Eck

Unskilled users need to be skilled at one thing: reading. And maybe: posting questions in a legible manner. That's about it. Each project is described nicely by the authors as to what it contains and anyone who reads the information in the various sticky posts and others should be able to decide which packages are for them and which would be redundant if used together with other packages. Anyone sticking to a no longer supported by the manufacturer operating system should be aware that they will now need to get minimally skilled, as the resources and updates for that operating system as well as any technical support are now only provided by volunteers giving of their free time. This is much like users who choose to use free software that is unsupported (although much is, a user has available some which is not). They must adjust to not being able to yell at the creators if something is not understandable or they haven't easily gotten to work something they'd like to. They will need to learn where to ask, who to ask, and to do some reading on their own. No one expects technician levels of knowledge to be necessary and it isn't. Only a minimal amount of research into their particular needs is necessary and our volunteers should not be required to cater to their target users in the same way that they would be expected to if they were selling a new, fully supported operating system and update packs. So I believe that if one wants or needs to use Windows 9x systems, they are in the realm of an advanced, experimental user nowadays. This is the case because the makers have flown the coup. If they want it super easy they need to purchase a currently supported computer pre-loaded with a currently supported operating system and the same with the software and hardware they'd like to add to it. Then they can contact someone and have a legitimate complaint if something is just too hard to understand or doesn't work as advertised. It's time to RTFM!

Gosh, that's a lot of users no matter the percentage. Yet, few find there way here from what I read in the threads as far as new posters. It's a nice feeling to read threads from folks we've been getting help from, chatting with for years and it's nice that it's kind of a small group. However that doesn't say much for the poor PCs and users of same that receive advice that I've read on other popular computer forums to either upgrade if they can, 98 is unsafe on the net, or advice on just getting to Windows Update right away and get whatever measure of performance and security by using that service. Unfortunately Windows Update was abandoned for 9x WHILE Windows 98 was supported. Updates were never fixed that were broken and less and less important security and bug fix updates that were released for XP were backported to install on 9x. The folks giving advice are still directing users there, and only some suggest Gape's Service Pack. Often they give links to older, obsolete versions of that Service Pack as well. As much as I enjoy the cozy environment here, those folks (millions of them?) really need to get themselves over here and get their systems security patched and optimized. Unless they enjoy using the sort of bug infested, spyware infiltrated, hopelessly slow computers that herbalist and other technicians have likely encountered out in the field. But who's going to let those folks know about this place if so many tech advice articles and forums either diss 98SE or offer uneducated advice that may have been sort of acceptable back 7 years ago but is not applicable today? Microsoft is no longer the place to go for Windows 98SE support, but still that's where most are directed to. That Windows 98 Still Alive Campaign was a nice idea, but it didn't seem to get enough notice. No one expects a raising of market share. But those that still have this 9x thing should be directed to options that will get the most possible out of it.

Wow! I didn't know the usage was still around 20%. Myself, I just jumped on board 98SE again having used it in Virtual Machines for a while and having a Vista/Linux dual boot. I changed that to a 98SE/Linux dual boot as my old computer is not really best equipped for Vista with just a gig of ram, 400MB FSB and the older AthlonXP3200 processor. It's okay, but hard drive churning is a result of lots of cache use. I just didn't want to wear out another hard drive. And I prefer 98SE to either XP or Vista anyway. Figure that if Windows is my 2nd OS I might as well enjoy the experience while using it. Yeah, I miss a few newer software things but really not too much. And virtual machine use was not satisfying with no Direct 3D. So here I am. And I think this board and its list of stickies is just fine. There's a thread there with links to various different update sources and things available for 98SE users. I think it's a good thing for there to be different choices as far as update packages are concerned. Like different Linux distributions, this gives a user the opportunity to choose one that serves his/her individual needs best. I prefer Auto-Patcher along with separate installations of 98SE2ME, 98MP10, NUSB, EXPLOR98.EXE, Maximus-Decim MDAC (although that's going into the Auto-Patcher soon) and the 891711 ani cursor thing. Others will prefer Maximus-Decim packs or Gape's venerable Unofficial Service Pack. There are still folks who just don't want Internet Explorer's latest and Windows Media Player's latest, Direct X, etc, and so the various update packs that stick to Windows system updates are better for those users. So all these being available offer the user some nice choices. The all in one, least confusing, has mostly everything pack is really the Auto-Patcher and that's been done. It's probably the simplest method for non-tinkering sorts of users who just want to run one pack and easily update a fresh system with just about all the things that let's say a new computer purchased with Windows 98 today should be like, without the bloat of OEM advertising things and trial software versions to get rid of, of course. It really is an amazing compilation that takes much of the guess work and wondering about what updates are obsolete, replaced by bug fixed versions that work, etc. It lets users completely avoid depending upon non-working never fixed Windows Updates. The other packs do that too, but Auto-Patcher just contains enough stuff to not need to do a lot of other updating manually.

