LoneCrusader

I personally don't think trying to run with over 512MB of RAM with tweaks is a good idea, but as you see there are obviously others who swear by it. Apparently "YMMV - Your mileage may vary." It may work for you on your system and it may not. From what I remember of the old discussions offhand it is also relevant how much memory is physically installed; i.e. having only a 1GB RAM module installed and using the limiting tweaks may work, but if you put in 4GB RAM for other OS'es in dual-boot then the tweak that worked at 1GB may not work anymore. The stickies cover most things, although sometimes one has to dig through several pages to cover an entire subject. MSFN for 9x is like a vast museum that one can get lost in. So much information is here that doesn't exist anywhere else. And there are too few of us left to keep it all dusted off. But I digress... "IDE Mode" on a modern board will almost always mean "Native IDE SATA" rather than "Legacy IDE PATA." Only Legacy mode works properly with 9x. VBE9X is a nice project but it's very limited. For instance without hardware acceleration 9x-era games and such probably would not run properly if at all. It essentially serves to escape 640x480x16, but that's it. RTL8111D or previous work as far as I know; RTL8111E does NOT work. A buggy driver exists that will work with some "E" cards but not at full gigabit speeds. SoundBlaster would probably be best for 9x; just be sure you pick a compatible one. Pentium 4 era is best in my opinion. Most everything still had 9x drivers, including some early SATA chips as mentioned by Nomen. Intel 865/875 chipset boards are best. A rare handful of boards with these chipsets exist in Socket 775 models as well, although still limited to 800HMz FSB CPU's. Search around, I've given lists of such boards here before several times. I've currently got Windows 95 OSR2 and 98SE "running" on a board using the Intel X79 chipset and a Core i7. I haven't used them for any "day to day" activity, but they're up and running nonetheless. 7950GT graphics card with working drivers. Haven't gotten around to Sound and LAN yet though.

This is not necessarily directed at you personally, but I love how we seem to have a sudden influx of people around here who want to "dispute" long established knowledge. You say "98SE doesn't crash with more than 512MB of RAM on physical hardware" when it is a known, well established, indisputable fact that it DOES crash. I've seen and done this myself countless times over the years. I've actually used Windows 9x as a primary, day to day, production operating system. Not just as a toy to amuse myself running VM's and wasting time while never spending actual "production" time on a system which requires stability. And for the record, I did also specify that tweaks MAY get you to 1.2GB. This is NOT guaranteed. This does NOT always work. And it most definitely WILL make your system unstable. So, why post and say "it doesn't crash with more than 512MB" when it does, and then say "I wouldn't recommend going over 512MB," because "it might be the reason they're unstable." Might?? Ya think?? No, I don't mean that. I mean what I said. "Almost always?" Certainly not. Those tweaks never worked for me. Only once did I see 9x run with more than 512MB and without crashing, and this was when using an old version of the Unofficial Service Pack (which I believe included Xeno's VCACHE patch along with said "tweaks") and the system was very unstable. What's the point of those tweaks if it makes the resulting system unstable? Fine, Windows 98 drivers are available for a handful of early SATA controllers. But what "modern" motherboards are actually using these chips today? So they had 9x drivers 10 years ago when they were used. Great. But who uses them now? What good is this to the OP? The OP specified a "modern" system. I haven't seen a board using those SATA chips in 8 years or more.

Compatible? Not really. However whether it can be made to work or not mainly depends on your level of determination to succeed. How much work (read:trial and error and time) are you willing to invest getting Windows 9x running? Do you accept that non-free patches may be required to get you results? More specs on your planned system might be helpful... but here's a few quick points to consider: -Windows 9x will only see and use one CPU core. -Windows 9x will crash with more than 512MB of RAM; some tweaks MAY take you to 1.2GB; paid patch will definitely take you to the 32-bit limit of 4GB. -Windows 9x will not use Native IDE SATA controllers/drives without a paid patch. AHCI is even worse. If you can't set your HDD controllers to Legacy IDE mode you'll have to deal with slow DOS-mode compatibility filesystem. -Windows 9x has been without any drivers for new graphics cards since the end of the NVidia 7xxx series and the ATI X8xx series. You will need one of these or you will have to either deal with 640x480x16 resolution or try using VBE9X which will get you better resolutions but no hardware acceleration and frequently crashes with DOS Boxes. -Windows 9x has been without any drivers for network cards for a while as well. Realtek and Marvell based controllers may work depending on version. -Windows 9x has no HD Audio drivers whatsoever. Be prepared to use an add-in card. -(Your motherboard will probably need 2 or more regular PCI slots for 9x-compatible cards.) If you've read and digested this and still wish to try, then you've come to the right place.

