Windashnet

I think you have basically missed the whole point of KernalEX and that is to keep an old system usable without spending a zillion dollars on a new version of windows. KernalEX works with a wide and varied collection of software, it doesn't support everything, but it does support a hell of a lot of Apps that have basically dumped support for older operating systems. (some of the different software that works is listed right on the first page of this thread first page second post Everything that says fixed is working, if you go threw this whole thread you will see tons of apps, but what you really need to do is install KernalEx on your old windows 98/ME system and see what works, then if something doesn't work ask questions here and people can tell you how to do things.) Even a lot of apps that say they support an older windows system will not work, So KernalEX is a much needed add on to help keep an older system working. Perfection does not exist in the software world, sure there are some apps that don't work with KernalEX, but a lot of the problems I've seen are related to problems other than KernalEX, which is a hell of a lot more then you can say for most of microsofts patches. As to the browser bit, well I think a lot more of that ends up on the KernalEX thread because those who update their browser at every new iteration are well to put it nicely not very computer literate and they think installing every new browser iteration is going to protect them from all the nasty critters running wild on the net, which they don't. Most of the panic is caused by company's out to make money, who want people to install new browsers, so their new advertising works, that's why all the problems happened in the first place, company's installing "features" to force people to view advertising, this is what allows all the nasty bugs to infect computers in the first place. The newest HTML5 flock has been so they can put more trackers on peoples computers, so they can target you with even more advertising. As to IPV6 well that is more of a USA government push, so they will have an exact location for every internet connection world wide, if you read up on the critter its all about assigning a unique IP number to every single person and device world wide, not just an update of IPV4. And there is a IPV6 winsock for older systems, but as someone said any current router(built into most cable and DSL modems) can already do IPV4 to IPV6 translation, so you don't need IPV6 on your computer anyway. I'm gona tell you something else, that's going to happen, unless people do some serious contacting of their representatives and get laws passed to make the net free and that is we will all get taxed directly for everything we do on the net, for each e-mail, for each picture, for every video clip, in short a tax on everything. They have been wanting to tax people directly for web use for a while now and tried to get a law threw in the USA, I think they have tried in England and I'm sure other places. Back the the topic of this thread, KernalEX is a great product, even more so when you consider its free, it may have a few bugs but I haven't seen them on my two old computers. That said, sure not everything works on it, but tell me a piece of a similar kind of software that everything works with it, I'll bet you can't find any. The big company's can't make software that works on every machine, with every set of hardware, with every set of installed software, etc. So why complain of free software that works pretty dang good at what it was designed to do. The is only one thing I would like to see for KernalEX and that is better documentation, but I can't complain, doc's are time consuming, hell I have been thinking of weeding threw this thread and the other KernalEX thread and making my own set of docs by gleaning the needed info and pruning out all the rest but I've started a couple of times and just kina put it off. Anyway I have rambeled a bit too much, but one final thought and that is ... To commend Xeno86 again for all his many many many hours of hard work.

You're right, it's fine in IE6, at least as far as the fonts go. It looks a right mess in other ways, but I guess that's because the site doesn't support IE6 any more! Thanks, I think I may take it up on the Opera user forum, as it looks pretty certain it's nothing to do with KernelEx. I still think it's strange that the problem only shows in Windows 98 and not in Windows XP though! That's because I have a custom button there to launch the displayed page in IE if it doesn't appear to work properly in Opera! A lot of the time they don't display properly in IE either, but sometimes they do. I have seen web pages that do the same thing you are talking about but I'm using Firefox. I don't use Opera but if it has the same options as Firefox, you may be running into a page that has some weird "character encoding" with more than one character set used on the same page. On Firefox you can manually change the setting under the "View" menu "character encoding" option, Opera should have something similar somewhere. Most pages use "Western (ISO-8859-1)" or "Unicode (UTF-8)" but there are others. I think if you can find the option on Opera and change the "character encoding" to a different one (such as "Central European(Windows-1250)" or maybe "Western(Western-1252)", etc. ) when you see the weird characters displayed, Changing to the right character set should fix the text displayed. Some of the alternate character sets are installed when you install "Multilanguage Support" in the windows "Control Panel", "Add/Remove Programs", "windows setup", "Multilanguage Support". I think you can also download other code sets from microsofts web site, but since your looking for win98 stuff it will be buried. Anyway just an idea, hope it helps.

