Gansangriff

Big recommendation for Teamspeak 2, if it's for voice chat between Windows PCs of all ages. Despite being super old, Teamspeak 2 works even on Windows 10, as well as good old Windows 98. The system requirements are ridiculously low. The codecs are ridiculously outdated (some of them convert your voice to mysterious art!), but they're efficent. Still many public servers are up and running and self-hosting is possible as well. What a nice software. Teamspeak 2 Download: http://teamspeak2.bplaced.net/neue_seite_3.htm

Retrozilla displays the site forum.aviaskins.com fine here on my Windows 98 machine. Maybe there are some language packs missing on your Windows 95 installation. Well, I don't know the path on Windows 95, but on Windows 98, you can go to the Control Panel -> Software -> Windows Setup. There is a list of optional packages that come on the original Windows CD. I have a category there for foreign language support. Maybe installing that helps?

You could change the background of the whole page to black (Format -> Background), then change the font colour to white. Or if you don't want the whole page to be black, you could create a text box, double click the borders to get to the format settings, and set that colour to black.

@UCyborg: For Armagetron, it's different. The developers don't test it specifically on old computers. Armagetron is rather old in its codebase and is based on an old version of SDL. There is a plan to upgrade things, but hopefully the main developer will be as slow as ever! You probably have to tune down the graphics on a Pentium 3 to make it look fluent, but firstly: Armagetron has lots of options in the graphics menu and secondly: In such a low-poly game, there is not much lost. 100 FPS on the P3 is possible!

Most programs work in any way, regardless of having a Windows 98 First Edition, Second Edition or 98lite- or KernelEx-enhanced version. If OS version dependant problems occur for one chap running FE and the other running SE-KernelEx, it will be little effort to look for the actual version being in use. I felt the "vanilla" in the thread title had the nice taste of vanilla ice cream on the tongue. Although Win98 tastes either way well, the basic 1998 version and the patched "current" version. Anyways, this thread was good so far for bringing together the 10 people of around the world that use this obsolete technology and want to write/ask things about it. Surely the 10 could be split up into 4 98SE-vanillas, 2 FE-robusts, 2 98patch-Hightechies and 2 98-BETA-stoneagers... Cross-talk between these groups probably was helpful!

My hands are falling off only, when I have to do boring things on my computer. But else, I don't need any good keyboard and continue with old, scrappy keyboards, even a 10 hour programming session. Just the Ctrl key was annoyingly stuck and I've regreased it like a bicycle. Now the keystrokes flow again. With a Windows 98 machine, there is not much to complain about. It just works perfectly reliable. Well, except for the occasional hang-ups that Windows 98 has, but restarting always helps. At least since 22 years... I think the difference between 98 and 98SE is small. Most programs and hardware runs on both, if it supports one of the two. Here, I wanted to show you this: A currently working Windows 98 online game. Armagetron! (https://www.armagetronad.org/) Free Software. Competitive Snake. Very raw game. Left, right, brake, look around, that's all. Pure skill (and lag perception). To become good at this game against other human players, you probably need serious autism! Works on a Pentium 2. If you like to have a look at Armagetron, this video shows it well: https://invidious.snopyta.org/watch?v=x8HY0Wh_ZgE Quote Wunderbar98: " i resemble that (grumpy old dinosaur). Why not, there's lots to be grumpy about. Anyone who used good old hardware and software back in the day can see where things have led. " Ah, relatable attitude. Will go extinct, but at least we pointed the finger at bad changes and were right. Sigh, probably the old machines will be the best option to do computing stuff in the next years, too. If you play with me Armagetron, we'll form a group called the "Windows 98 Dinosaurs" and shock all these Discord kids with proper technology, haha!

This is awfully confusing. Although modem / router / switch are different things, their words are often used wrongly. Maybe check this site for more information: https://www.cables-solutions.com/switch-vs-router-vs-modem-difference.html So Hotwire is your internet provider? You have to ask them, if you are allowed to use your own router. It depends on the laws in your country. If your router is missing the option for Wifi, then you could connect a simple Access Point to your router. They are very cheap. Also, think about using a very long LAN cable.