No, Windows ME doesn't have native USB2 support either. Microsoft made no USB2 drivers for 98/ME and I guess we're lucky that the 2K files just happen to work. A USBHUB20.SYS 4.90.3000 does exist, but this file was developed by VIA and distributed with their USB2 controllers. It doesn't come from Microsoft and it isn't universal, only working with VIA controllers.

No, USB. Rosewill RNX-G1LX Interesting... I thought I might have just figured this out, but if yours is working faster then it throws my new theory out. (more below) Good! Now for a theory about the speed issues: What if all 9x-compatible USB WiFi devices (and their drivers) are assuming that Windows 9x only supports USB 1.0/1.1? Since Microsoft offered no official USB2 support, many manufacturers assume that no USB2 support exists for 9x. (For example noted in this manual for a 9x-compatible TP-Link USB adapter.) Now, to extrapolate further: USB1 speed of 1.5Mbits/sec = 192KBytes/sec. Assume a "safe" limit of 150KBytes/sec when writing a driver for USB1 bus speed? Of course this is all just speculation. But it made sense until you said that you were getting 250KBytes/sec.

I obtained a USB Wifi Adapter based on the RTL8187 chipset which has a working Windows 9x driver without WDMEX. I thought I would use one that had working drivers and compare the results to what has been seen with the devices here using RT2870.SYS. The download speed is still garbage, it never exceeds 150KB/sec and floats around the 142~149KB/sec range so it appears there is some kind of "limit" at 150KB/sec under 9x for wireless LAN for whatever reason. This needs to be researched... Also, after a few minutes of downloading a large file I get a non-informative BSOD with a garbage address in it just as I get when using the RT2870 device with WDMEX. This may or may not be related to the speed "limit" if some kind of buffer is being overloaded or something isn't keeping up. Also noticed the USB Adapter was pretty hot after only a few minutes of use, I don't use WiFi very much so I don't know if this is normal or not. So whatever causes this BSOD is not related to WDMEX or the missing functions it provides for RT2870.SYS. A different BSOD that appears with the RT2870 devices does not appear with the RTL8187 however.

I don't know what exactly you have in mind for your 98SE system, but be aware that the ATI X800 cards may have issues with some DOS programs (old DOS games WarCraft and WarCraft 2 for example; as of now these are the only ones I know). Most seem to work fine but it's something to keep in mind. Also I believe Dave-H here had some small annoying issue with X800 and X700 cards specific to his setup but he would have to elaborate further on it.

Windows 7 is very "iffy" from my standpoint. The removal of the proper Classic Desktop/Start Menu Shell is a non-starter to begin with. I know there are ways to get it back, but I shouldn't have to use 3rd-party tools to restore something that should never have been removed in the first place. Not to mention the fact that 7 is/was plagued by all of the invasive "GWX" garbage, although I suppose that may have calmed down some now. I give Vista a pass only because it feels like it was the last operating system where Microsoft actually TRIED to make a "nicer"/"prettier"/"better" (whatever you want to call it) operating system and user experience. I believe they failed in the "better" part, but they still get credit for trying. After Vista it's all downhill.

If I remember correctly I believe that particular call can sometimes just be patched to something else that is the same length and is present under 95. Somewhere there was a discussion of it but it's slipped my memory. "GetCurrentProcess" is the suggested replacement function. Here are the relevant links: This could make more software Win95 compatible. SysInternals Forum Another solution

Here's hoping. I don't really care for Vista, but I draw the ultimate final line there. I refuse to be forced onto any later version of Windows, even if it's only for Internet use.

Windows 9x can work pretty well on ICH6 and later systems provided some assumptions are made and some necessary prerequisites are accepted. First, avoid boards using an Intel proprietary BIOS and probably AMI BIOS as well. AWARD BIOS is preferred. (Strike 1 against this ASRock board) Second, you will either 1) need rloew's SATA patch, OR 2) you will have to verify that all SATA controllers can be set to operate in Legacy mode. Third, you will need an add-in Sound Card that is 9x compatible and a slot to put it in. Fourth, you will need an add-in Network card that is 9x compatible and a slot to put it in. (Realtek chip on this ASRock board MAY work with 9x.) (Unless you are lucky enough to have an onboard one with 9x drivers; usually Realtek or Marvell based.) The real unknown with this board is the AMI BIOS. If the BIOS is not 9x-friendly to start with it can cause all kinds of resource conflicts and other annoying issues. Probably should use SETUP /p i to disable ACPI with this system. I have very little experience with AMI BIOS but it has generally been bad. AWARD BIOS is good. Intel BIOS is trash.

