soporific

I get the same message --- it happens on a completely clean and fresh install of Win98se and also after its been patched. I only JUST included an option to go to Windows Update automatically from the menu options, and then they go and do this. Really makes you loyal to Microsoft doesn't it? No, you did the message right, and thanks for finding the problem with LOCATE.COM --- It was driving me nuts. I can now redo that entire module - because LOCATE.COM wasn't working, it just put a stop to anything else I was going to put in there. I can now go back to where I was at about 2 months ago with my plans for that module. THANKS AGAIN !!! And also for the post after the one I quoted.... the code probably looks a bit funny but that was because I was trying to overcome the LOCATE.COM problem --- so i will re-check it as i go.

Introducing AutoSYSTEMini... version 0.56 beta Change log: v0.56 - 15th March, 2007 - improved RAM value code AGAIN -- i will get it right one day ... - added a proper method to detect your language - improved the localization. v0.55 - 15th March, 2007 - improved RAM value code - removed invalid setting from information file (thanks MDGx) v0.54 - 13th March, 2007 - added localization support - changed RAM value code - no more adding 1 to get the correct value - should be right now. v0.52 - 10th March, 2007 - added program installer and icon v0.51 - 10th March, 2007 - added FREEMEM.exe - much better tool for finding the RAM size - added support for French localised editions of Windows. v0.50 - 5th March, 2007 - initial release What the frack is it? An automatic and help-guided SYSTEM.INI tweaks installer What does it do? It is a DOS utility that helps you make the correct choices for tweaking your SYSTEM.INI file on your Windows 98se machine, and does all the work for you. It could even work on Windows 95 & Windows ME but i'm yet to test it on those OSes. And, sorry any non-english speaking peoples using localised versions of Win98se, it aint gonna work for you guys yet -- i'll see if I can't make it universal. EDIT: this now works for English, French & Italian. Why would anyone go to the trouble? The reason i'm doing this is because the core of this program will appear in the next preview release of Auto-Patcher and i wanted to develop it a bit before release. Is it safe to use? Yes. It saves your original SYSTEM.INI as a permanent backup and also provides an undo file for your last tweaking session. You can set values On and Off and also completely (and safely) remove the settings. In fact, its probably over-kill the amount of features this little utility has. Installation instructions? Unzip to any directory (spaces and more than 8 letters are fine) and start the file in the root directory (START_ME.BAT) What settings can you adjust: - 32BitDiskAccess, ConservativeSwapfileUsage, DMABufferSize, KeyBoostTime, MinTimeSlice, RemovableIDE, Chunksize, MinFileCache, abd MaxFileCache. Other settings are on the drawing board. What features does it have? * automatic selection of best settings for your computer based upon installed RAM. * extensive undo options * you can set settings quickly and all at once, and also you can set each individual settings manually as well * User-friendly -- you don't need to know anything about computers to use this program - everything is explained. * Total program size is 270k. Doesn't install any registry settings, just unzip and use. Feedback needed - i want to include this program in the next release of Auto-Patcher language strings ... beware, there's lots! And i'm sorry if i got it wrong ... :ENGLISH SET TexVe=Verify this program correctly identifies how much RAM you have SET TexAf=MB installed on your computer SET TexMa=set manually SET Tex01=version SET Tex02=Welcome to Soporific's SYSTEM.INI Tweaks Installer SET Tex03=This will tweak your SYSTEM.INI to take advantage of your modern hardware SET Tex04=The installer will record your current settings SET Tex05=and save them to an undo file that you can use SET Tex06=to restore your original settings if you need SET Tex07=The settings you can adjust are SET Tex08=Press any key to continue SET Tex08a=or SET Tex08b=to quit SET Tex09=Now making your original undo file SET Tex10=Now loading your computer's current settings SET Tex11=Now loading saved settings SET Tex12=Choose a number to change each setting SET Tex13=Automatically load the best settings using your computer's RAM value SET Tex14=current computer SET Tex15=defaults for Windows 98 SET Tex16=high SET Tex17=extreme SET Tex17a=performance SET Tex18=last SET Tex18a=undo file SET Tex18b=reboot SET Tex19=original SET Tex20=save Settings SET Tex20a=make SET Tex20b=install tweaks SET Tex21=display Information on all the settings SET Tex22=Quit the program SET Tex23=Environment space used SET Tex24=It seems you haven't yet verified SET Tex25=this program correctly identifies SET Tex26=the