Hmm. Soporific, try installing the Maximus-Decim latest MDAC updater he released recently (like yesterday I think). I have no idea if it would have an effect on your problems after installing the Unofficial Scripting 1.7, but after installing it Winamp Pro 5.35 (with the in_cdda_5.34) stopped having several problems opening plugin configurations like the Direct Sound output plugin and also some playback problems. I think there's stuff he has in there that 98SE needs to work with various things. No idea what, or which things, but it fixed that Winamp problem for me. Might want to consider it for the manual installs folder. It's always helped me easily get MDAC stuff on properly and now it's been updated to the most recent items. Now, there's something that's a real system update that everyone would likely get benefits from.

Thank you for the update! I've just gone back to making 98SE the Windows version installed on my system and had previously used this update to ensure that all the MDAC stuff was properly and fully installed. I had been concerned that it hadn't been updated in a while. And I wasn't sure if the MDAC module in soporific's Auto-Patcher included the 2.5 stuff that is left out of the official 2.8 versions. I knew that your updater installed the necessary parts. I just applied it. Thanks again. Shouldn't this thread be one of the stickies? Seems to me this is about the most complete, least confusing method of ensuring MDAC and friends (whatever it is they do ) are installed correctly.

That's not the latest version of Shockwave. The latest, and the one in the current Auto-Patcher is 10.3.023. Quite buggy. Adobe changed the file name in the links to 10.2.023 (previous, working version) but neglected to have it point to the named version. It still downloads the buggy 10.3 version. So File Hippo is a good place to get that working 10.2.023 one, like I did. One doesn't need a codec pack to get MediaPlayerClassic. And one doesn't need to trust a 3rd party codec pack to play various file formats in any preferred player. Folks who don't like the commercial versions of RealPlayer and QuickTime can choose to install RealAlternative and QuickTimeAlternative. DivX 5.2.1 works on 9x and there is a web plugin and format filter that has been tweaked to install on 9x and plays the on line DivX videos just fine. But if you want the player you should update the one installed with 5.2.1 to the 6.2 update. The Auto-Patcher offers the legacy Windows Media Player 7 , the Windows Media Encoder 7, and Windows Media Player 9 along with a combined install that installs the Microsoft Windows Media Player Codecs for the 9 Series Player, updating the package with the additional codecs included in the Windows Media Player 9 and 10 on XP. If you want to do without the newer Windows Media Player versions, Microsoft offers a codec package for the Windows Media Player 6.4 called something like Windows Media Player 9 codecs for the 6.4 player. Then of course there is MediaPlayerClassics ability to be tweaked to replace the 6.4 player and have even more codecs. FFDSHOW is constantly updated to include the latest versions of codecs. It is customizable so you can turn off its native codecs for most things and only use it for the obscure codecs not otherwise available on Windows. I don't install it unless I need it for one of those. Nero 7 Ultra installs a ton of codecs, as does PowerDVD 6 Deluxe. But if one does not want to purchase things then the stuff mentioned above can provide similar. The afterdawn.com and free-codecs.com sites offer tons of different codecs and software to play and encode. Auto-Patcher likely cannot stay completely patent compliant if it starts including 3rd party codec packages and players that sometime include patented IP that is not free to distribute by anyone other than the patent holder and its licensed distributors. Plus, some include nasty spyware. So including that stuff is highly unlikely. If you want it, install it on your own.

That maybe the next thing I look into. I turn off those tweaks in Auto-Patcher (or don't turn them on if they are off by default) because 98SE2ME puts in the traditional ones that Gape's pack always did anyway. I just do the VCACHE max to 393216 at the first boot after install so it won't have a problem with my 1 Gig of Ram. I notice he doesn't do the ConservativeSwapfileUsage =1 anymore and I didn't add it. I did make my min and max virtual memory customized to 3X my Ram right away too. I'll check out that thread to see what folks are doing now. I just installed Norton Utilities 2002 to my 250GB hard drive that's one big partition installed with 120GB then expanded to about 191 usable by PartitionMagic. I ran DiskDoctor, had it fix what it found, rebooted, and ran SpeedDisk. I just set it not to optimize the swap file. I already customized it and don't want it to mess with that. I turned off the Surface Scan too. As long as things are working I'd rather not sit and wait while it checks out the unpartitioned space. Things haven't blown up! But I guess I won't really know if it trashed anything (regarding 48bit LBA addressing) unless I start getting a lot of weird problems. I haven't run WinDoctor yet. Not sure I believe in that kind of thing anymore. In the old days I used to let it whirl away at the registry but I figure if it isn't broke, don't fix (break) it. Haven't run 98 in a while and got used to a zillion things loading at startup not really bothering XP, Vista, or of course Linux. I'm going to have to look into that though. I have eleven system tray icons and I startup with about 41% resources free. Goes down to the 30's quick when I start doing things. That might not be the best way to run 98, eh? For security I have Avast Home set to its defaults with the email scanner and all its web stuff on and ZoneAlarm with the email, virus scanner detection and alerts off. I'm wondering what to do about Spyware detection. I always used Spybot Search and Destroy but I've been reading that the new version is broken on 98SE. Not only that, but the older one automatically updates it to the new, broken version. I'll try to read their forums to see what people are doing. I know I need something. Ad-Aware stopped supporting 98SE but I used to prefer Spybot S&S anyway, although sometimes I used them both. Now it looks like either is a hassle to use. And the Yahoo Toolbar stuff (haven't bothered with it yet and would rather not) doesn't include the Spyware detector on 98SE either. What do we do? Gotta have something to scan and remove that stuff if we catch anything. Kind of miss McAfee, as their stuff includes spyware detection and removal. But their last 98SE version was just a hassle with its messing up their updating process using wininit and writing the file incorrectly. I had to make sure to delete the nonsense they wrote and keep the correct lines every update. Well, I let all of the subscriptions for it expire and canceled the automatic renewals. Out of the Auto-Patcher topic, but then we're not too many folks now and where else but here can we ramble on about Windows 98? Edit - I installed Spybot Search and Destroy 5.2 (latest) to see. It went fine! I unchecked to have it update while installing, unchecked SDHelper and TeaTimer (never use TeaTimer and I immunize after the first update), and told it not to run after the install. I restarted the computer, went through the wizard, got all updated and immunized, ran a scan and it removed the usual stuff it does to a fresh Windows installation, and all is well. Gotta say that maybe turning everything on and running right away and not rebooting might be one of the things causing the new version troubles in 9x systems. Maybe my treading gently and carefully made it register what it needed properly. Then again, maybe it's dumb luck or a newer version of the program. I just downloaded it before installing.