I think this is a great idea! I don't have much money but I'd at least drop a little in the kitty and buy Xeno86 a 12 pack of beer or a case of pop for all he's done, its not enough but I can't afford to give him what its really worth. If I had real money I'd toss him a couple of hundred grand just for keeping money out of that old robber baron Gate's pocket.

I believe there is a add-on for just what you are talking about. What I'm refering too is small apps that you can add to firefox these are not part of firefox by default. That's why they are called add-ons, they used to be called plugins. They are real small for the most part in the 200k or less range and add feature or modifie the way firefox works to fit the users needs and wants. Its a very powerful feature that makes firefox much better then it is by default. Here are a couple of add-on's that look like they mite do what you want, but you should look threw the add-ons to find one that's best for you. password tote lastpass password manager

Hey there. Have you looked at the firefox add-on's section? If I'm decoding your post properly, you want saved passwords and auto-logon to web sites, and saving bookmarks, and I think things like auto opening of a set of pages you look at often, and some other features in a browser for win98. I use firefox 3.6 on winME with KernlEX and have lots of add-on's to do all sorts of things. I can tell you the firefox add-on's section has something for just about everyone. Just look threw the add-on's and I'm sure you can find add-on's to do what you want to do. You can add the capability to use internet explorer short cuts directly, run ad blockers, run daily load these tabs, have preview pics of web links, download all images on a page, etc. etc. etc.and on and on. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/ Sometimes the newest stuff isn't the best stuff, no matter how many flashy ad's they throw at you.

I was not aware that going from a .04 to a .10 was a major update, I figured it was just a security patch or bug fix, it was a long time ago the last time I messed with Linux. I had seen a distro to turn an old box into a hardware firewall but so far I haven't got that installed. I have played with a couple of live cd's and a linux on windows but those were just fire it up and see what it is kina deals not really using it. I installed ubuntu 11.04 a couple of times before finding out the installer has a couple of issues, but once I searched around and got a little info, every thing was working well. I got wine working(This was simpler then it was last time I played around with it.) and loaded a bit of windows software I didn't have a good linux alternative for. This also worked fairly well once I downloaded a config app for wine to easily change things around till I figured what worked best. Ubuntu 11.10 is not a "god I got to shoot this computer its so slow", Nothing like some peoples windows boxes, ware they have updated to win 7 on a 500Mhz or something stupid, just kina like its busy doing something in the background all the time(I seriously hate computers doing things I don't know about.). I'll take your advice and ask a few questions over at the ubuntu forums and see if I can find any more info. I had looked into the smaller linux distro's but I heard that ubuntu 11.04 should work fine on that box, so I tried it and it was just as fast as winMe on that box and faster then winXP. I was actually quit surprised as originally I figured I'd have to use an old or striped linux distro as I can't live with "click this wait a day, click that wait a day ....), cripes I have no idea how people can stand a computer like that. I'll keep those other distro's you mentioned in mind, I may play around with them one of these days. The fix for whatever is slowing up the box will probably be some cryptic terminal fix or something. I had to use a couple of those already for DVD playing and to get the scroll bars back (I hate those scroll spot things, who ever thought that one up should be shot.). I looked around on google but no luck there(It mite be just knowing how to word it though.). I actually have had real good luck getting all the newer codex's installed on ubuntu, only had to look for a couple of ones to install other then those ubuntu's built in media player loads off the net. I got a couple of video files I never did get working on windows to play on the ubuntu player. Only media issue that I have not found a fix for is VLC. I got used to using it as a media player on winME but the ubuntu version is slower then hell, many videos are like slide shows. I've been thinking of loading the windows version of VLC in wine and see how it works. Thanks for your help.

