LoneCrusader

I have yet to use any SATA devices in any of my systems, and I don't have experience with them, but if you cannot get the manufacturer drivers to work, you may want to consider RLoew's SATA drivers. They are not free, but it may fix your problem. RLoew is a member here and will probably see your post, maybe he will have some further insight. For now, here is a link to his website: R. Loew Electronics Consulting

Ok, I see your point. First, I am not implying that one partition/bootsector/OS/filesystem is more or less likely to go "berserk" as you put it. I was just giving an example of the benefits of keeping each OS's boot code and/or system partition fully independent of one another. Whether or not one system or another would fail is not the point of my suggestion. In my own setup, I use System Commander installed to my 98SE (1st Primary Partition 1st Hard Drive) to manage booting 98SE, XP, and RedHat 9. So technically, System Commander is using the MBR + 98 partition when it loads. However, when I choose one of the three operating systems, say XP, both of the other partitions (98 and RH9) are marked hidden by System Commander before passing the boot process to the chosen OS. This way XP has it's own isolated C: partition, it's own independent boot code, and does not see, alter, or invade my 98SE partition. As far as which bootloader to use, that's really a matter or personal preference combined with what features are needed by the individual user. I personally like System Commander, as it has a nice interface and allows one to password protect access to the boot menu (of course anyone who knows much about computers can get around this, I know). However System Commander does have limitations, for example, it cannot hide logical partitions from one another. Most people would not need this feature, but it is worth mentioning. The link I provided above suggests XOSL (Free) and BootIt NG (Not Free) as example bootloaders. I use BootIt NG on one of my systems, and it works well, and can hide logical partitions from one another. One possible method of making the boot process completely independent of any OS partition would be to create a small partition just to contain a bootloader, and then have the booloader hide it when passing the boot process on to a given OS, as I described above. Instructions for this were included in the documentation for System Commander, and I am confident it can be done for other bootloaders as well. This method would provide further insulation against the possible corruption/failure of any OS/partition/boot code, as only one partition/OS would be affected by said problem. And, in the event something went wrong with the boot loader, it could be repaired without having to deal with the "quirks" of any OS, or alter/repair their boot files.

As I said, I am unfamiliar with this, I just know that booting WinXP from the second drive did not work with my setup. This is not different in any way from what will happen to the 9x. I mean, if something goes wrong with your 98 partition and/or bootsector the XP will be unbootable AS WELL as your 9x. That's why do boot starting floppies exist (and yes, you can boot start NT/2K/XP/2003 and Vista :ph34r:/2008/7) from a floppy. cannie made a very specific topic, that is however full with info about dual booting: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=118623 jaclaz Obviously the 98 partition would be unbootable in that situation as well, I thought that was obvious. My point was that BOTH systems would therefore be unbootable, as WinXP would have placed it's boot files in the 98 partition. If XP was not allowed to do this, then only the 98 partition would be affected under these circumstances. Just offering a different perspective. I believe I will stick to the Dan Goodell way.

AFAIK, there is no way to set it permanently to a different User Agent using the Switcher. There may be a way to do this by altering the registry or some file, but I don't regard it as that much of a problem, as most sites don't complain, I've only had problems or nag screens on MySpace and YouTube so far. Apparently, as you pointed out, the browser version is all that matters, because this string works as well. Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win95C; en-US; rv:1.9.0.18) Gecko/2010020220 Firefox/3.0.18

You can add strings as you wish, or try using the IE ones. See the other thread for full reply.

Once the User Agent Switcher is installed and you have restarted Firefox, click Tools, then scroll down to "Default User Agent," another menu panel should appear, click "Edit User Agents," click the "New" button, choose New Folder, name it "Mozilla Firefox," then select your new folder in the list, and click "New" again, this time choose "New User Agent." A box will appear with several blanks in it, the first one is the description. I would name it "FF 3.0.14, WinXP" then the line below it is the User Agent String. Copy and paste the string I gave you or one you have chosen from the other site I referenced into this box, overwriting the one in it, which is your current one. Then click OK twice to get back to your browser. Now the new User Agent should show up under the "Tools > Default User Agent > Mozilla Firefox" menu. Click on it to set it as your current User Agent. When Firefox is closed and restarted, the User Agent will be set back to default, however, all you have to do to change it is click on the "Tools > Default User Agent > Mozilla Firefox" menu again, as any User Agents you set up and save will be retained. For anyone out there who wants to keep Win98 in the User Agent for the heck of it, I found that this String works as well: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98SE; en-US; rv:1.9.0.18) Gecko/2010020220 Firefox/3.0.18

In my experience with multibooting, (and my setup and opinions will differ from others here), I would never allow Windows XP to see the Windows 98 partition. If Windows 98 is installed in the first primary partition on the first hard drive, and then you try to install XP to the second primary partition on the first hard drive (WITHOUT HIDING THE 98 PARTITION FIRST) XP will assign its partition drive letter D, however, it will invade the 98 partition with it's boot files, (BOOT.INI, NTLDR, etc), overwriting the 98/DOS style boot sector. Then, if something goes wrong with your 98 partition and/or bootsector, your XP will be unbootable. As far as I know, 2K/XP cannot be booted from any hard drive other than the first one without the use of a boot loader that can remap the hard drives. (GRUB4DOS has this ability, but I do not use it and have very little experience with it.) I may be incorrect in this, as most of my experience is only with 9X systems, but I did try once to boot XP from the second hard drive, and it did not work. For a complete understanding of multibooting, I recommend this site Understanding Multibooting by Dan Goodell. Good luck!