What you could do is make a module especially for the scripting update. Make the default of Auto-Patcher to install the older official Scripting 5.6 update. Make a toggle available for installing the Unofficial 5.7, which would explain that it is experimental and to only install if compatibility is desired for newer technologies. This would install 5.7 instead of the 5.6 update. Certainly remove that unofficial 5.6 as it is obviously not working well. If we tell Internet Explorer not to install when it asks, we won't have the scripting support so that is not a desired option, even if it removes the nagging. So the Unofficial 5.6 really shouldn't be used. 5.7 works fine, as far as I know. My software has been installing fine with a few exceptions, if scripting does have anything to do with it. That Adobe Reader updater not being able to write to that folder, PowerDVD 6 not being able to run the latest update (but I installed the older 2003e update and it worked fine). It is possible that the latest one can't install on 98SE but they removed the older update anyway. It complains about not being able to run setup, but when I extracted the update with WinRAR and ran setup myself, that runs, but just like the compressed download it complains that it could not run setup. I think it's a setup within the setup? Whatever, PowerDVD works fine with the 2003e update and I think that the latest one is some minor single update and not the whole thing anyway. The file is much smaller than the 2003e update is. I don't think it includes the previous fixes and that makes it just a blunder on their part that they removed the 2003e update from the download section. And DivX Media Filter made a complaint that it had errors, but it works fine in Windows Media Player. It just doesn't offer the system tray icon like it does on XP/Vista. Maybe that's what it didn't successfully install, but it isn't really needed. Windows Media Player uses the DivX 5.21 codec to play the files and it even did the usual check for update the first time and shows the DivX watermark briefly when the playback starts. That's how I know it's using the DivX codec from them rather than the one installed by PowerDVD 6 Deluxe. Don't know whether some of those install errors were due to Scripting or not. The Adobe one was strange, but the others could be explained by the installers expecting Windows XP stuff. Nero, RealPlayer, QuickTime, Java, Flash and Shockwave (once I cleaned it out and started fresh) had no problems installing and running. I'd leave Sun Java, Flash, and Shockwave out of Auto-Patcher. These are all better left to the user to get and install.

Heh heh. More excitement. I did have to clean house. I got 10.2.023 from filehippo.com but the uninstall and reinstall, and the reboot asked for left Shockwave without some needed file. So I used the Shockwave 8 and 10 uninstallers in the System/Macromed folder, and the downloaded Flash Uninstaller. I clicked all the entries of them in Add/Remove Programs and when it couldn't find uninstallers I let it remove the entries. I checked out the Windows Components tab and saw that the Shockwave entries are no longer available. Then I deleted the contents of that Macromed folder and restarted the computer. I went to Adobe in Internet Explorer and had it install Flash. I installed my downloaded Flash for Firefox installer. I installed my downloaded Shockwave 10.2.023 from filehippo. All is now perfect and the tests on their site work. Soporific, I really suggest that the best way for folks to get the latest Flash and Shockwave on their machines is to go and download and install the stuff themselves. I can't see it working correctly with the fresh stuff installed immediately with Auto-Patcher right after a new installation unless perhaps if nothing that is installed includes their own older Flash and Shockwave versions. Once they are on there (Flash 7 and Shockwave 8), they really need a cleaning of the house, wiping all of that, before the new versions can install properly on a Flash and Shockwave barren machine. Sheesh, their Adobe Reader just gave me fits getting it upgraded. The downloader they use couldn't write the second update into the \Windows\Application Data folder they use. The first worked, but from then on only my going to their site and clicking the updates tab and downloading each one myself and installing them worked. Something was interfering with their updater downloading the files to that folder. I could see the incomplete 0 bit file there. Anyway, all updated now.