Yea I'll have to try that, thanks. I've just had good luck getting real usable answers here, whereas many of the other computer forums tend to be full of well shall we say less then usable ideas. I was also on here tonight looking at a post on the KernelEX thread and saw there is a linux thread here so figured I'd ask a few questions.

I clicked the update button kina on accident in ubuntu 11.04 and updated to ubuntu 11.10. I notice it seems much slower, anyone else notice this? I was looking for an updated app and kina said what the hell and clicked the update before my brain engaged. I really didn't expect a problem with a minor update in linux. I guess it shows how close to windows its getting. Now it works just like windows, update and barf. Well I guess its not quite windows, it still works just a lot slower, windows would have been a BSOD(AKA the dreaded "blue screen of death".). It could be my computer which while faster then the min supported is getting a bit long in the tooth. It is just a 2.66Ghz P4 Socket478, ATI9550+, 1Gig ram, so its not a speed demon. Its not that its horribly slow but 11.04 was faster and I would rather it be faster then have all the latest bells and whistles, but on the otherhand I'm not in the mood to reformat and reinstall either.

I am wondering if it is possible to use different desktops such as Unity, KDE, X, etc. on different workspace's and swap between them with the workspace switcher in ubuntu 11.10?

I got an update notice in my e-mail, I see you have an updated version. This is great as it looks like you are working on a bug I'm having with a stupid LG DVD rewriter, it has securedisc on it and that may be why it isn't working so far. I got it for $12.00, so its not a big loss if it is a bad drive. I thought it was just a driver issue, and I got a question to LG support(I'm still waiting for a reply.). If its some securdisc problem then at least I'll know what it is. Its acting weird, as it recognizes a CD\DVD but won't read. Thanks for KernalEx its a great project! We need more people in the world who do things to help people. Plus I love keeping money out of microsofts greedy coffers.

HTML5 is not even a standard yet. Firefox3.5 supports some parts of HTML5. Here is a link to some info from Mozilla, developers of firefox. https://developer.mozilla.org/en/HTML/HTML5 But my guess is your not having a HTML5 problem, what you are most likely running into is a page that uses some weird internet explorer non-standard HTML. There are several firefox plugins for that. Get the IEtabplus plugin/add-on for firefox. There are other IE plugins but I think that is the simplest one. You get a button to open a page in a IE tab but still get much of the web safety you get from firefox.

I don't think there is anyway your gona run windows and linux at the same time on that box. You could possibly get some windows apps to work on an older linux under wine, but even there is going to be real slow. There is a linux firewall app that will run on a very old pc which you can probably find for just about nothing at a thrift store, that you can use as a firewall appliance putting the linux box between your pc and an external cable or DSL modem. As to small linux you don't even have to install linux to use it, there are live CD versions. Here is a site with a list of small linux's. http://bengross.com/smallunix/ go down past the embeded versions Also you can look up info and URL's for linux here http://distrowatch.com/ Now if you are just wanting to run firefox semi-safely, nothing in the windows world is 100%, you can get one of the old firewall apps for that old PC from sites like these http://www.oldapps.com/ http://www.oldversion.com/ or the regular shareware sites like http://win.softpedia.com/ http://download.cnet.com/windows/ http://www.tucows.com/downloads?hp=A2 Tucows used to keep old versions for a long time, but I see today they have changed things a bit, so I have to look around again and see whats changed. And then I recommend for you to get plugins(Add_on's) for firefox https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/ First off get adblockplus plugin. Get the killjasmin plugin. Get quickjava plugin and use it to turn off java, flash, and silverlight, only turn these on on trusted sites this plugin puts little click buttons on the firefox status bar to enable disable several options, I also disable java-script when accessing a page that I don't know about, this plugin will do just about as much to protect a machine as a firewall does. Get the activestopbutton plugin this is just a good idea if a site does something weird stop it and dump it. Now if you want to get rid of other things you can get plugins like refspoof or useragentswitcher which you can use to send other then your machine info, these also will cause some sites not to work, and change the way some sites look, so there not for everyone. One note not all plugins work together, and even if they work together they may need to load in a certain way, if you get a problem disable a plugin and then re-enable it, this will change the load order and fix some conflicts, but I have ran into bugs ware I had to disable almost all my plugins and then re-enable them, so beware. If there is some other problem you are having, there is most likely a plugin for it, some plugins need updated regularly like adblockplus, others are best left alone if they are working for you, as sometimes a new version is not a better one, you can also get a plugin to save your plugins to installable files. I can't find the name right off but just do a search on firefox plugins page and you will find a few, I have a couple of different ones loaded one to do a full backup and another to save the plugins locally. Anyway I hope this gives you a few ideas, I hate to say it but people can be a bit of well shall we say problems when you ask about stuff for machines they think are due for the trash bin, me I am a packrat and keep everything, plus I don't think old machines belong in the trash, hell they work just as well as the day they were made, they just need new uses.

