[Win98 from CD loads config from HD installed Windows]

Is it, perchance, this one?

Thanks for the uploads.

Looking inside the archive I can see it is dated 2010-01-06. I think it must be the last version which uses vdk.exe to build a 15mb super floppy. The version 2010-02-14 uses instead bfi.exe to build a 1.44mb bootable floppy image and bfi.exe is W98 compatible and I'm guessing its version 109 (2010-01-15) that is the first to use bfi.exe and the one that is supposed to work "Out of the box", without having to modifiy the build scripts.

[Win98 from CD loads config from HD installed Windows]

I have a Win98LiveCDBuilder_109.7z with date inside 2010-01-15.

Sounds like Jan 2010 must be the working version. Can you upload it please?

[Win98 from CD loads config from HD installed Windows]

"CORE.INI [ApiConfigurations] default=2" doesn't disable KernelEx, but sets the default to Win98+enhancements.

Set this registry value to disable KernelEx by default on apps not explicitly set to another mode:

Kex+.reg------------REGEDIT4[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\KernelEx]"DisableExtensions"=dword:00000001

And to enable:

Kex-.reg------------REGEDIT4[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\KernelEx]"DisableExtensions"=dword:00000000

Thanks for the info. KernelEx could do with them in 2 reg files included in the install folder so people can change it's default setting nice and easily.

[Win98 from CD loads config from HD installed Windows]

Guess you must have missed the preceding Post Links?

http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/140391-windows-98-live-cd-project-update/

Requirements:

-Windows 98 Second Edition CDROM

-Computer with Windows XP, 2K3, vista or Win7

-Virtual PC or VMWare for test your ISO (optional)

WinBuilder Projects inevitably require minimum XP.

BeatZero also posted a screenshot of Winbuilder successfully compiling it on Windows 98. Winbuilder does work on Win98, I have successfully built other projects on Win 98. The problem is not with Winbuilder but with the 3rd party helper tool which builds the 15mb super floppy image vdk.exe.

> I gave it a go on Win 98Se with KernelEx and the result is build failure.

KernelEx told it you were running it on Windows 2000.

Do one of these:

1) uninstall KernelEx

or

2) In %windir%\KernelEx\CORE.INI, set [ApiConfigurations] default=2

then reboot and try again.

Excellent! I was looking for a way to disable KernelEx by default for other purposes.

[Win98 from CD loads config from HD installed Windows]

See what you can get with it, and please report your progresses.

Thanks for the upload. I gave it a go on Win 98Se with KernelEx and the result is build failure.

The project scripts try to shell execute "cmd.exe". There is no such thing as cmd.exe on Windows 98, there is command.exe instead!

Also, it tries to use a program called vdk.exe to build a floppy image. VDK.exe says it runs on WinNT only, not on Win98. The virtual drive cannot be created on Win98, meaning when the script tries to copy files into the virtual floppy image, the result is build failure.

The offending lines:

ShellExecute,Hide,"cmd.exe","/c #$q#$q%Tools%\VDK\VDK.EXE#$q OPEN * #$q%Temp%\WIN98\WIN98.IMG#$q /L:%pScrollBox61% /RW#$q#$q"//ShellExecute,Hide,"imdisk.exe"," -a -f #$q%Temp%\WIN98\WIN98.IMG#$q -m %pScrollBox61%:#$q"FileCopy,"%Work%\*.*","%pScrollBox61%:\"FileCopy,"%Work%\DOS\*.*","%pScrollBox61%:\DOS\"FileCopy,"%Work%\WIN98\*.*","%pScrollBox61%:\WIN98\"FileCopy,"%Tools%\MENU.LST","%Temp%\"FileCopy,"%Tools%\GRLDR","%Temp%\"ShellExecute,Hide,"cmd.exe","/c #$q#$q%Tools%\VDK\VDK.EXE#$q CLOSE * /F#$q#$q"//ShellExecute,Hide,"imdisk.exe"," -D -m %pScrollBox61%:#$q"

It needs a Win 98 compatible way to build the floppy image.

[Win98 from CD loads config from HD installed Windows]

This should be the last version that I actually tested and built successfully:

http://reboot.pro/topic/10373-winbuilder-running-on-windows-98/?p=130617

If you want to have a go at it, I can upload it somewhere and provide you a link to it.

Yes please, if you could upload the last working version that would be great!

[Win98 from CD loads config from HD installed Windows]

But it seems to me that there is *something* "wrong" in the way you build your "bootable Windows 98 CD", at the time there were not such issues that I can remember and I doubt - no offence intended - that you managed to build a working 98 from the latest Winbuilder project, as that is seemingly "botched" :

The original thread on MSFN:

http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/140391-windows-98-live-cd-project-update/

Latest version is here (but it has seemingly "issues")

http://reboot.pro/topic/10373-winbuilder-running-on-windows-98/

Yes it is botched. The latest Winbuilder project (August 2011) couldn't even complete the build on W98. It had the following problems:

1) Changing the screen resolution preference in the GUI causes the 01-WIN98_BASE.script to become truncated to 64kb, resulting in build failure. The way around this is to change the resolution preference manually in a text editor such as PSPad. A longer term solution would be to put the preferences and GUI into a sepereate smaller script less then 64kb, so truncation won't be a problem.

2) Build failure occurs when the script fails to find explorer.exe in the Win98LiveCD\APP_TMP\Win95Shell\ folder. The solution is to add the following lines to 01-WIN98_BASE.script at the point directly above where it looks for explorer.exe

ShellExecute,Hide,"%Tools%\7za.exe","x #$q%SourceDir%\win98\WIN98_22.CAB#$q explorer.exe -y -o#$q%BaseDir%\Temp\Win98LiveCD\APP_TMP\Win95Shell\#$q"ShellExecute,Hide,"%Tools%\7za.exe","x #$q%SourceDir%\win98\WIN98_22.CAB#$q shell32.dll -y -o#$q%BaseDir%\Temp\Win98LiveCD\APP_TMP\Win95Shell\#$q"

3) The 01-Finalize Image.Script stage maxes out the computers ram because the script uses default 7zip compression settings and 7zip is appalling with ram usage. The solution is to change the 7zip compression settings to lower compression level in 01-Finalize Image.Script by adding -mx1 parameter. (The resulting windows.7z file will now be 10mb instead of 9mb, but will compress in ~10seconds rather than 1hr.)

ShellExecute,Hide,"%Tools%\7za.exe","a #$q%WIN98%\Windows.7z#$q -y -mx1 #$q%targetDir%\WINDOWS\#$q"ShellExecute,Hide,"%Tools%\7za.exe","a #$q%WIN98%\Windows.7z#$q -y -mx1 #$q%TargetDir%\*.*#$q"ShellExecute,Hide,"%Tools%\7za.exe","a #$q%WIN98%\Windows.7z#$q -y -mx1 #$q%TargetDir%\Programas\#$q"

4) mkisofs hangs at the stage where the iso is to be made because the version of mkisofs supplied with the project is not compatible with Windows 98. The solution is to replace the mkisofs with another version supplied on a 2008 edition of UltimateBootCD.

Making the above modifications will cause the most recent Winbuilder project to successfully build on Windows 98. However on booting from the CD, it suffers from the same problem Telop decribed. It starts loading windows from the installed hard drive instead of the CD and complains about missing DLLs and gets stuck in a loop on the choose screen display resolution dialog.

I tried an earlier WinBuilder project dated Feb 2010 off archive.org however, build failure occured on this project too, complaining that explorer.exe not found, as described in #2 above.

Which is the last version of Win98 live boot CD that actually works?