Tommy

And you're absolutely right on that one. Mainly whenever I go to the web to look for answers on why Linux isn't doing something, generally those are the answers you see. I haven't registered on any Linux communities so I haven't tried my hand in any discussions but what gets me is when some of them act like you should know everything about Linux because they do. They say "it's easy". If you have no experience in it, it's not easy. You can use some of your Windows knowledge to work around things but when it comes to command line, they're two totally different beasts. Q4OS doesn't seem to be loaded with a bunch of jerks and I like the OS from what I used of it, which someone on here recommended to me a while ago now but I can't recall who it was. Linux can most certainly feel intimidating to those who are new to it. And sure, it's not Windows, but if it's not Windows, then help out those people who come from Windows to Linux! Help educate them. Windows is extremely straight-forward these days with almost no command line needed but that's not true with Linux. Sometimes in order to do something, you really have to know many commands in order to accomplish something. Linux isn't even something you can use offline very easily either unless it's all preloaded with stuff you want. Windows really doesn't require internet connections at all (save from activation), but Linux isn't really like that either. So there are major differences on how the OS works and how software works and is loaded on there. I'm used to installation wizards but you don't always get that on Linux which is another reason it's not always easy for newcomers to use.

I have a co-worker named Zoey too. Welcome back to MSFN!

Despite the fact that Microsoft is pushing Windows 10 so hard on their users is quite underhanded, but there's no way he's winning $600 million. I mean...it's a computer for cripe sake! Now if we're talking a big corporate conglomerate that ended up with days of downtime and millions of gigs of data loss...then I could probably see. But this is a personal computer! Sounds like someone wants to retire and live it up big.

The only problem which I haven't been any to figure out is on IE11. I do use images at work for certain things and though I managed to install Chrome and Firefox on a machine that typically only allows IE, there doesn't seem to be an equivalent view image or a proper save as function on it as opening as a new tab just takes you to the image's website anyway. So you are part right in that regards and have noticed since that it does work via Firefox but even with these changes, I truly don't know how it's going to stop those who really want to use images anyway. It's almost as bad as websites that disallow right clicking to copy and paste which can generally be thwarted by the good ol' keyboard shortcuts but sometimes when you want the information on a website to print out but not all that other hub-bub for use later on, it's just another one of those things that would be nice to have but now you have to go through an extra step or two to get it. Reminds me of the good old days of the Odyssey of Hyrule and trying to figure out how the heck to get that Triforce in Ocarina of Time. Many of pages printed with things to try that turned out to be an utterly complete waste of time. lol (It was one of those sites that had right click disabled but back then websites weren't so ad-ridden and full of bloated javascript that threw up stalled warnings and slowed everything down)

I can see too, but yes, it's extremely annoying because not everyone wants to have to load an ad-ridden, slow as heck, unorganized javascript website that immediately tells you to subscribe to their newsletter and put your first born up as a sacrifice before continuing onto their site. What honestly happened to fair use? How many times do (most) people take images and claim them as their own and then make a profit over them? Just like service animals, it's thanks to those few that take 7 miles when given an inch and it ruins it for everyone else.

Anyone notice that this happened in the last couple of days? When I first saw this, I thought it was a glitch or a fluke! http://www.thedrum.com/news/2018/02/19/google-removes-view-image-button-part-settlement-with-getty Apparently there are extensions for Chrome and Firefox to restore this functionality but once again, technology takes a hit rather than a step forward in usability. Thanks Getty!

I too am trying to learn a bit more about Linux, although frustrating, I'm picking up a few things. I like Q4OS because you can install XPQ4 and it gives you the look and feel of Windows 2000-10. They're not exactly the same but pretty dang close and can really help those who need that Windows environment to help them get accustom to the new OS. But I do feel Linux can be more complicated to use that Windows and those who are used to Linux and use it on a daily basis look at you and act all macho and just give you vague, stupid answers to questions you might have. Well, guess what! You were a new user at one time too! I may even check this distro out at some point too but one great thing about Q4OS is the install center, it does take a lot of pain out of installing programs. But the direction Microsoft is heading in, I refuse to go to Windows 10 and I will learn Linux for my everyday computing and stay on Windows 2000 for legacy programs or programs in itself that don't work with Linux via Wine.

Welcome! It's great to have you hear and thanks for coming out of the shadows and becoming a member! And don't worry about donating. Although it's a big part of keeping us going, if you can't do it, you can't do it. That's sometimes how life is. But we definitely appreciate any little bit that we can receive. Even $5USD is very much appreciated!

