Thanks Jacklaz! I will keep this in mind as an alternative before scrapping if I wont get USB to work properly.
I was now able to install the USB drivers this way:
- Used WinRar to open latest U98SESP3.exe and from within it the SP3.CAB file from which I have obtained U98SEUSB.EXE
- On the retro rig, I have booted into WXP, connected USB stick and saved the U98SEUSB.EXE file onto my FAT32 D: drive which is accessible under W98 as well
- Restored a fresh partition of W98 with RLoew RAM patch already applied
- Disconnected all USB devices. Only PS/2 keyboard remains connected now (a must have)
- Booted into the W98 partition
- Pressed ESC during all driver prompts during W98 boot
- Boot, escape all driver prompts
- Copied U98SEUSB.EXE from D: to desktop
- Installed U98SEUSB.EXE from desktop, selected Windows drivers (not VIA) in the installer
- Boot into BIOS and disable USB
- Boot into safe mode and remove 3 things. If it freezes, simply reboot and repeat until successful (can easily take around 10 reboots sometimes). Always click Properties first and give the computer a few seconds to warm up between each click (could be placebo). Start removing the 3 things from bottom of the list of unknown devices going up. These 3 things will not necessarily be on the bottom of the list so look around.
- Boot into BIOS and enable USB
- Connect USB mouse (and no other USB devices! just mouse!)
- Boot, escape all driver prompts EXCEPT anything USB related which you install/finish while clicking YES when asked if you want to "keep the newer file".
- When on W98 desktop plug in USB keyboard and install/finish while clicking YES when asked if you want to "keep the newer file".
- When on W98 desktop plug in USB flash stick drive (mass storage device) and install as above or simply verify if it works fine straight from the start (did for me)
Now that being out of the way, I am still stuck in a driver hell that is W98 because I cant seem to be able to install NVIDIA FX1300 drivers now (worked fine before). I have tried various drivers, both EXE and manual HAVE DISK method, both normal and safe mode, nothing... It appears as everything installed okay but its either not working or OS auto-reboots upon startup. Its probably a HW conflict (IRQ? addressing?) and I dont have any experience with that. Hopefully I will get that going eventually and will report back if these new USB drivers actually fixed the ingame issues I was having or not.