amount of RAM installed SET Tex27=on your system SET Tex28=Press any key to do this now SET Tex29=Now checking to see how much RAM you have SET Tex30=This program thinks you have SET Tex31=of RAM available to Windows SET Tex32=You can confirm this now by going to SET Tex33=Start - Settings - Control Panel - System SET Tex34= SET Tex35=If this is not correct you can manually SET Tex36=enter in the correct amount so that the SET Tex37=rest of the program will produce settings SET Tex38=appropriate to your computer SET Tex39=Is this amount correct SET Tex40=Oh well, that's why there's an option to manually set your RAM size SET Tex41=Please enter your RAM size in megabytes SET Tex42=You cannot enter nothing for this setting. Please enter something SET Tex43=Your selected RAM size of SET Tex44=has been recorded and will be used in all SET Tex45=calculations that use the size of your installed RAM. SET Tex46=If you make a mistake, just run this option again. SET Tex47=This will install your original undo file SET Tex48=You are about to make changes to your SYSTEM.INI file SET Tex49=Are you sure you wish to continue SET Tex50=Your original undo file has been installed SET Tex51a=This will install SET Tex51=your current SET Tex52a=undo file SET Tex52=Now making your original SET Tex53a=Now loading SET Tex53=your computer's current settings SET Tex54=saved settings SET Tex55=Choose a number to change each setting SET Tex56=has been installed SET Tex57=the information file for SYSTEM.INI settings SET Tex58=settings from this computer SET Tex59=Are you sure SET Tex60=Please Note SET Tex61=This will now install your selected tweaks SET Tex62=If your system refuses to load on reboot SET Tex63=restart in SAFE MODE and run the undo file SET Tex64=If you aren't sure if you know you can boot into SAFE MODE SET Tex65=Check this first!!! As long as you can boot into safe mode, there SET Tex66=is no settings you can make that will stop the computer starting up SET Tex67=Continue installing tweaks SET Tex68=to continue SET Tex69=to go back SET Tex70=Settings have been saved SET Tex71=The undo file has been created SET Tex72=The INF file has been created SET Tex73=Now installing tweaks SET Tex74=tweaks have been installed SET Tex75=Setting Name SET Tex76=Valid values SET Tex77=recommended SET Tex78=Information :: ie Press: 0 for OFF SET Tex79=Press SET Tex80=for SET Tex81=Recommended settings SET Tex82=to Delete this setting entirely SET Tex83=to go back SET Tex84=default is SET Tex85=off SET Tex86=to automatically configure this setting based upon your RAM SET Tex86a=to automatically choose the best setting SET Tex87a=You have SET Tex87=less than SET Tex88=of RAM installed SET Tex89=This means it is recommended that we set :: SET Tex90= SET Tex91=or more SET Tex92=Enter nothing SET Tex93=Please enter the new SET Tex94=buffer size SET Tex95=This value is invalid SET Tex96=Please enter a value between SET Tex97=and SET Tex98=value SET Tex99=default SET TexRe=Reboot now SET Tey00=to Input the figure manually SET Tey01=As your computer's RAM is SET Tey02=setting is SET Tey03=Best to set to SET Tey04=Using a guide of SET Tey05=This enables 32 bit access to your hard disk SET Tey06=You computer will run at reduced performance with this off SET Tey07=Disabling is useful for troubleshooting SET Tey08=This forces the system to use as much of the computer's SET Tey09=physical memory as possible, before using your hard disk SET Tey10=Recommended for computers with 256mb of RAM or over SET Tey11=Affects communications with peripherials including SET Tey12=sound card FM/wavetable, MIDI playback-recording SET Tey13=and disk read-writes SET Tey14=Specifies the time in seconds an application runs with SET Tey15=increased priority when it receives a keystroke. Makes the SET Tey16=keyboard more responsive when running multiple applications. SET Tey17=Sets the minimum time period that each process has SET Tey18=access to the CPU. Lower values improve multi-tasking SET Tey19=but decrease overall performance, & visa versa. SET Tey20=To turn on support for removable SET Tey20a=drives :: like as in "turn on support for removable drives like Iomega, Syquest, etc" SET Tey21=like SET Tey22=depends on RAM SET Tey23=Specifies size of each block of memory buffer in bytes SET Tey24=Use larger chunks if you have lots of RAM SET Tey24a=but too big will work against efficiency SET Tey25=It's a good idea to use values that are multiples of :: min as in minimum SET Tey26=min :: max as in maximum SET Tey27=max SET Tey28=Vcache is the Windows disk-caching virtual device driver SET Tey29=Provides excellent disk performance, so don't use others. SET Tey30=eg SmartDrv, etc... unless directed to by MDGx of course SET Tey31=Excellent SET Tey32=load settings SET Tey33=install SET Tey34=of SET Tey35=It seems you haven't yet made an undo file SET Tey36=language SET Tey37=detected AutoSYSTEMini_0.56.zip