I had a similar problem with MySpace a while back. There is a Firefox Addon that will solve your problem, the User Agent Switcher. You can use it to manually set what your browser will identify itself as, known as the User Agent String. I set mine to: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; ; rv:1.9.0.14) Gecko/2009082707 Firefox/3.0.14 and it does away with the nag boxes. See this site for more User Agent Strings, and my Firefox/MySpace thread for more info.

I do not think that I would be the only one to perceive certain responses in that thread as hostile. And the idea that "NDIS.VXD 4.00.1113 does not fix any version of 95" is blatantly incorrect, as my experiments and the results of others can now confirm.

I had originally thought that somehow I was the first person to discover how to fix this problem in Windows 95, because I remember searching for a solution a few years back (Old post at Annoyances.org) and was unable to find one. However, recently I discovered this thread Windows 95 unofficial patches by Petr wherein he obviously had identified the problem, along with a solution. I am amazed at some of the hostility given to his solution and some obvious misinformation in that thread.

I wish I had taken a screenshot of the error when I saw it before, now I am unable to reproduce it. Everything seems to be working fine now.. that's good of course, but I don't know what was going on before. EDIT: I can now also confirm testing of the UDF driver on Windows 95B, everything still works perfectly!

I must say it would be very nice to have such a driver, and/or be able to support >4GB files on 98. Especially for dealing with DVD .ISO's. This issue was discussed recently in my thread about flash drive problems. But as dencorso said, if RLoew cannot fix it, then it's not likely to be fixed.

What can I say, another brilliant release! Working perfectly here:

I tested rloew's PTCHCDFS on Windows 95 C with CDFS.VXD 4.00.1113, the file is patched correctly, but I discovered a few minutes ago that if the DVD contains >4GB worth of files, the "Used space:" and "Capacity:" byte counts on the General Properties tab only show as "---". If the DVD has <4GB worth of files, the byte count shows up correctly. I have not used this patch yet on Windows 98, so I do not have a reference, but I assume this is not a problem in 98. EDIT: Bizarre error not reproducable, works properly now.

Thanks for clarifying this, I wasn't sure about it.

I knew there had to be a way. I just wish I had the know-how.

I think if you deleted AUTOEXEC.BAT then Windows would generate a new blank one (not sure about that). It's never foolish to be sentimental, haha, I still have the hard drives from my first Win95 computer, the partitions died on them, but I never formatted over them or used the disks again in the hope that one day I could resurrect them. But anyhow, glad I was able to help you.

He's talking about a blank new line, as in a carriage return, or "Enter". DOS treats a blank new line as a carriage return, it's like pressing ENTER at a C:\> prompt without typing a command, you just get another C:\> prompt. For example this empty blank line ^^ in my post would produce another C:\> prompt. Check your AUTOEXEC.BAT in Notepad and Delete/Backspace out any blank lines. Or, since your AUTOEXEC.BAT is blank, click Edit > Select All and then press Delete. Once you have done this you should not be able to move the cursor from the upper left corner with the arrow keys.

I should clarify this section from above: Yep. I said Yes, meaning that I have one of these things; folders/files that would require Joliet or UDF; not meaning that I have all of these things. Here is the deepest folder: D:\DRIVERS\Video\ATI\ATI Radeon\Windows 95\8500\Install\Gart\IntelGart\setupdir\0007\Readme.txt which is 10 directory levels deep. Here is the longest path: D:\DRIVERS\Motherboards\Soyo\SY-P4I845PE ISA\Drivers\V1.0 Boards ONLY\Realtek Audio\WinNT4\SoundMan.exe which contains 103 characters. I do not have any Unicode file or folder names, and I do not have any "ridiculously long" filenames. I do however have file and folder names that have multiple periods . , Spaces, and the charcaters I mentioned before, & ! - etc. Thank you for the file, the information, and the potential solutions. But this does not have anything to do with UDF or the problem we were talking about. It is useful for the DVD boot issue, but that had already been solved back on page 3. The IS a very simple difference, addressed back on page 3 by cdob. Windows 95 does not support UDF, and therefore is not reading the UDF long filenames. And, as dencorso and I said before: Solution: Include Joliet on the DVD instead of or along with UDF. We have been arguing about this for no reason other than you keep "a$$-u-ming," as you say, that I don't know what I'm talking about when I (and others above) said my DVD would require Joliet. Any suggestions you may have for the other thread would be appreciated, should you desire to give them. That is your choice. so (...and the others as well).I don't dare risk too much from UBCD (obvious reasons) for fear of being banned. I'm already treading heavily with this "conversation" (self-warned...). Great-grandpappy always said "don't go away mad, just go away". I'm gone, but pretty p-o'd! I truly wish you success in your endeavor. Have a great day... I fail to see where you think that I am implying that you are "twisting my arm." My point is that we have been arguing for no reason about things that have already been solved or are not relevant to the problem at hand. EDIT: Found a longer path.