Well I just installed my saved copy of Shockwave 10.2.022 because all the download links there SAY they are giving you 10.2.023 but they REALLY give you 10.3.CRASHANDBURN. You can right click the downloads and they are all that newer buggy version, even thought the directory it is downloading it from is the 10.2 one. I found out when Firefox crashed with it and then I checked the version. Apparently they meant to go back to the older version but they put the same newer files in there I guess by accident. So I can't even get the latest 10.2 version because .022 is all I've got. I'll deal. They'll fix it and update I'm sure. At least I won't crash.

Dave-H, Try what I used to do before the Environment Space Fix put stuff in Autoexec and config.sys. Delete the lines from there, as the Revolution Pack disagrees with them. Running the fix again will just put them back. Gotta get Auto-Patcher to run without out it. So, look in C:\Program Files\Auto-Patcher (or, wherever it's installed). Find the .bat file that the shortcut points to and right click it and choose Properties. On the memory tab raise the drop down for environment space to a higher number. I can't remember, but I think I used to do it to all the .bat files I saw in there. But try it with just the one that starts the thing first. I think it's: START_ME.BAT If you still get the out of environment space error then try doing that to all the .BAT files you see in there. As long as any of those are run they will obey whatever settings you put into its pif (or Program Information File).

Looks like Adobe either took down the newer Shockwave or it detects that I have Windows 98SE. All roads there now lead to 10.2.023, the one that appears to work well. Of course, that's the one to include in the next Auto-Patcher, the full version download I would say but I'm not sure which you've been using. The folks who have had Java 6 Update 4 problems I think should be aware that it's been an interoperability issue with the latest Flash for some time using any Sun Java and the new Flash version. I think Java 5 users experience the same thing. It's something for Adobe to fix, I think. No need to go back to the old Java if it doesn't make a difference. I found in System Information that I do still have 2 instances of that ACPI IRQ Holder for PCI IRQ Steering who's registry entry apparently has something wrong that makes it show as not functioning properly. I know not to bother troubleshooting this on this motherboard as it has always shown those even if I remove all the devices and have them redetected. They just show up again. But everything works and there are no blips in Device Manager. The HP Device Manager that comes with my scanner does show a whole slew of those ACPI IRQ Holder things with blips. There's no fix for it that I'm aware of. Not an Auto-Patcher problem, but included with my feedback and suggestions comes my progress and ranting.

There are packages available in the driverheaven forums called U-PAX I recall. They have their own site too as well as their own forum. They haven't worked on SBLive stuff in a long time, but you can download full iso's to burn of full setup cd's for the SBLive cards. You just need to locate the link for the last versions of the packages for the SBLive. They are full software/driver suites, tweaked to provide the latest drivers and software available for the SBLive, mostly adapted from the Audigy 2 stuff. If you don't want to tweak the official cd's yourself or just use the official SBLiveWare offered, that may be the best way to go. Lot's of folks loved their packages.

Actually the full versions of Shockwave are the best to use as they include all parts of Shockwave. That's good for legacy type programs or even newer programs that use more than just the web plugin. I've always replaced the Slim if I got it by installing the Full one over it. The additional options like the toolbar can be unchecked, just say no, and it will install without it. Well, the SystemWorks 2005 shipped from Amazon, and it looks like I'm going to win that ebay bid for 2003. Since my stand alone Utilities 2002 includes those Dos tools, I'll probably just install what I already have. Kind of positive it supports the large hard drives. If everything breaks when I run it I'll find out. I just don't want all that other stuff in SystemWorks. I even turn off the installation of the Undo Wizard so I can install it without that problem filled Norton Recycle Bin replacer. If I can keep 98SE stable, it'll be great as I have a ton of old favorites that run on Windows and it'll be nice to use them. Going into Vista was just too annoying for me to use it much so even though lots of that stuff would work fine, I avoided it.

Heh heh, great, I blindly took your word for it and committed to a bid. I just found that SystemWorks 2005 was the last 98SE compatible version. I bought it pretty reasonably from Amazon a few minutes ago. Oh well, at the least I'll have a newer WinDoctor. I sure hope that other guy who's bidding wins. I won't need 2003 with a brand new retail box of 2005 coming. It doesn't look good with it only being 5 bucks right now and I'm still winning. But maybe that other guy will want to spend more than $15 on it and I'll be saved. You know, I used my Utilities 2002 on a 250GB SATA drive, a single FAT32 Windows 98SE with no noticeable problems a couple of years ago. Your's was the first comment that made me doubt it was really 48bit LBA compatible. The only problem was perhaps that it did keep coming up with a lot of errors, much more so than Windows Scandisk would ever report. And there seemed to be conflicts between what the bad shutdown dos Norton DiskDoctor would report and what the Windows version would. I could go a year without a single error, except maybe the first run, using Windows Scandisk. Norton made me nervous. Then again, perhaps it was something to do with the huge Sata drive and my running Scandisk on only smaller, 20-120GB drives through the years. Well, I'll have some pretty boxes and cd's anyway. I kind of think Norton Utilities was supposed to be fully 48bit LBA compatible, and have conjectured about it on old threads. But I don't believe Symantec ever officially made any comment about it. All I know is it appeared to work and Windows kept working even after defrags with it. I just didn't want to take any chances. I'll just only install the Utilities portion of SystemWorks 2006 when it comes. I was peeved when they stopped the stand alone Utilities. I was a McAfee user, and now use Avast in 98SE. And GoBack? I had my fill of that chugga, chugga stuff back when I had the full versions of that. I do too many weird partition combinations now to try trusting that thing not to break my hard drive.

