile) 945 946 955 975 G965 P965 Q963 Q965 FISR (Intel 865PE chipset) MSI K9MM-V Intel 900 Series with socket 775 MOB no longer supports Windows 98/ME/SE Intel infinst_autol.exe or intelata_enu.exe did work winth Win 9X until 2006 When you try to install newer 9XX chipset.inf file today “infinst_autol.exe or intelata_enu.exe”, they refuse with “Operating System not supported” or even “rundll32 export failure” messages. If you carefully extract the file content to many of *.cat file level and examine them carefully. I see the $chicago$ headers and ‘donothing’ instructions within them. I am not even a coder but just a photographer and graphic artist, I can still see that Intel was influenced by somebody in the background. Perhaps one of software giants stopped Intel’s driver development team from releasing drivers suspected detrimental to the sales of new software campaign. The time and motivations seem to co-incide with discontinuation of innovative and altruistic Winternals projects from Texas. The Winternals was well capable of providing add-on component pack for Windows NT and Windows 9X at $29 (meaning such pack can appear on eBay for $4.99 range p&p inclusive) per seat to perform the today’s role of Windows XP platform (application compatibility wise) aside from ADS (alternative data stream) which I do not care for in any means. Games of software giants play are not as devastating as oil price schemes detrimental to the future economy of our country but it’s really something. Question of morale of the country strived on philosophy of freedom. Pinecloud Economic interest was not build into hardware enumeration hierarchy until 486 or even early P5. Pci/ven code started to appear in Windows registry after P5 era. Windows block device mapping has no logical relation to physical device mapping e.g., c0t0d0p0s:b (hba ID, target ID, disk ID, partition ID, slice ID) which makes more sense over Windows device vendor signature based mapping perhaps arising from its economic interests. Playing with pci/ven codes cut and paste using established models already running on Windows 9X and XP as reference guide at “Brutal Force Locksmith Method” eventually works because it has worked on setting up PCI-E video card. for me. Doing it on disk enumeration has much more threat of losing data. That is why I have not tried as hard.

Intel 900 Series with socket 775 MOB no longer supports Windows 98/ME/SE Intel infinst_autol.exe or intelata_enu.exe did work winth Win 9X until 2006 When you try to install newer 9XX chipset.inf file today “infinst_autol.exe or intelata_enu.exe”, they refuse with “Operating System not supported” or even “rundll32 export failure” messages. If you carefully extract the file content to many of *.cat file level and examine them carefully. I see the $chicago$ headers and ‘donothing’ instructions within them. I am not even a coder but just a photographer and graphic artist, I can still see that Intel was influenced by somebody in the background. Perhaps one of software giants stopped Intel’s driver development team from releasing drivers suspected detrimental to the sales of new software campaign. The time and motivations seem to co-incide with discontinuation of innovative and altruistic Winternals projects from Texas. The Winternals was well capable of providing add-on component pack for Windows NT and Windows 9X at $29 (meaning such pack can appear on eBay for $4.99 range p&p inclusive) per seat to perform the today’s role of Windows XP platform (application compatibility wise) aside from ADS (alternative data stream) which I do not care for in any means. Games of software giants play are not quite as devastating as oil price schemes detrimental to the future economy of our country but it’s really something. Question of morale of the country strived on philosophy of freedom. Pinecloud Economic interest was not build into hardware enumeration hierarchy until 486 or even early P5. Pci/ven code started to appear in Windows registry after P5 era. Windows block device mapping has no logical relation to physical device mapping e.g., c0t0d0p0s:b (hba ID, target ID, disk ID, partition ID, slice ID) which makes more sense over Windows device vendor signature based mapping perhaps arising from its economic interests. Playing with pci/ven codes cut and paste using established models (memory addresses in particular) already running on Unix and Windows XP as reference guide at “Brute Force Locksmith Method” eventually works because it has worked on setting up PCI-E video card. for me against the will of software giants. Doing it on disk enumeration has much more threat of losing data. That is why I have not tried as hard to overcome.