You can basically use any CPU for Windows 95 so long as you're using my FIX95CPU patch. I've seen no problems up to 3.73GHz. Some very old programs may have issues but I'm not aware of any specifically and there's no way to know that without trying first. The main issues to be aware of are device compatibility (including those built on the motherboard) and of course the amount of RAM unless you have rloew's RAM patch. As a general rule any system based on an Intel 845 or earlier chipset will have drivers available for Windows 95.

You seem to have a lot of very strange problems running these older systems...

There is no guarantee your system will work with more than 512MB of RAM even with the SYSTEM.INI tweaks. They never worked for me on any system I tested them on. I did see 98SE run with slightly over 1.2GB one time when using an old version of the Unofficial Service Pack, but the system was highly unstable. If I were you I would forget anything over 512MB until you get everything set up and working smoothly. Then add it and see what changes. You may end up needing rloew's RAM patch if it doesn't work or makes your system unstable.

I was able to duplicate Mercury's results with the same VID&PID RALINK device and using rloew's latest WDMEX. Successfully connected to a WPA2 network under 9x using the Odyssey Client as well.

Most of the issues with 98 on a 915 or later chipset can't be fixed or helped by just having INF files. As I said the INF files only give proper names to the "generic" devices already installed by the OS during SETUP. Sometimes they will eliminate unknown devices such as "PCI System Management Bus" but all the INF does is give it a name - it doesn't load any files or set any configuration data for the device. Note that no .SYS, .VXD, .PDR, .MPD, or other actual "driver" files are contained in any of the Intel chipset packages. The only device in these INF's that actually causes a file to be loaded is the "LPC Controller" which is a legacy bridge providing compatibility with older BUS'es such as ISA. The LPC Controller entries cause ISAPNP.VXD to be loaded, but this file is already present and loaded to begin with. The real "compatibility" issue with 9xx and later chipsets under Windows 9x lies in how the motherboard BIOS is set up; what options it has and how it manages the system. For example I have an Intel-branded Intel-BIOS 965 chipset board that has some issues when trying to run 9x. However a Gigabyte-branded AWARD-BIOS 965 chipset board works fine. Now as we both know laptop BIOS'es are always "proprietary" as intended by their manufacturers and usually severely limit the options available to the end-user, this presents a problem when one wants to use the laptop in any fashion different from the one intended by the manufacturer. These proprietary BIOS'es tend to cause various conflicts, especially when running Windows 98 with ACPI enabled. Also, a big hurdle to compatibility with laptops using the 915 and later chipsets is the various other integrated devices. The ATI Mobility Radeon graphics chips are obviously problematic in some configurations (I've seen reports of the Dell version of this chip working with 9x but the HP version in my ZD8000 does not. It won't even work with VBE9X.) and I don't know if any available NVidia-based Mobile cards work any better, and in any case they are usually not user-replaceable. I believe I have actually found 9x drivers (not tested them all yet) for every single device in my ZD8000 except the video. SciTech Display Doctor does work on it, but I can't set the screen's native resolution of 1440x900 without it trying to go into some kind of "panning" mode, and when SDD is installed it breaks Plug & Play which means USB Flash Drives don't work when connected. Anyone who knows how to fix this problem with SDD please chime in... I have attached the 915 Chipset/ICH6 files extracted from the package I linked previously. This is the extent of Intel's support of the 915 Chipset under 98SE/ME. My unofficial INF's can be used to identify any other 9xx devices on the 915 laptops should they not be covered by the official files. ICH6INF.ZIP

You are the one who came in here acting as if you knew more about the subject than anyone else. If you have supposedly tried to get the package working then it is assumed that you have actually run it or know how to extract it properly. Apparently not, based on your statements. This is simply false, yet you were quite adamant about it. The support may be limited but it does exist. Another obviously false statement. If there were no INF files in the package it wouldn't work for any of the 8xx series chipsets either! This. Again, acting as if you know more about the subject than those who are trying to help you. I apologize if you were offended, but implying that I don't know what I am talking about when I try to give you information or implying that I am purposely misleading you is not very polite either.