barbarien, Too much stuff, bloat is a major thing to avoid. Free stuff like most of what you mentioned are freely available for those who want them and are not Windows updates, fixes, patches. Absolutely no codec packs please. Best way to destroy the Windows multimedia framework requiring a reinstall. But then, I've never tried one with the exception of FFDSHOW and I turned most of that off only keeping the odd codecs the major players don't install. I haven't even used that for quite some time. The Maximus Decim Windows Me look and feel stuff is installable separately for those who want it, again not an update. There's still a Windows Me theme at the usual theme websites. I install that sometimes, don't apply it always, but do steal the icons from it if I want a different look. Applying it reminds me too much of Windows Me (go figure). But yeah, the icons are nice and if applied the Explorer backgrounds and html information panes have the Windows Me look. Uberskin and the future of Revolution Pack looks interesting. But really there's no need to have either in Auto-Patcher. It's already there (the older Revo Pack) and it's nice to have it in the manual installs so there's no need to not include it, but adding eye-candy programs that folks can just come here and get that aren't really system updates is just going to make this thing too big. Most don't want DotNET 2.0 except for specific purposes. The install and reboot for it and its updates take forever. It used to be in Auto-Patcher and was taken out, probably for those reasons. Windows Media Player legacy is an install of 7.1. The WMP9 is the official one with the addition of the WMP Codec Package for 9x that was a Microsoft update. It gives 9x the missing codecs that came out after the last WMP9 98SE edition, stuff from WMP 9 and 10 on XP. No, it is not the cumulative unofficial version or the 98MP10. But Auto-Patcher does offer 98MP10 in a separate module. I install the downloaded version myself instead because what I add in between has to be done before 98MP10. What's nice about 98MP10 is it also includes a bunch of Internet Explorer updated files from the Windows XP version. It used to be two separate packages for the Internet Explorer XP stuff and the WMP 10 stuff but now they're combined. I prefer that to the WMP only and non-Microsoft things that are in the unofficial cumulative WMP 9 package. You can't use both either. It'll break! DeepBurnerPro is cool. Don't know about the trial version though. I bought and used it for a while, but I've gone back to using the last Nero 7 Ultra Edition available for 98SE. I bought the thing and it works for me. I had gone for DeepBurnerPro back when Nero was too buggy (and I was having 98SE problems in general at that time), but that last version was pretty good and offers tons of features. I've found that a combination of QuickTime 2.1.2.59, QuickTime 6.5.2, latest RealPlayer 10, Windows Media Player from 98MP10, Nero 7 Ultra, PowerDVD 6 Deluxe, Flash, Shockwave, Java, Adobe Reader, DejaVu (Lizardtech for a few cd's of comics I have) and DivX 5.2.1 get just about everything to play. Sometimes stuff like FFDSHOW and/or MediaPlayerClassic fills in the blanks and there are some things that just won't play without XP/Vista and newer versions of the players. But even though I install them, since that's just my choice and not a Windows Update I'd rather do it myself than have it in Auto-Patcher. My philosophy has been I like proprietary official stuff, even if I need to buy it, on Windows, and free software and open source project stuff on Linux. They're different worlds and I think things you can buy for Windows work better on Windows than the 3rd party free stuff, and the reverse is the case on Linux. Probably because you just have upstream that is either a company or a few guys working on free stuff on Windows whereas often the same projects have hundreds of folks doing bug reports and distro maintainers fixing and patching them on Linux so of course the final result is a better piece of software. Less people use them on Windows so even though it's free software, the quality and compatibility of the software with the rest of the operating system is not as high as on a Linux distribution. Point? I'd rather not have a lot of stuff like that cluttering up Auto-Patcher.