Intel infinst_autol.exe did solve the problem until 2006 When you try to install newer chipset.inf file today i.e., “infinst_autol.exe or intelata_enu.exe”, they refuse with “Operating System not supported” or even “rundll32 export failure” messages. If you carefully extract the file content to many of *.cat file level and examine them carefully. I see the $chicago$ headers and ‘donothing’ instructions within them. I am not even a coder but just a photographer and graphic artist, I can still see that Intel was influenced by somebody in the background. Perhaps one of software giants stopped Intel’s driver development team from releasing drivers suspected detrimental to the sales of new software campaign. The time and motivations seem to co-incide with discontinuation of innovative and altruistic Winternals projects from Texas. The Winternals was well capable of providing add-on component pack for Windows NT and Windows 9X at $29 (meaning such pack can appear on eBay for $4.99 range p&p inclusive) per seat to perform the today’s role of Windows XP platform (application compatibility wise) aside from ADS (alternative data stream) which I do not care for in any means. Games of software giants play are not as devastating as oil price schemes detrimental to the future economy of our country but it’s really something. Question of morale of the country strived on philosophy of freedom. Pinecloud Economic interest was not build into hardware enumeration hierarchy until 486 or even early P5. Pci/ven code started to appear in Windows registry after P5 era. Windows block device mapping has no logical relation to physical device mapping e.g., c0t0d0p0s:b (hba ID, target ID, disk ID, partition ID, slice ID) which makes more sense over Windows device vendor signature based mapping perhaps arising from its economic interests. Playing with pci/ven codes cut and paste using established models already running on Windows 9X and XP as reference guide at “Brute Force Locksmith Method” eventually works because it has worked on setting up PCI-E video card. for me. Doing it on disk enumeration has much more threat of losing data. That is why I have not tried as hard.

In seek of a right ICH7 SATA / ATA driver for Windows 9X My problem is deep rooted and frightening but it is a single problem – Lack of ICH7 SATA driver set for Windows 98SE. I believe that one of software giants has discouraged Intel to further provide Windows 9X drivers for newer chipset. The newer chipset happened to be in my Dell Dimension. With this excessively bitter experience, I may not buy Dell or any newer MS-OS ever again in my life time as longer as Windows 98SE, Solaris and Linux remain strong. In my Dell, Windows 98 is barely surviving without correct driver. USB GEforce and SB Audigy works well because I was able to overcome through cut and paste pci/ven hundreds of time to establish right pci-e root bridge in CPU/motherboard resouce hook. Windows 9x and Windows NT are built with right and altruistic mind and I can welcome their personalities so to speak and live with them but not with XP or Vista. I do not want OS itself to get into every operations of computer. OS only should perform launching the programmes and minimal house keeping of memory. Other than that I do not expect anything out from it. I do not want CPU bus bridges (a.k.a., memory controller or multifunction bridge) themselves to get into every operations of computer neither. Making them emulate sound card, video card and RAID controller are out of question. My real dream system would pave 10 or so PCI-X slots of 133 or 266MHz bus with at least 18 hardware IRQ allotted. Each card go into these slot has i80303 or better PCI bridge/dedicated IO Controller with embedded CPU with 256 MB on card memory. It means that printer card, mouse card, floppy card, sound card all shoals have own CPU/LPU/MPU and memory subsystem that OS does not even have to know. Give a file name to all such subsystem as memory block. I did succeed to build a system at leaset a halfway close to this ideal in 2000 Two Xeon CPUs Intel 80303 on SCSI card 256MB (7 Int13 compatible GDT Logical Volumes formed before OS start) Motorola 68030 and Emu DSP on Sound Card 64MB Intel i80960 on Tektronix Printer 64MB Matrox Millennium 400 (to gain Unix compatibility otherwise GE force GTS is OK) Another AHA3950 for CD/CDR and scanner OS supported: Solaris, BSD Unix, Caldera-SCO, Redhat, Suse, O/S2 PC-DOS7. Window 3.1, Windows 95a, Windows 98SE, Windows