I really like KernalEx and have been surprised at how well it really does work, I am like you in that if something works well, I don't upgrade until I have too, but I was having problem with firefox 2 as many sites are forcing upgrades as they have put in code to make pages not work in older browsers, you can turn off style sheets, etc(get the quickjava plugin for firefox) and see some these pages, but its a pain as it goes back to the old web and things don't look as polished, on the other hand it kills most of the ad's. I usually set new app installers to native windows ME mode and see if the app installs and if not then I set KernalEx to XP mode on the installer file and then everything I have gotten to work, which is almost everything I have tried(I don't use opera, so can't be specific on that one though) has worked with out any problems. With KernalEx firefox 3, up threw 3.6.13 works well, at least for me, and fixes a few of the recent 2.x web page problems, So firefox 3 mite be a good choice for a second browser to use with the older Opera untill things get fixed. You will have to get many new plugins to replace ones that worked on 2.x but won't on 3.x as they have put the "fix" in on firefox to stop the older ones from working, luckily most all plugn developers have already got their plugins fixed for firefox 3.x. Something you mite want to look into is replaced windows DLL files(not addin ones, but default ones that are replaced), I have run into problems with DLL's being replaced by some apps and the replacements not working well, what I have done is expand all the DLL's out of the windows install cab files so I can see if a changed DLL is causing problems with things this can fix a lot of stability problems also interrupt sharing can be a major stability problem for all versions of windows. The MFC42 DLL was a biggie on graphics apps at one time, this got fixed latter as most apps just included a renamed version that worked with their software. Another little snag I have ran into on DLL's, that causes stability problems, is different DLL versions in different places in the windows DIR's(like having one version in windows, and another in system, etc.). Anyway just trying to help out. And to the developers of KernalEx, Thanks, its great software, I hope you can support it for a long while to come. Microsoft needs to learn that $200 for a proper copy of windows is too much, some of us aren't made of money.

I haven't been able to find version 2.5.197 anywhere. However, I did find a copy of 2.5.195, and I can confirm it crashes (unhandled exception) instantly when you select "Print" from the menu. Nothing shows in 'wintop', so it seems the crash is within the 'PDF XChange Viewer' package itself. In other words, 2.5.195 (and presumably 2.5.197) aren't entirely compatible, even with the help of KernelEx 4.5.1. Joe. I think the problems with the newer web browsers are intentional on the developers part either threw deals with microsoft or indirectly by using microsoft programing apps. I notice firefox 3.x is different between the version I use with KernelEx and the one I'm using on ubuntu linux in the way some pages with "protection" for images, advertising, etc. I have to have a plugin on the windows version but not on the linux firefox. I also note between firefox 2.x and 3.x on windows many of my plugins were disabled that get rid of advertising popups and popdowns , etc. luckily most of the plugins had updates to fix the changes made to firefox between 2.x and 3.x that re-enabled the crapvertising.