Heh heh. Caught me speechless. Seems that this one worked great except for that Scripting problem and maybe Shockwave crashing if its latest version isn't prepped for 98SE enough or at all. Only shot for it seems to be if the newer 5.7 scripting somehow makes Shockwave sites work properly with the latest Shockwave. I still have to try that out. It was easy getting it to crash just going to the Adobe Shockwave support site and their test players page. The thing crashed Internet Explorer every time, either after the page loaded, when leaving the page, or when closing Internet Explorer. That 48LBA thing was great. I installed with 120GB and after Auto-Patcher installed Partition Magic and expanded to just 40GB short of my 250GB drive (about 190GB or so). Partition Magic insists on keeping about 15% free space on larger drives for some reason. I'm bidding on a SystemWorks 2003 because someone posted that Norton Utilities 2002, which I have, only has the dos version 48bit LBA compatible but not the Windows DiskDoctor and its defrager (name escapes me at the moment). I don't think the Windows Me versions in ScanFrag/98SE2ME are so I'm holding off on using anything for now. I bid a max of $15, which would be great but now there's another bidder. That environment fix is a necessity for me. I tried it without it and got the out of space problem. I delete the lines when done since I use 98SE2ME and you gave that warning. And NUSB worked fine. It actually calls itself by the Via device name for it and names my 8237 southbridge. I guess it really is Via USB 2.0 PLUS. It had installed a Microsoft Enhanced one in VMWare, but it knew I had Via on the real motherboard here and installed it specifically. Awesome. It a super time saver. Can't help an update having problems every so often. Wish I could think of more to suggest. I thought of Windows Media Player 7 Bonus Pack Full, but that needs user interaction and has to go on before the MDGx 98MP10 so even the manual installs folder is no good for it. Since this is a real install I installed that so I could have the fancy visualizations and skins. It's got a converter, but I think that goes one way from mp3 to Windows Media so that's kind of useless. If anything most would want the opposite. Next is copying all my stuff. That's why I'm in Linux now. I don't look forward to hours and hours of copying. I gave up the ship until tomorrow.

Halleluyah! SCR579X.EXE works! No more requests to download scripting that's available locally. Everything just loads! Thanks barbarien, but of course especially MDGx for fixing whatever it was that was wrong with that at first. I have no idea if anything's broken, but so far nothing is apparently broken and that bug is gone. Next comes 98SE2ME, 98MP10, NUSB. I'll try the latest Shockwave then. Maybe with Scripting fixed the new one will work. If not, we know how to uninstall it and go back to the older ones so I'll give it a shot. Assuming I survive these next things first. Soporific, it looks like websites do need the newer files (or really old ones perhaps) for the Scripting. Perhaps the next version of Auto-Patcher can include SCR579X.EXE? That, or the official Scripting 5.6 since that unofficial 5.6 seems to not work too well.

Thanks for the status report, barbarien. I've downloaded that Shockwave and perhaps will try it. Java I will install, as I've heard the latest does work fine on 98SE. And since I've already got the buggy scripting updates, hopefully someone will come up with a way to work around the problem or new versions to fix it. I'll keep checking that other sticky with all the latest updates in hopes that something will show up dealing with the scripting bug.

Too late! I wiped out Vista and installed 98SE to the hard drive. I left the Audigy 2 ZS Platinum in there, had Debian on the second hard drive with Grub in its partition instead of the MBR and so made it real easy for BootMagic to take over from the Vista Bootloader I was using. I had removed the fstab mounting line beforehand, and now just added it back with the 98SE mounting lines and all is perfect! What isn't perfect is I have the gotta install Visual Basic Scripting support in Internet Explorer on most websites after running the Auto-Patcher. Ah well, here's hoping a new Scripting 5.6 Unofficial update gets out with this fixed. I think it's got to be in that thing. I think Creative software added Shockwave 7.14 into the mix, so now I have the really old 98SE Flash and the less old but still ancient 7.14 Shockwave. No matter. I'll take care of that after I get my software installed. I toggled those off, as well as Sun Java, in the Auto-Patcher so I could install them myself later. I have the uninstallers on a cdr that'll get loaded when I go through my copying from cdr hours soon. Got the full latest version installers too. Next thing is WorksSuite, OfficeXP, and 98SE2ME, 98MP10, and NUSB. But I'll be hanging out in Linux in the morning first to get Debian Lenny's daily upgrades and stuff. The NVidia official last 98SE driver still makes me shutdown by hitting Restart and when Windows exits, holding the power button on the box. Shutdown is borked by something in its background stuff. I tried putting a semi-colon in front of all their stuff in the Run and Run Services but something besides those things causes the monitor to lose itself on shutdown (but not on restart, weird). So I put back all the NVidia stuff. Might as well have the fancy tools since it doesn't make a difference. I tried an older Via Hyperion 4-in-1 4.56v on my machine. The newer ones had given me some troubles the last time. This nicely installed all those IRQ Routing things that the newer ones just don't have included. I haven't checked System Information yet but I hope I get less registry errors reported in ACPI IRQ Holder for PCI IRQ Steering devices. No errors in Device Manager and all the hardware and drivers work so we'll see. NVidia shows AGP 8X, which was a problem with the newer Hyperion Pro's too (showing 0X). I always needed to install the Windows 95 VXD folder's AGP vxd driver to get full AGP speed with the newer driver packages. Still, I haven't run DxDiag yet so I'll see if the AGP Textures are active. If not, I'll start extracting the 4-in-1 package and get those vxd's installed. That Via AGPGART.sys never cut it for me in the past, but maybe I've gone back far enough before they crippled 9x AGP, setting them to PCI Bus speeds for "stability" reasons. I can't go too far back since it's a KT880 and the real older ones (fondly remembers 4.38) just don't work with the chipset properly. I could install the Via USB 2.0 drivers since they always worked for me, but I suppose NUSB offers more so I'll go with those. I think they're really just the Via USB PLUS according to a thread I saw comparing them. I'm waiting to get 98SE2ME on here before installing my USB devices and the drivers for it. I just hope the installation all gets done smoothly. I've had better success recently doing it in VMWare than on my actual hard drive, so we'll see how it goes. I've got internet and ZoneAlarm is doing its job. Windows Media Player starts. The Creative stuff opens and works even after updating all of it. Cthelper did its usual crash once, but that's actually normal. Pretty good so far.