ME Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, Windows XP 1.0 Supported OS means they can co-exist without modifying metafile structure of legacy form NTFS 1.X. System runs XP and Vista fine but they modifies old Windows NT 4.0 basic data volumes exist in extended partitions if you do not manually pre-mark their EPBR ID from 07 to that of an Unix type such as bf. This invasive personality of Vista and XP 2.0 or 3.0 rules out their qualification of compatibility to any of my system. They can even kill their own sister Windows NT 4.0’s partition. I am not so much affected by LBA28 LBA32 or LBA48 issues since I never have owned any SCSI disk larger than 280GB (Cheetahs 15.5 Series) nor SATA larger than 0.954TB (Barracuda ES2) per single unit. To install any new OS on SATA platform, I temporarily put an Adaptec 39160 with SCSI drive in channel A and DVD or CD rom on channel B for temporary installation then check if OS and driver correctly mount and recognise file system on SATA. Run series of test from there, then ghost new OS partition from SCSI onto SATA and hide original partitions on SCSI after marking newly ghosted partition active on SATA MBR. Believe or not, it is not too much work. I am used to boot Unix OSes from command line with single or double line strings invoking boot loader. You get used to it. The first, I had to develop a mind to comprehend to different device block mapping expressions pointing out OS kernel location in the system such as c0t0d0p1s:a, /dev/sda1, h0,0,1 or multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1). Then lean primitive commands like map, remap, hide, find, offset, root, boot, kernel and setup. I never knew anything except SCSI because SCSI was easy and friendly due to being shared bus system with its addressing manually setup by controller slot and jumper pins on target. Of course I was charmed by new generation WD VelociRaptor SATA II disks which boot Windows XP faster than 15000RPM Seagate Cheetah 15.5 series drives. But I trust more familiar SCSI a lot more. SCSI has never given me any headache for past 15 years in any OS arising out from driver issue. Economic interest was not build into hardware enumeration hierarchy until 486 or even early P5. Pci/ven code started to appear in Windows registry after P5 era. Windows block device mapping has no logical relation to physical device mapping e.g., c0t0d0p0s:b (hba ID, target ID, disk ID, partition ID, slice ID) which makes more sense over Windows device vendor-signature-based mapping perhaps arising from its economic interests. What a bitter world has it become! It can possibly mean that if a hardware manufacturer wasn’t nice enough to software giants then the hardware manufacturer can be easily killed by being deprived of sales unless the manufacturer was independently powerful as Hitachi, NEC, Panasonic, Pioneer, Sony, Siemens and like. Sadly IBM, Sun and Apple have slightly lost their level of freedom and power comparable to Sony in the past 8 years. Lets give them another chances to restore themselves in the next 8 years! Long Live the MSFN to succeed in its unbiased altruistic mission! Long Live Windows NT and 9X! Pinecloud

In seek of a right ICH7 SATA / ATA driver for Windows 9X My problem is deep rooted and frightening but it is a single problem – Lack of ICH7 SATA driver set for Windows 98SE. I believe that one of software giants has discouraged Intel to further provide Windows 9X drivers for newer chipset. The newer chipset happened to be in my Dell Dimension. With this excessively bitter experience, I may not buy Dell or any newer MS-OS ever again in my life time as longer as Windows 98SE, Solaris and Linux remain strong. In my Dell, Windows 98 is barely surviving without correct driver. USB GEforce and SB Audigy works well because I was able to overcome through cut and paste pci/ven hundreds of time to establish right pci-e root bridge in CPU/motherboard resouce hook. Windows 9x and Windows NT are built with right and altruistic mind and I can welcome their personalities so to speak and live with them but not with XP or Vista. I do not want OS itself to get into every operations of computer. OS only should perform launching the programmes and minimal house keeping of memory. I do not expect anything out from it. I do not want CPU bus bridges (a.k.a., memory controller or multifunction bridge) themselves to get into every operations of computer. Making them emulate sound card, video card and RAID controller