LoneCrusader

Are you running your experiments in a VM? I HAVE seen the CPU info be missing when running under VMware, regardless of the SYSDM.CPL or UPDATE.SYS version. The missing info in the situations you are encountering may not be caused by UPDATE.SYS, but it IS caused by UPDATE.SYS in the situations I am working on. The 98SE HotFix version of SYSDM.CPL does not have any issues displaying the CPU info. I know this, because I have that version in my slipstreamed build, and it works fine. The problem is elsewhere. EDIT: Some "not entirely correct" information struck through.

The "Donate" system from the option at the top of the board is broken. After I choose an amount to donate, and choose PayPal, instead of sending me to the Paypal site to complete the transaction, I get this:

The frustration comes from not being able to keep the previous skin. This always seems to get broken with every upgrade, which is pretty pathetic on the part of IPB (we know it's not your fault). None of us are opposed to having other "new" skin options; it's the fact that the old one dies every time.

Can you post a screenshot of what you're talking about? I'm actually working on a different issue, but there may be a correlation. Normally the CPU information works fine on my 98SE, however, if the Windows ME UPDATE.SYS or Petr's patched UPDATE.SYS files are used on a 98SE system during installation, no CPU information will be displayed (or properly created in the Registry).

I know you're hard at work on the new upgrade, and with any "upgrade" there are bound to be plenty of glitches. Hopefully at least the database errors will be solved. Issues: When quoting someone, their entire post is displayed as a "block" rather than plain text with Quote tags and one cannot easily separate parts of it to avoid unnecessary redundancy or to address specific points. It also cannot be simply "copied" and reused because when copied, the quote tags are lost. Sometimes the cursor is lost when posting, and only switching to another active window and then returning to the browser will make it reappear. (Firefox 3.6.28) I hope the topic Subtitles can be reinstated, I think they are very useful and should not be removed. Sometimes there are very valid reasons for creating back-to-back separate posts. Granted, it should not be "abused," but the board should not auto-merge them by default either. This is what we have Moderators for. Please return to the previous theme (or similar) as soon as possible. <rant> I know it's not your fault xper , but why do these board upgrades always have to break the previous theme? </rant>

The best thing you can do is reinstall. There is no reason to hang on to an obviously broken installation. If VMM32 was not properly compressed, then something is wrong, end of story.

If rloew's suggestion does not work, I recommend you START OVER; reinstalling Windows 95 and ONLY install FIX95CPU and the Demo RAM Patch. The other updates you installed are either irrelevant to this issue, or may replace newer files with obsolete ones. Also be sure that you are installing FIX95CPU as intended, and not using the "slipstream" method, as failure to precisely follow the slipstreaming instructions could lead to a situation where VMM32 would not be properly compressed.

Most likely it is due to the RAM, but there's always the possibility it could be something else. Go here and download the Demo version of the RAM Patch and install it. It will run for 10 minutes, and should allow you to determine whether you can boot Windows 95 without the Protection Error or not before the time expires. If it fixes your problem, you will know that the RAM is at fault. Then you can decide whether to purchase the full version, or to reduce your RAM to 512MB or less.

We need a better description of the error, if possible. Does it give any other information other than just "Windows Protection Error?" You will probably have to reduce your RAM to 512MB. The "RAM tweaks" that are found here and elsewhere never worked for me, and the only way I was able to use more than 512MB was by purchasing and installing RLoew's RAM Limitation Patch.

Is there an NUSB for Win XP? Windows XP doesn't need NUSB, it already comes with generic USB Storage Drivers, etc etc out of the box.

Thanks for testing. I haven't had the opportunity yet to actually use these on ICH7 and up yet. I do know that everything I integrated from the last official 98SE INFs DOES work, because I have used it successfully on ICH6 and ICH5R boards, but this was before I added the ICH7/8/9 data. I am not surprised that the PCI BUS installation fails, I saw this on my attempts to install vanilla 9x on ICH7/ICH10 without any INF drivers. I will investigate further as soon as I can. I am surprised that xRayer's driver works where mine doesn't though, because I actually compared them before I released my versions. Also I noted some instances in xRayer's INFs where the device VEN&DEV line entries point to install sections that do not exist. (This is a side-effect of directly copying those lines from a 2K/XP INF file without the corresponding sections, one should either do this and modify those sections accordingly for 9x, or when the VEN&DEV entries are copied, they should be edited to point to the proper sections in the 9x INF... but who am I to criticize, LOL , his apparently works and mine doesn't, so I'll have to figure out what is different. )