Okay, the latest WDM stuff for 9x that people got to work pretty well was the Frankenstein installation of the Audigy 2 (not Audigy 2 ZS) cd, modified by the file that when executed upon the copied Creative cd on the hard drive would add some SBLive information to the Setup file to let it all install on whichever the model SBLive card was on the machine. That process worked fine but needed some work-arounds to use the EAX Advanced EQ (had to click the mouse on its volume tab in EAXControl to unmute it each time), and the mix didn't really sound authentic with unnatural booming base and even with adjusting that down and the treble up you got missing midrange. The drivers were really tuned for the Audigy 2 series even though they included SBLive compatible files so it could be used with it. Those are likely the ones you are struggling with. I found them too much bother for too little reward. What I used when I wasn't insistent upon using the older VXD's that included Windows MS-DOS box compatible SB16 drivers (turns out to be my favorite, but you might not love the old LiveWare stuff like I do), was the installation cd that came with the last SB0224 retail box release. It's a full set of software and drivers that include a version of what is in the Live Uni-Pack for Windows XP they post in their download section, except it installs on Windows 98SE and Me. That's the middle driver in your list, and the ones I always wound up using on both 98SE (when I didn't care about ms-dos box soundblaster sound) and on XP. Perhaps they give you problems on some games I don't play, but the whole driver/software combination worked just fine for me. That same combo can be done without that cd if you look around for the Creative replacement cd which is offered from a link in the Creative forum and is still being served and maintained, or by calling Creative and purchasing it. I have an older one of those, which includes 244's instead of the 252's, but at least you can install the other software and PlayCenter without installing the old LiveWare versions first and then upgrading, which is full of problems as the really old stuff doesn't mix well with the newer. The other software offered for download by Creative in their legacy section are only updates which need a previous version installed. That frustrated a lot of Platinum breakout box owners. The full cd's include the software and driver mod's necessary to make the breakout box work properly but the downloads offered do not (the drivers) or won't install without the previous version (the software). But the full cd's install the whole package. They are equivalent to the Compaq driver and installation cd's but have the newer versions of the software already on them. The updates on the net only run on XP, so you'd actually need one of the full cd's to use the latest versions on 9x. Only the PlayCenter update works on 9x. Even that Uni-Pack driver will not install on 9x. But the cd version contains that driver with 9x installation capability. Sometimes the 252 (or other) driver setup's will tell you that no SoundBlaster hardware is detected. In that case you need to browse to the Audio or Audio/Drivers or Audio/Setup folder and find CTZAPP.EXE or similar. Have it install the WDM drivers, point Windows to either the system folder, a cat folder, your Windows installation folders (should have them somewhere on your system for times like this when you may have your cd drive occupied), or some folder on the cd when it asks for certain files it can't find. They ARE somewhere. Maybe even a temp folder sometimes has them. Reboot and then the cd setup should work to install the rest, just uncheck Windows Drivers in the Custom Install checklist as sometimes that doesn't go smoothly on top of already installed drivers. You'll have to search around for some of the older information for details depending upon what you want to do. The legacy Creative forums on the uk Creative site used to have some nice guides in some threads, but I don't know if they still have those up. Other private websites offered specific guides for just about every method available. If you really want to use those Audigy 2 era drivers, you will need that executable (forget what it's called) that modifies the Creative setup files and inf's for all the card numbers. driverheaven.net used to have some guides there for doing this sort of thing. Good luck!

