imai

Agree with Jaclaz, his proposal is less drastic than mine but may succeed in scaring off most spammers (just one more post and I am in !)

Speaking for myself I think it would be a terrible loss for all W98/ME users if this forum would not be continued. There is still valuable hardware and software in use that will only function under these old OSs. So if the problem is caused by a few "bad apples" can't we just prevent access to the W98/ME forum for new members ? I mean read-only for all but new posts for current members only. It is unlikely that there will be a vast increase in W98/ME users in the future but there is still some development going on that is of interest for W98/ME users.

Thanks to all your good advice I have W98SE running on a Asrock 4coredual-sata2 mobo with 2 GB PC2-5300 memory (only 1GB in use). Processor Intel Pentium E5200 ATI Rage 128 pro AGP 4x system.ini MaxPhysPage=40000 MaxFileCache=261120 MinFileCache=32768 ChunkSize=4096 Config.sys: device=c:\windows\himem.exe (renamed himem.sys)

To Duffy and RLoew, Great info, now at least I know how to start things up!! And I can make some clear decisions. In my particular case I want a dual boot with W98SE and WXP. The W98 box will be used for an old AV Fast Master capture card that can not run under XP and in the XP box I will do the video editing. So I need lots of RAM for editing (the more the better) but I don't need it for capturing. If I understood you correctly then I can limit the use of RAM in the W98SE box by settings in the system.ini file and run W98SE without problems. Somewhere else in this forum Vick1111 had W98SE on a SATA disk and with 2 GB RAM without Rloew's patches and I have the same MOB so for a start I will try his settings an see how it goes. If not I will let you know (over a week or so) Thanks again for the info am I grateful

Hey Guitar_Samuri, I'm afraid I can't help you but I have similar problems. There are a lot of knowledgeble people in this forum and I appreciate and applaude their efforts to help people like myself who do not know an OS inside out. I had W98SE running on a modern MOB but with limited memory and on a 120 GB IDE HD. The trouble started when I decided to increase memory and to install W98SE on a SATA 500GB drive. I completely messed up my system although I had read lots of good advice in this forum. My point is: In this forum you can find solutions for almost any problem you can think of but what I miss is a step by step manual how to install W98SE (preferably in dual boot with XP) on modern hardware. I mean, starting with the partitioning, what is the best way to do it. Some say start with 1 small prim. partition, install W98SE, the drivers and the LBA patch and create the rest of the partitions. But the LBA patch and other patches are included in the unofficial upgrade. So the question arises which updates should I install and what is the sequence of installing the updates and the drivers. Another thing is the RLoew patch for large amounts of memory, when you look at the list of W98 users with > 1GB memory then you will see that many are using the patch, others using Vcache or XRayers safemode etc. Now when do you need the one or the other, is there a relation with large RAM drives ? So many questions for a dummy as myself but I am sure that all the answers can be found in the forum but alas it takes so much time ! Another suggestion for the moderators: Is it possible to have a wikipedia approach in ths forum for this type of manuals ? Where all members can make changes in the How-to manual(s) any time they experience improvements? Then it would become a common effort, not taking too much time for one person Hope to get reactions, regards, Imai

Sorry I should have kept you informed of what I have done to get it (almost) going. The installation of the 521A went smoothly after installation of DirecX8.1, then I ran NUSB3.3, taking a chance because it is intended for the English version of Windows and I have a Dutch version. My 2GB USB stick was then identified as a USB2 flash drive which had to be formatted. There was no data on the stick so after formatting I could load it with data. Graphics were OK after the installation of the ATI AGP driver. So I wrote the message that all was fine. My enthousiasm was somewhat tempered the next day when I found that a second 2GB USB stick did not show up in ThisComputer. There is a memory conflict in system devices for the ACPI-BIOS systemcard extention, but that may be solved when I increse memory. The next step will be to install 2GB DDR2 ram (changing the system.ini file as explained in this forum) and the installation of a SATA drive so your advice for the driver is well timed. Thanks again and any other suggestions are most wecome.

Thanks to all your good advice my problems are solved The next step will be to increase memory.

Rjecina thanks for the help. The VIA site was available and I found the Via_HyperionPro_524A, according to VIA the best suitable for W98SE and the PT880Pro chpset but .......... When I ran the setup, the installation halted with the message that it had stopped before installing all items and that the system had not been changed. I have no clue why this happened After restart Windows found new hardware: Via standard host bridge (5X), PCI to ISA bridge, PCI to PCIE bridge, Ultra Vlink contrller, I/O APIC IC and PCI to PCI bridge controller. When I directed Windows to the viamach directory of Via_HyperionPro it seemed to install the drivers but I still miss AGP and USB support. In Windows hardware management there is still a yellow question mark at PCI Universal Seril Bus and my Samsung Syncmaster still runs on a standard PCI graphic adapter. What to do next ? In the HyperionPro package is no AGP driver for W98SE but I can check the manufacturer site for the videocard, the USB Root Hubs and the Universal hostcontrollers for PCI to USB are functioning correct. Can I have a malfunctioning motherboard ? Or would it be wise to reinstall W98SE and install SP3 beta ? Please advise, Best regards Imai

Hi folks, I was very pleased to find on this forum the "modern" MB that will work with Windows 98 SE. I have an old FAST AV Master capture card that will not work under XP or Vista as only drivers for W95 and W98 exist. So I bought an Asrock 4coredual sata2 R2.0 MB and installed W98SE on an IDE HD with 256 MB DDR400 memory and an AGP4x videocard. Installation was no problem but there is no USB support and I can't change the resolution (16 bits colour, 640x480). The Asrock site do not provide drivers for W98, only drivers for W2000 and more recent OS are available. What should I do to get this going ?