No problem. USBSTR95 is "as close as you can get" to NUSB for Windows 95 at the moment. It supports basically all USB Flash Drives and all USB Floppy Drives. Card Readers are a toss up. USB Hard Drives don't work, and neither do USB CDROMs, etc, don't know about USB ZIP drives. It suffers from a limitation, only ONE USB Flash Drive can be connected ONE time per Windows 95 session. You must reboot before you can use another (or the same) Flash Drive again. w95usbflash11 has this same limitation, as both packages use the same core drivers for Flash Drives. The best thing about USBSTR95 is that it provides a nice Unplug/Eject utility that is otherwise not available under 95 like under 98SE/ME. Hopefully, a better USB Storage Solution for 95 will be available soon.

All of them should be fine except USBVIEW and w95usbflash11. USBVIEW does NOT work under 95 at all, and for now, use USBSTR95 rather than w95usbflash11. USBSTR95 provides the best currently publicly available USB Storage solution for 95. On zShare, you click "Free Download", and you have to endure an ad popup, then you wait 25 seconds or so while it counts down, and then click to download.

For the third time...

The errors have never really stopped. I've still been seeing them every day, to varying degrees of severity.

Hello everyone! This project is fairly straightforward. I have integrated the Device Data from the Intel Chipset Software Installation Utility versions 6.3.0.1007 and 8.3.1.1009 (up to ICH9; all after ICH6 is UNOFFICIAL) (excluding server motherboard/Xeon CPU chipsets due to 64KB INF size limit) into the original MACHINE.INF, MACHINE2.INF, and MSHDC.INF files. At the moment, only files for 98SE English have been created. I may consider creating equivalent versions of these INF's for ME/98FE (MAYBE 95, it is more complicated) if there is sufficient interest. Updated info for USB Devices is not included in this initial version. The reason being that there would need to be multiple versions of USB.INF and USB2.INF, depending on if the original USB files are to be maintained; if manufacturer-issued USB2 drivers will be in use; or if NUSB 3.3, NUSB 3.6, or any other unofficial package is used in a target system. Hopefully some of you with Intel or Intel-based systems can test these in a new installation. Answers to a few initial questions: Do I NEED these INF's? No, but they can take a step out of setting up a new system. They are also only useful for new Windows 98SE installations on Intel or Intel-based motherboards. How do I use these INF's? Unzip them and place them in the same directory as your Windows 98SE CAB files prior to installation, and they will be used instead of the older versions inside the CABs. In order to use these, you will need to copy the \WIN98 folder of your 98SE CDROM to your Hard Drive and install from there, or be able to create a new Windows 98SE CD with these files added to the \WIN98 folder. What do these INF's do? These INF's provide all of the Device Information contained in the above listed versions of the Intel Chipset Software Installation Utility. If you use these updated INFs during 98SE installation, you will no longer need to install the Intel Chipset Software Installation Utility to provide drivers/identify devices on your Intel or Intel-based motherboard. EDIT 7/20/13 : I have split the project into two INF sets, one to be used with Intel Chipsets up to ICH6 (mostly 8xx chipsets) and one to be used with ICH7/ICH8/ICH9/ICH10. (ICH10 not included yet!) Please use the proper version for your system. I have tested the ICH6 and below INFs on some ICH6 and ICH5 systems, and I know these work. Based on the issues schwups reported below, I have reduced the size of MACHINE2.INF for the ICH7 and up INF set. This set is still experimental, and this reduced version is for testing ONLY! If anyone can test, especially on ICH7/ICH8/ICH9 systems please report your results. INTEL_INF_98SE.ZIP - 44.9 Kb EDIT 11/23/15 : I have updated the project to include all devices up to the Intel Chipset Identification Utility version 9.4.0.1017. The newer version requires slightly different handling, so the older version and links are left intact. See Post #31 for link and more info.

No problem. Good luck!

If a Linux or other "live CD" is used to boot the machine and load a "live OS," which holds the CD drive in use to run, then how is the OP supposed to insert the ME CDROM at this point and copy to the HDD? (Unless there are 2 CDROM drives...)