I apologize for the snippets, but I feel I need to address each issue separately. No I haven't. Because I just said several times above that I am running some experiments and I am not ready to create the DVD again yet! Here are two screenshots. The first one is from Windows 98 Second Edition and is properly displayed. This is what it is supposed to look like! The second one is from Windows 95 C OSR 2.5 and is truncated/translated. This is the problem! This is the whole point of the UDF discussion above! This project and this thread have nothing to do with the UBCD! I am not trying to create something similar! I do not plan to install anything from DOS except Windows, or DOS programs! Who said anything about renaming anything during installation!? You are getting off on tangents that have nothing to do with the problem at hand! Yes, jaclaz and I mentioned that earlier. I asked a question about it and DirectCD that no one has attempted to answer yet. I appreciate your suggestions and assistance. I just feel that you are not paying close attention to what has been said. For example, once again this has nothing to do with the UBCD! You keep returning to that and it has nothing to do with what I am trying to accomplish here, or the problem I am having, because the problem is 95 specific! Check screenshots above. Do you happen to know the answer to my question about this UDF reader and DirectCD that I posted above?

Yep. Apparently I only need Joliet, like I said, ImgBurn chose UDF on its own. The only reason I have been discussing UDF is for exploring the possibility of adding a UDF driver to 95. I thought I explained the problems very clearly... I won't know whether or not the problem will be cured until I actually make another version of the DVD/ISO, which I am not ready to do yet. Right now I am just experimenting with some other functions, and working on the final selection of files to be included on the second copy of my disc. Yes, the DOS Boot Floppy is only for Windows installation and running DOS tools. I am not using GRUB4DOS for this project, as I finally got the DVD booting with a normal DOS floppy, which was my original goal. But my floppy is heavily customized using those files you mention. No. But neither am I. It can be very easy to get confused trying to understand other people's projects and methods, as you don't actually have a copy of it in front of you to see what's going on. Yes, why can't things just work or at least be simple? Haha

:wacko: I repeat, my DVD WILL REQUIRE JOLIET OR UDF unless I go back an manually rename a bunch of files and folders! There are OTHER files and folders on this DVD besides just files from the 9X install CD's! Drivers, Software, Tools, etc etc. Some of them have long folder or file names. Some of them are more than 8 folder levels deep. You didn't think I got over 4GB of data just from 3 9X install discs did you? This has nothing to do with Windows setup/installation. I have had no problems with Windows installation from this disc, only reading the disc IN Windows 95 AFTER installation. I am using VPC5 because M$ disabled 9X support in their versions. You are trying to over-simplify this. If I had just copied the 9X install CD's, then the DVD would probably conform to ISO9660 and there would be no problem, But that is not the case.

I created the ISO and DVD with ImgBurn as suggested by jaclaz. ImgBurn chose ISO9660 and UDF on its own, I did not choose them. I assume UDF was required because some of my files or folders did not conform to ISO9660. I plan to recreate the DVD eventually, but as of right now I am only working with the existing one. These are just experiments, I am checking to see if everything works before creating a final product. As I said, I have found 2 problems: 1. VPC 5 will not capture the ISO, or the DVD itself. No idea on this one. 2. 95 does not properly read some of the file/folder names on the DVD, even though it previously read a CD with the same file and folder names. Logically this must be due to a lack of UDF support in 95. (CD probably had Joliet, not UDF) Solution: Include Joliet on the final version of the DVD. I plan to do this. In the meantime however, I am simply exploring the possibility of adding a UDF driver to 95.

For the heck of it, I tried adding UDF.VXD 4.10.1998 from the 98 FE cabs to the VMM32 folder, and added it to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\services\VxD to see if it would load on startup. I got an error saying that UDF.VXD was damaged. I wonder if there are any earlier versions of UDF.VXD to be found, maybe from some of the 98 Betas? I turned up the UDF reader link in a search I did the other day, and also read something about DirectCD enabling the use of UDF. I have never used DirectCD, as I read a long time ago that it causes a lot of problems, but I do remember once having it installed on a 95 machine. I wonder, does DirectCD install a standalone UDF driver that might somehow be extracted from it, or is it just the same as the UDF reader?

It is possible to create a Bootable Floppy Image on a CD/DVD of up to 36MB. The required geometry is 1024 Cylinders 2 Heads 36 Sectors. I use my own CD/DVD burner. I do not know if any other CD writer will support this. FIX95CPU and DUN14-95 could both fit on a 2.88MB floppy, so as long as one was using strictly floppy or cd images for their setup, it would not be a problem. However, it would be a problem for anyone who actually needed to write FIX95CPU to a floppy disk.