Hey just a thought here but have you tried shutting off other apps, including tray apps like the message suggests? Also have you tried updating direct x or using a different video card or different drivers? Shutting down apps doesn't change anything. Version 2.5.197 works. Versions 2.5.198 and 2.5.199 don't open the pdf files. It was just a thought, many times newer apps are larger and have more DLL's, etc. and sometimes just fail because there isn't enough resources to support them. Anyway I just figured I'd mention it, so you don't go wasting time tracking down something that isn't broke. I have this friend who's wife thinks she needs to load every stupid IM client, and a bunch of other background apps, and her problem almost always ends up being a problem with available resources when she gets a new app. I go over, shut down all the stuff that doesn't need to be loading, and everything works perfectly. Also with most apps, any change that is just in the last portion of the version number, it is usually just minor bug fixes and not a major reworking. Sorry to cause you a problem, its just the error was so explicit in that it said there was a resource problem I thought looking at conflicts and resource hogs mite get the bug fixed, but anyway just ignore my post(s).

Hey just a thought here but have you tried shutting off other apps, including tray apps like the message suggests? Also have you tried updating direct x or using a different video card or different drivers?

I've seen this problem in windows that doesn't have kernalEX installed, I think it is a base memory problem in windows.

Hey is there an edited version of this thread or a way to download the whole thing as a single file with out going to each page and downing it and then putting the whole mess togther and then editing it.. I would like to either be able to prune out all the extraneous stuff and just have a list of how to use, what works, what doesn't work but works if you do this, what doesn't work with no idea how to fix it, and what will never work, ..... basicailly a simple users guide.

There is another internal option on windows 95/98/ME to use a large hard drive, that is a special IDE or SATA controller such as those made by Maxtor/Promise and other company's or a SCSI controller. I have a Maxtor IDE card (ATA133) (these were originally sold by Promise) it supports IDE drives threw 750gig directly, it shows up under windows as a SCSI controller which doesn't have the file size limitation that a reg IDE controler has. I also have a VIA SATA\IDE card it also shows up as a SCSI in windows, I have a 1Terabyte SATA drive and a 750Gigabyte SATA drive and a 320Gigabyte IDE running on win ME. Plus A 20gig boot drive and a DVD writer on the primary controller, so I know this works. These are cheap on E-bay, I paid $3.00 with free shipping for the new VIA card I have, Maxtor/promise cards are a bit more, but have more options like being boot-able, the VIA isn't. Also make sure the card you pick has drivers for win95/98/ME as some don't. Oh and one note: You may have to disable one of your on-board IDE ports to use these cards, and note on the Maxtor ATA133 cards you need to use port2 first and only use port1 only if using more than two drives. SCSI Drives were able to go over the 1Terabyte as a single partition threw LUN spanning of multiple SCSI drives, so large drives are directly supported on SCSI under windows 95/98/ME, so no patches, you may have to partition on over 1Terabyte though, but I don't have a drive larger than 1Terabyte so I can't speak about that. Win95 and some versions of win98 may need additional win drivers. You can download software from most of the hard drive manufacturers to partition and setup those large hard drives under win95/98/ME if you don't know how to do it the old fashioned way. This software will also work on USB attached drives, well at least the Maxtor and Western Digital software, no clue on other brands, I won't use Seagate as they fail way too fricken often, Hitachi's support is a bit less than I liked and their drives seem to be a bit slow but seem to keep working so far as I've seen, I saw problems with Samsung on both speed and reliability. Maxtor software will work on other brand drives as long as a Maxtor drive is in the system. I'll have to see what happens with Maxtor now that Seagate has them, best get any software you need from Maxtor as Seagate mite not have it online for long. I recommend the Western Digital green drives, they run cooler and if you have a system you can see the speed difference on them from a blue or black version, you have a hell of a lot better drive controller than most boards have. Most of the external USB SATA drives work fine under win95/98/ME but may need drivers from one of the older IDE USB drives you can get off the manufacturer's web sites. These drivers can fix the hard drive shut down problem under windows with some on board USB controlers. Also you may have to install a USB card and disable the on board USB ports, I have had good luck in boards with this problem to use the ALI 2port USB card, you can get these cheap used on E-bay, some people may need the ALI USB fix patch for everything to work right.