Let's not start talking about leaks, guys. @Destro You must either have a really good installation or the computers at my job really suck. My general operations are very internet based and of course, IE11 and I think despite this, most of these pages run in compatibility mode because if you force them onto Google Chrome that I managed to sneak on there, mostly all the pages are broken in one way or another. I guess this is what they mean by forcing IE upgrades makes company pages not work right which is actually true. Either way, even when I do other special projects such as video or even photo editing, many times it can be stable but then other times it just crashes and produces weird artifacts. Combine that with Citrix and it's a recipe for disaster. Our Citrix servers use Windows Server 2008 R2 so that's another NT6 based OS and sometimes I'm forced to do some of my operations through Citrix because of corporate restrictions on Windows 7 which is weird since they'd basically the same thing unless different group policies apply to each environment. If we want to go back to Vista though, COM Surrogate errors happened constantly on my home computers. I think the workaround solution was to place it as an exception through DEP which helped some of it, but not always. Windows 2000 will always be my main OS of choice, it's what I'm using to type this right now. Although Windows 98 holds a special place in my heart simply because it was the first OS I ever used since I got into computing a bit late in the game and so for me, it's not so much I want to use it as a main OS but rather I want to see what the heck can be accomplished in it and how usable it can become with some tweaks done to it.

Speed/usability > Pretty/fancy Your site is so easy to use, none of that other bloated junk. Even a dialup connection would be able to use it with no problems. Wasn't the internet always meant to transmit information in the first place? I prefer it to work so I can read what it says, not wait hours for junk. And one more thing I hate, these sites that have to hide their navibar in one of those stupid 3 lines buttons that don't work properly on older browsers, even FF9.0.1 and so it's always expanded over half the screen and you can't even read anything behind it. That irks me so bad! Stop imitating mobile garbage!

Windows 2000 is the perfect replacement if Windows 98 becomes so far gone that nothing modern will work on it. Windows 98's biggest handicap is obviously online usage. But you can't really blame it, web "de"evolution has come so far that browsers need to be consistently updated. As far as I'm concerned, the web itself is almost unusable without an AdBlocker these days. When I'm forced to use IE11 at work, there's at least 3 or 4 ads that surround my content and it slows me down, even on a computer from 2014. It's just too much bloat, complicated code, etc. Windows 98 wasn't coded for this gosh darn modern web. Other than that, running older applications on Windows 98 is indeed much faster than on newer operating systems. Windows 10 is a train wreck and Windows 7 gets more praise than it really deserves since the NT6 architecture is slow and there are times I have more crashes on Windows 7 than I do on Windows 98. If Windows 98 crashes on me today, it's almost always my fault. Now those COM Surrogate errors on Vista/7.....I see no reason for them as they pop up for no reason.

I guess my question here is, are you planning on using the netbook for actual internet browsing or other offline activities? As much as I love 9x, especially Windows 98, using it on the internet is still quite difficult even though we have a few members working hard at trying to get a more functional browser for the operating system. If you're going to do any sort of internet activities on there, I'd recommend Windows 2000 instead for the time being because it would be fully compatible (as long as compatible drivers can be found, which shouldn't be a problem due to it originally using Windows XP) but combined with unofficial updates, you could still use the 52.4.0 esr version of Firefox. Now, if it's just a play computer that you just want to mess around with and don't care what it does, Windows 98 would be perfectly fine to install. How much RAM does it currently have? It seems it comes stock with 1GB which won't trigger the stop screen during bootup (to my knowledge and experience) but if you have more than that, you'll either have to remove some RAM or use RLoew's RAM patch. Windows Me, I believe, can use a little more without modifications but I cannot verify that from my brain alone. Another difference between 98 and Me is that Me handles newer hard disk configurations better. For example, I have a Gigabyte motherboard that I installed Windows 98 on and even though it says it's IDE, has an IDE port, and even IDE mode, I still needed RLoew's SATA patch in order to get it running correctly. Otherwise unless I operated the OS in disk compatibility mode (by disabling all 32-bit drivers via system properties), it would lock up on me during boot. This was the case for an ASRock motherboard which I don't believe I ever got working since it predated me buying the patch and using it, but Windows Me worked just fine without any special modifications. So honestly, depending on your experience, I would go with Me first and see how that works out and then if you're feeling bold or have the hang of it, try 98!

Welcome to MSFN! It seems as though you've got quite a bit of things going on here. If you need any help on something specific, be sure to post about it in the appropriate forum!

Welcome to MSFN! Have a good time and yes, we do discourage shouting. It's hard on our ears (and perhaps our eyes too? I'll have to check on that one. )

Nice to see another diehard Windows 98 user around here. It sounds as though you'd rounded up quite a cache of updates from Microsoft which is good because most of them are non-existent now unless you visit archive.org and muck around there a bit. With printers, I've discovered that HP printers in particular aren't extremely picky at drivers and sometimes you can get newer ones to work with older model drivers. Of course you won't have your high end function drivers, but if you're just looking to print, it will get the job done. In fact when I contacted HP what seems to be quite a few years ago now about my Photosmart working on Windows 2000, he even went out of his way to find a solution for me even though on the box is says a minimum of Windows XP. He said just to use 1 of 2 DeskJet drivers which I cannot remember offhand what they are now unless I go through my emails but with that and being able to use the IP address to remote into the printer and use the scan utility within it, it was fully functional as far as I was concerned. So I'm sure something like this would be possible for Windows 98 as well.