Are you sure you know what you're doing? Of course there are INF files in the package! You can't just play around looking at the file with 7-Zip or whatever, you have to run it to extract them. Examine the "Command Line Flag Options" in the README if you need a command to extract it without installing it. No. Those Catalyst drivers support standard X600 devices, not Mobility X600 devices. There is a difference. They have been reported to work with Mobility devices in a couple of cases but these reports are isolated and not regularly reproducible.

The current Firefox 50.1.0 x86 setup will run properly under XP x64 SP2, however the 50.1.0 x64 version errors out and claims Windows 7 is required. I know that officially Mozilla only supports the x64 version on Windows 7 and up, but I wonder if this is simply an artificial limitation, especially in the case of Vista? I have seen reports of "later-than-officially-supported" 64-bit versions of Firefox running on XP x64 but not for 50.1.0 specifically yet. Waterfox 50.1.0 is still supporting XP x64 as well... Anyone know how to patch the x64 installer to stop this or what to compare between it and the x86 version to find out?

I've never tried to actually run the installer on a 915 chipset system so I'm not familiar with the behavior there. I know it works on the 875 chipset despite it not being specifically named 9x compatible (although the 875 is not much different from the 865, which is named-supported). You could try running the SETUP or extracting it to a folder and then manually use the 98SE Device Manager to update the driver for the "System Management BUS Controller"; pointing the driver dialog to ICH6CORE.INF and see what happens. 915.INF and 915M.INF will contain some of the devices as well. The security catalogs are pretty useless in all honesty. Probably all they would do in this case is verify the checksum of the INF file against the original one created by Intel. These are also unnecessary to make an OS run on a given set of hardware. Having a "working" chipset driver does not guarantee that the OS will run any smoother. In my experience Windows 98SE starts to have problems with ICH6 (9xx) and later chipsets when trying to run using ACPI. Usually it is necessary to run SETUP using the "/p i" switches to disable ACPI and thus prevent various instabilities. It is possible the USB problems you saw were caused by ACPI as I have seen this on newer systems. I have an HP ZD8000 laptop which uses the 915 chipset as well. I have had issues getting 9x to run properly on it but the main problem is the ATI Mobility Radeon X600 graphics chip rather than the motherboard chipset. In any case my unofficial Windows 98SE chipset drivers for 9xx and later Intel systems are here.

+1 I discussed this issue previously with rloew and he says there is nothing of interest in HAL.DLL from SP1. The problem is the issue of the potentially buggy drivers as exhibited by the USB issue, NOT whatever was changed in HAL.DLL. Reverting to the SP1 HAL.DLL will not prevent the potentially buggy driver problem so therefore it is no better a solution than patching the SP3 version or a later HotFix version if available.

Just what "instructions" does the 915 INF not have that, say, the 865 ones do? Intel's chipset drivers are essentially a set of glorified text files that only give proper names to their respective onboard devices. An OS can run just fine without these in any case. I don't remember anything being different about the 915 INF when I made my unofficial INF drivers for 9xx and later chipsets. You are correct however that the download linked by ~♥Aiko♥Chan♥~ does not support Windows 9x at all. This is a mistake made by Intel, either inadvertently or purposely. The last 9x compatible version is 6.3.0.1007 here. It does contain a 915 INF but 925 is not covered. Not sure about 910.

While you can make such an ISO yourself, it's still illegal to distribute it and it's against the forum rules here to ask others to do so. Despite the age of Windows 9x, it's still under copyright. You should be able to find enough information scattered around here to create such an ISO for yourself. Look for topics regarding MSBATCH.INF or "slipstreaming" in this section of the forum. I believe there is an old thread regarding "w98_slip" that should provide good information and I have also discussed slipstreaming at some points since. Topic locked. EDIT: Corrected name of old slipstreaming package

Are you using a plain vanilla installation of 98SE or are you using the Unofficial Service Pack or any other updates? Assuming a plain vanilla install, try installing this HotFix and see if it solves the problem. If not, try removing the device and reinstalling it with the Dell driver after the HotFix has been applied.

Have you tried these? Dell Link (I see the card has a Dell part number so this may be the best option. ME drivers should work under 98SE. If you can't run the .EXE on your computer try unpacking it with WinRAR, 7-Zip, etc.) DriverGuide Link 1 (Solve the CAPTCHA to prove you're not a robot and is should link you directly to the file. Good to see DriverGuide has stopped using forced .EXE installers.) DriverGuide Link 2 (Same)