barbarien, Just think. There were times I installed Windows 98SE and updated it by going from bottom to top of the mdgx.com printed lists for 98SE fixes and updates, IE fixes and updates, Direct X fixes and updates, and Windows Media fixes and updates, and then all the add-ons. I had downloaded each update to its own folder with a descriptive name so I knew what each one was. Complaining about installing a few packs? You know what? I found that using a favorite Unofficial Service Pack (Gape, Maximus-Decim, soporific, pick your favorite) got me about the same results as doing all that manually. Just less time consuming, tedious, and confusing if using a compilation pack than doing it myself. Things have the same chance of either lucking out with a stable system or being messed up no matter which way is chosen. I now pick the easiest way, which is now the Auto-Patcher with the Explorer, 98SE2ME stuff toggled off, then the manual installs folder stuff, then the Office install, then 98SE2ME, then NUSB, then EXPLOR98, then q891711. I guess? Driver hardware installs somewhere mixed in where appropriate, but this VMWare install didn't make me guess when to do that this time. I guess on real hardware I'd do the motherboard chipset drivers first thing. Don't need those on a fake OS. RetroOS, Shockwave is there from the start on 98SE, just an ancient version. I figure my installing of that WorksSuite software is going to put a newer older version on anyway so I might as well update to the latest. In the past I've cleaned house once all my software installed every various version into the poor, helpless Macromed folder. Maybe I'll try that. I uninstall everything related in add/remove, run the downloaded Flash uninstaller (the Shockwave one is the same as add/remove so that one is just a waste), go into add/remove and Windows setup tab removing the Shockwave Flash stuff from there, reboot, delete the contents of Windows/System/Macromed, install Flash from the web, Flash again from a downloaded installer for Firefox, and Shockwave from a downloaded Shockwave Full installer for Firefox and Internet Explorer. But I have to wait until I get Firefox installed before that cleaning house process. Until then I leave things as muddied as my software installs make them, occasionally going to the Adobe site to have it reinstall the latest if I notice that Flash 7.14 is messing up something. Any software that installs Shockwave 8 replaces the latest Flash with 7.14. See why I clean house? Otherwise old useless folders and files that confuse programs remain in that folder. The last message I got on the Adobe Flash installer website was that I needed to install both the latest Flash AND Visual Scripting to view this site correctly. It only installed Flash I think, but I do think Scripting is the culprit for the crashes and perhaps the new Flash when Internet Explorer tries to close its playing. I don't think it is Shockwave related. Things are just a bit borked right now with the Scripting update. The latest Unofficial one says it installs vbscript .8834 but .8832 remains there regardless. Something isn't installing right. Office stuff also interferes. When I had the 98SE guest on Linux in Virtualbox, I didn't install the Microsoft Office or WorksSuite stuff, only OpenOffice.org, and did not have these problems. I just like the Works templates that work on Word, the maps of Streets and Trips, and Encarta. And that Digital Image Suite Anniversary Edition is nice on 98SE too. I figure if I'm going to use Windows I should be able to install stuff I've bought and enjoy using on it. Sure wish Windows files weren't do darned sensitive. One little mis-match and stuff can break. I'm going to wipe Vista and install 98SE. Just gotta get in the mood for switching soundcards and for a long process. I want Direct 3D on 98SE, as well as real Dos with Vesa SVGA for the games. Virtualization just teases me.

I tried the older official 5.6 to no effect, so I reinstalled the newer unofficial one. Then I tried installing the 942615 unofficial IE cum (I uninstalled the older one first) since someone had said it had worked with the newer one. I followed the directions that came up to create the reg file that tells that it has been installed, then installed it. I got the newer BROWSEUI.DLL. No problem booting, I guess because when I use 98SE2ME I do not use Option 3 or the Revolution Pack stuff. Same problem. Oh well, I guess it'll await some fix for this to be discovered. See, this is why I've stayed away from Windows in general and even 9x in particular. It's really easy to have broken things happen and difficult to get fixed. I also discovered that often after Flash items display, Internet Explorer will crash when exiting, and even sometimes forcing a close and restart with a popup. I did need to reinstall Flash from Adobe since the newer one from Auto-Patcher was replaced with an older version by my Microsoft software (Works, Encarta, etc) installations. It installed fine, I rebooted, but the stuff still crashes on that Adobe test site. Crash, crash, crash. Seems like old times! Why again do I like Windows?

Hmm, well I have BROWSEUI.DLL 6.0.2800.1914, the older, good one. So I reinstalled the Unofficial Scripting update. Same effect. The post by charly may be correct. I'll try reinstalling the older scripting 5.6 official scripting update and see what effect that has. Edit - Well, I didn't see the older one lazily attainable within the Auto-Patcher folders and really would prefer to keep the newer files. No idea whether the browser I'll actually use once installed, Firefox, will have this same problem. So I'll await the next Unofficial Internet Explorer Cumulative update and see what happens with that. I could copy over the older Scripting 5.6 update from an old cdr, but the problem really isn't THAT annoying. Maybe the newer update is better security wise.

Thanks RetroOS! I wonder if WinRAR extracts those Cumulative updates. I'll install it and try, if the bad BROWSEUI.DLL (1915) is on the system. Gotta boot out of Debian and into Vista to open VMWare and check out this stuff! Which means dealing with all the updates and scanning to get Security Center to shut up. I kind of have no idea why I keep installing Vista and having it annoy the h e c k out of me. I also install the Audigy 2 ZS when I do that. Now, the SBLive 5.1 Platinum is actually better for 9x (vxd's with ms-dos in Windows and in dos and it works on this motherboard) and better for Linux (all mixer buttons work, speaker mute available when using headphones, etc. Sounds just as good. Audigy 2 ZS is just adapted drivers from EMU10K1 as Creative didn't release the source for EMU10K2). So changing back to SBLive and just 98SE and Linux requires a bunch of work, switching breakout boxes, reinstalling all, etc. Pain in the neck. But I think it's coming. Vista runs like XP did when I was an early adopter using older hardware. Not so great on this old motherboard. So I hate using it. Sigh. I'll get on Vista now and see what I can do about BROWSEUI.DLL to fix this. Might as well tinker a bit.