It can't hurt, but if you have removed everything in Safe Mode, there's no reason to load Safe Mode a second time. Just cancel the requests to load drivers and verify that none have returned to the Device Manager on the next (Normal Mode) boot. Yes, the driver files are not removed from your system, they should be redetected along with everything else when NUSB has installed. Be sure that you physically disconnect all USB peripheral devices (printers/scanners/MSD's/etc) from your machine while you do this, and don't reconnect them until AFTER NUSB has been installed successfully and you reboot again.

Only Mass Storage Devices are supported. Devices that do no operate as "MSD's" as you call them are not supported. No, "native" in this case simply means that a "generic/universal" driver is provided for MSD's, as opposed to 98SE without NUSB, which requires each USB Storage device to have it's own manufacturer-provided driver. Above answer also applies here. Correct. No. NUSB36E upgrades the USB 1.1 Controller/Hub Driver Stack. This does not change or add any external device support. No. A driver "Stack" is simply a set of driver files, usually including an .INF file with device data, plus .SYS/.VXD/.PDR etc files that actually interface with hardware. There is no existing "Universal Stack" under 98SE and Windows cannot "write" a "Stack. These drivers must be created by programmers. More on "Driver Stacks" below. The latter. Yes, but not necessarily in that order. Devices not currently connected to the machine do not show up in the Device Manager in Normal Mode. This is why Safe Mode is advised, because it shows ALL installed devices, whether they are currently connected or not. You should remove ALL entries for ALL USB connected devices (including entries under "Universal Serial Bus controllers," "Disk drives," "Storage devices," and any others, including Printers in your case) under Safe Mode, and then reboot into Normal Mode. Order of their removal is not important, just be sure you remove them all. Bypass/Cancel any driver installation requests on the next boot, and when the Desktop has loaded, check the Device Manager to see that none of the USB devices have returned. If they have, remove them, then install NUSB36E, and you will be prompted to reboot for the new drivers to be installed. No problem. Now, more on "Driver Stacks," which seems to be a point of confusion for many, not just yourself. NUSB333E contained two "Driver Stacks." One driver stack is for USB Mass Storage Devices. The other was for USB 2.0 hardware (controllers/ports/hubs) in your machine if it has USB 2.0 capability. Windows 98SE does not have a "Driver Stack" for either of these types of hardware "out of the box." USB Storage Drivers, USB2.0 Hardware Drivers, and the USB 1.1 Hardware drivers that do come with 98SE are three separate entities. Each of these does a different job. The difference with NUSB36E is that it also updates the USB 1.1 Hardware drivers to the Windows ME versions. The "USB Storage Drivers" and the USB 2.0 Hardware Drivers are all the same as before. Updating the USB 1.1 files allows for the use of more "USB Composite Devices" (which I don't have enough knowledge about to describe properly) on some machines and in certain configurations. This feature has really not been tested much in "applied" situations, because those situations seem to be uncommon, or they have not been reported/discussed here. So, NUSB36E contains THREE "Driver Stacks," each independent and for different hardware devices. Drivers for USB 1.1 and USB 2.0 ONLY provide support for devices INSIDE your machine, not External devices. The only External Devices supported are USB Mass Storage Devices.

No, all you have to do is go under "Add New Hardware" and manually install "PCI bus." (If I remember correctly; this was done under Windows 95, so it may be slightly different under 98 & up. I will check it again.) EDIT: Yes, it's the same process under 98. "Add New Hardware", choose to manually select a device, then choose "System devices," then "PCI bus." 98 & up MAY? have other issues with ACPI on these systems. 95 does not support ACPI to begin with, so it's not an issue under 95, but I can't speak for the others.

It can probably be made to work. xRayer created a set of modified INF's for newer Intel systems, and I have been working on a similar project. I did encounter some problems getting 9x up and running on ICH7 and ICH10 Intel boards however. When installing Windows 9x, sometimes the PCI Bus Enumeration will fail (probably due to a later version of ACPI which doesn't play well with 9x), leaving the system with only a fraction of its actual devices installed. This can be fixed by manually installing the PCI Bus Enumerator. (Thanks to rloew for figuring this out! )

FIX95CPU has been updated to version 3.0. Get the new version here. See the first post of this topic for what's new in this version. If you have already successfully installed FIX95CPU on Windows 95 OSR2, there is no need to update. This new version mainly addresses issues specific to Windows 95 RTM. Special thanks to TmEE for hosting the new version.

Thanks for the update!

I actually got another one of those "There appears to be an error with the database" errors, where the page loads, but the default Font is changed, and the error shows up at the bottom of the page...