Yahoo Mail is a funny case. If you throw half of the site in the bin, you can actually access the mail without any layout styling at all in your Windows 98 webbrowser (for example Netscape 9.0.0.6), looking perfectly naked (see the image in the attachments). A textbrowser would probably load the site too. Hosts file entries will kill connections to the listed sites (look at C:\Windows\hosts): 127.0.0.1 ads.yahoo.com 127.0.0.1 geo.yahoo.com 127.0.0.1 yahoo.ivwbox.de 127.0.0.1 csc.beap.bc.yahoo.com 127.0.0.1 beap-bc.yahoo.com 127.0.0.1 geo.yahoo.com 127.0.0.1 y.analytics.yahoo.com 127.0.0.1 ad.yieldmanager.com 127.0.0.1 ivwbox.de 127.0.0.1 yui.yahooapis.com 127.0.0.1 ir2.beap.gemini.yahoo.com 127.0.0.1 eu-central-1.onemobile.yahoo.com (I probably missed some servers, that need to be blocked.) I've some old trash account there, when phone verification didn't exist. It keeps asking for a phone number since 10 years or so, but that can be skipped and access was always possible without phone number. Actually, this Seamonkey-Retrozilla has a very good mail client onboard, that supports some newer ciphers. You can start it with "retrozilla.exe -mail" (use the command line or create a starter for this). Version 2.2 works for my Posteo account on an ancient Windows 98 machine. However with that password loop that you're getting, it seems that your settings (outgoing mail and incoming mail need to be configured seperately) are wrong. Although your provider could be an a** too and have shut the option for unencrypted, SSL3, TLS1.0, TLS1.1... hope you get at least TLS1.2! Play around with the ports too. Although setting it to what your mail providers says in the documentation, should do the job. However in some cases, there is more than one port possible.

A decision is a decision, even if it comes out of nowhere. Last words... ehm, occasionally I did behave like an angry goose storming into battle. But everyone threatened stood his ground and so there were plenty of interesting discussions. Congratulations and thank you to all of you for sharing lots of knowledge here on MSFN! But which forum will be the centre of discussions about running old computers now? Vogons.org? Maybe board.eclipse.cx?

Shame on Germany. Shame on Russia. Shame on Ukraine. I wish all leading politicans of these countries to die from a heart attack. Dammit, won't happen.

Vokoscreen was a very good pick on Linux (on lightweight hardware), but a Windows version exists too. https://linuxecke.volkoh.de/vokoscreen/vokoscreen-download.html Free software. (Edit: However I just noticed it was the older Vokoscreen version 2.5.0, but that one was excellent on this small Linux notebook)

There are definetly smaller desktops missing in discounters, that sometimes offer computers. A small desktop, maybe even with passive cooling, would be more than enough what most people ever need. I remember very well these discussions in my last school year in 2011, that desktops will be the dinosaurs soon, they are too large, too complicated to set up, too many cables, not beautiful enough, impractical basically. Unfortuneatly some people have experienced the computer as frustrating, clicked on the wrong website once, next virus blows the system up. Too complicated, too many possible errors. A walled garden with these Appstores on the smartphones (on Linux too), that's more restrictive, "but at least I can't do anything wrong". That's what easy users prefer, so the desktop was on the decline on the mass-market. I know some people, who just use their devices for communicating via Whatsapp and Mail (short messages), videos are played over the smart TV. No PC required anymore. Writing surely is not as precise as on a keyboard, but for short messages, people seem to suffer past it. And the large keyboard (looking disastoursly complex, over 100 keys, only one short step away from the stoneage typewrites) can't rest on my lap while I'm doing yoga poses in front of my TV! And now the killer argument: I can't decide to turn on the computer! It feels like such a big task! Whereas the smartphone is always on. That's easier to check. Dammed, how lazy can people be, to be too lazy to turn on the computer! And if mobile games are enough (or gaming consoles)... well then, the PC truely lost its purpouse in some homes. Let's say, it happens, even for younger people here. Not everyone wants to build things with technology or to learn deeper things, we always have to consider that. The PC will be only dead, if an atomic bomb explodes and all electrics will be cut. Else, it's a device far too universal and useful to become extinct.

If it's a hardware failure, you could also try and boot up another OS. I'd use a Puppy Linux Live CD. If there is no sound on startup ("woof woof"), the speakers are probably broken. Unless something is disabled in the BIOS settings... did you have a look there? Did you work with Live CDs already? Feel free to ask.

What kind of computer do you have? A laptop? A desktop with in-built speakers? Where would the audio come out normally? Have a look at the control panel under "Sounds and Audio devices" (might be translated differently). Maybe there are different pre-settings for your headphones and your normal audio output. Check if anything is muted accidently. Also try different applications. Maybe it's just a bad setting in the video / audio program that you are using. Do you have no sound at every program?

What about other "googles"? google.de, google.fr, etc. Do these load? Which version of Mypal are you using? Type "about:" in your browser, that should give us more informations.