are out of question. My real dream system would pave 10 or so PCI-X slots of 133 or 266MHz bus with at least 18 hardware IRQ allotted. Each card go into these slot has i80303 or better PCI bridge/dedicated IO Controller with embedded CPU with 256 MB on card memory. It means that printer card, mouse card, floppy card, sound card all shoals have own CPU/LPU/MPU and memory subsystem that OS does not even have to know. Give a file name to all such subsystem as memory block. I did succeed to build a system at leaset a halfway close to this ideal in 2000 Two Xeon CPUs Intel 80303 on SCSI card 256MB (7 Int13 compatible GDT Logical Volumes formed before OS start) Motorola 68030 and Emu DSP on Sound Card 64MB Intel i80960 on Tektronix Printer 64MB Matrox Millennium 400 (to gain Unix compatibility otherwise GE force GTS is OK) Another AHA3950 for CD/CDR and scanner OS supported: Solaris, BSD Unix, Caldera-SCO, Redhat, Suse, O/S2 PC-DOS7. Window 3.1, Windows 95a, Windows 98SE, Windows ME Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, Windows XP 1.0 Supported OS means they can co-exist without modifying metafile structure of legacy form NTFS 1.X. System runs XP and Vista fine but they modifies old Windows NT 4.0 basic data volumes exist in extended partitions if you do not manually pre-mark their EPBR ID from 07 to that of an Unix type such as bf. This invasive personality of Vista and XP 2.0 or 3.0 rules out their qualification of compatibility to any of my system. They can even kill their own sister Windows NT 4.0’s partition. I am not so much affected by LBA28 LBA32 or LBA48 issues since I never have owned any SCSI disk larger than 280GB (Cheetahs 15.5 Series) nor SATA (Barracuda ES2) larger than 0.954TB per single unit. To install any new OS on SATA platform, I temporarily put an Adaptec 39160 with SCSI drive in channel A and DVD or CD rom on channel B for temporary installation then check if OS and driver correctly mount and recognise file system on SATA. Run series of test from there, then ghost new OS partition from SCSI onto SATA and hide original partitions on SCSI after marking newly ghosted partition active on SATA MBR. Believe or not, it is not too much work. I am used to boot Unix OSes from command line with single or double line strings invoking boot loader. You get used to it. The first, I had to develop a mind to comprehend to different device block mapping expressions pointing out OS kernel location in the system such as c0t0d0p1s:a, /dev/sda1, h0,0,1 or multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1). Then lean primitive commands like map, remap, hide, find, offset, root, boot, kernel and setup. I never knew anything except SCSI because SCSI was easy and friendly due to being shared bus system with its addressing manually setup by controller slot and jumper pins on target. Of course I was charmed by new generation WD VelociRaptor SATA II disks which boot Windows XP faster than 15000RPM Seagate Cheetah 15.5 series drives. But I trust more familiar SCSI a lot more. SCSI has never given me any headache for past 15 years in any OS arising out from driver issue. Economic interest was not build into hardware enumeration hierarchy until 486 or even early P5. Pci/ven code started to appear in Windows registry after P5 era. Windows block device mapping has no logical relation to physical device mapping e.g., c0t0d0p0s:b (hba ID, target ID, disk ID, partition ID, slice ID) which makes more sense over Windows device vendor signature based mapping perhaps arising from its economic interests. What a bitter world has it become! It can possibly mean that if a hardware manufacturer wasn’t nice enough to software giants then the hardware manufacturer can be easily killed by deprived of sales unless the manufacturer was independently powerful as Hitachi, NEC, Panasonic, Pioneer, Sony, Siemens and like. Sadly IBM, Sun and Apple have slightly lost their level of freedom and power comparable to Sony in the past 8 years. Lets give them chances to restore themselves in the next 8 years! Long Live the MSFN to succeed in its unbiased altruistic mission! Long Live Windows NT and 9X! Pinecloud

As I have suspected, it really seems arising from economic interest of software industries got behind Intel. Intel did keep drivers for 8 years cycle until about 2006. Intel’s position is a bit weaker than used to be. Now have multiple competitors. http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Des...23〈=eng Some of you remember about Winternals: Fat32 for NT4.0, NTFS for DOS and like from Texas? Strived on innovative, fearless and yet altruistic leadership. Unfortunately a software industry bought one of two partners out – the one who was creative and altruistic i.e., helping out local industries to keep IT cost down. That was also in 2006. Thank you all for your time. I downloaded and tried them both. Both popped out a message. ‘Unsupported Operating system!’ and aborted. In the past two months I have downloaded 130 plus files and I was able to get nvidia card without hooking 80945G PCI-e root prior to video card which is usually a perquisite. Made usb mouse and usb keyboard working try and error method. But disk driver is much tough. I can read French, Swedish, Japanese and Chinese so that I have also tried file repositories in those countries as well. I can usually find drivers back to Windows 3.1 era using this method but I may not win this time. On SCSI platform, I usually allocate a card with i80303 (RISC I/O Processor) and 256MB dedicated memory for every two channels on each HBA and a separate Adaptec 29160 for CD/DVD (only HP and pioneer produced decent DVD on SCSI). Oh, How much have I regretted buying Dell Dimension SATA II System. Do not have even a room to put SCSI drives due to cooling requirement (a 4” fan for every two drives). Anyway I wish that I had not had anything to do with SATA or 82801G ich7 but it is bit too late. I feel so foolish being manipulated and tormented by this tiny 82801G ich7 port # 27c0 and 27df. (SATA-UATAm-UATAs) I did have Windows NT, Windows 98, O/S2, Solaris 8 and Caldera-SCO Linux in such SCSI system but I also had one small logical volume dedicated for PC DOS and Windows 3.1 (logical volumes created by an i80303 are formed before any OS boots unlike Vista or XP type LVMs and you can have up to 7 LVMs per HBA to be truly compatible to Windows) I had abundant help from Germany to get i80303 card and ELSA –nvidia card working with Windows 3.1 and O/S2. This is a typical proof the new hightech hardware does not have to kill or chase out old OS. I would greatly appreciate any comment or news about 82801G ich7 driver for Windows 98 SE. Pinecloud, :blushing:

Using old Windows or OS of an Unix type prevents Virus infection – Definitely true. I have used Windows NT from 1996 to 2008. I experienced Virus attack (actually got active in memory) only once in 12 years and game file download (virus did not do anything since codes were not executed) 7 times in 12 years span. I run virus scan for downloaded files every time I download something. OS were O/S2, Windows NT, Solaris about the same share of usage. XP and Vista are structured with places where virus can hide. Alternative Data Stream Metafile Structure and System Volume Information Directory were not initially designed for such usage, but they have in fact become favourite spaces for ad ware, key logger, malware and virus to hide and wait for certain amount of time. Problem with O/S2 and Windows NT was that I have received complaints from eBay, PayPal and an online banking institution that they no longer supported my old Netscape 4.7 or Mozilla 1.0 on these platforms. Sun Solaris 10, Suse Linux 11 with Mozilla 3 are just fine and seem to resolve JAVA scripts better than Windows. Neither there are infamous XP-Acrobat stall not even once on these OS. Well enough, JAVA is designed for Unix platform to begin with. Browser and plug-in development seems to be no slower on these Unix like OS due to open source nature. Sometime even faster than Windows these days. Programme porting is voluntarily performed by student of many Universities world-wide for Linux and Solaris. They are designed to be people’s OS. Of cause it does not apply to OS like SCO Unix tends to be 3 years behind. Learning Unix or Linux does not hurt. If you install XP on FAT32 partition and disable hard disk write back cache, then you are more likely to find presence of malware and virus activity because you hear the hard disk activity not in sync with your modem light or application programme data demands. NTFS is a journaled file system derived from O/S2 whose disk write may not occur for a long periods of time. Later version of O/S2 uses more efficient and highly secure inodes based Unix like file system designed by IBM Today, AntiVirus programme like Avast can competitively find presence of virus in time before it gets into memory. Avast virus database is updated everyday lately Pinecloud