Thanks for the information.

Well if you don't upgrade to 6 sp1, then you're gonna have v5. As I said, on a fresh install I installed the Win98 to Me and everything worked afterwards. Much faster. If you want to give something back, did you notice any inaccuracies when using the report function at any time?

Hi there, I have a new problem to add to my outstanding one about the number of characters you can have in posts. A million characters? I wish ... but i digress... This one is considerably more serious... The problem: I posted some code into a codebox for peer review and noticed sometime later that what i posted had been changed by the time it was uploaded. I didn't have emoticons or signatures enabled so it can't be that. I've narrowed it down to the following: the following line has a space between each character: . . . \ h d c \ 0 0 0 1 . . . If you take out the spaces, it should NOT read: ...\hdc001... (ie i copied and pasted the line with the spaces, and then deleted each space - it was 0001 when i submitted it) I now feel like a git because some people may have read my code and thought I was nuts. Are there some phrases we should be avoiding? What's going on? So that's 2 things about MSFN that I wish I could change because its driving me nuts. Thanks in advance for any relief from my torment.

Hey there, NEWS: MDGx has gone the extra mile to make it easy to install and uninstall this so grab his version here. His also allows for many more drives than mine did. So grab it now! old post text: I've gone and put a hotfix together for this to add to the UBCD because Win98 doesn't turn on DMA by default and so this is now a must have hotfix for my project. this is a properly iexpressed hotfix. when you run it, you can back out before installation, there's a text file that explains stuff (masquerading as the license), and you get the normal boot prompts at the end. the silent switch also works. why oh why didn't i get around to learning this earlier. someone please organise someone to come to my house to kick me, please. Please note: most of what this does is do stuff you can very very very easily do yourself. To manually do what the hotfix does, you would go into device manager, go to the Disk drives section, and open up the properties of any drives you want to turn DMA access on for, and then select the DAM access checkbox. Then, you'd go into SYSTEM.INI and under the [386Enh] section, you would add DMABufferSize=64 How simple is that? Still, this does it for you. Good for unattended boot cds. The other thing is does do is automatically set DMA access for any drives you add in the future (up to 3). That's a good reason for running it anyway, hey. the readme.txt inside the hotfix: AutoDMA.EXE

Cool. So, can i download it by itself, separated from the 98se Auto-Patcher, by any chance? http://www.sharebigfile.com/file/98264/NETSETUP-zip.html Does this update require Internet Explorer to be installed beforehand? I'm sorry i'm not sure if this works on a system without Internet Explorer ... IE comes default with the OS and its pretty hard to get rid of it entirely. If you are asking do you need to upgrade to IE 6 sp1 before installing this, then the answer is no. It should work fine.

This is the Network Wizard that is available in Windows XP that automatically configures your system to network with other computers. It works perfectly well when used on a Windows 98 machine.

I'll go you one better, how about right now? --- the report function is now unrecognisable from what it was --- if you would like to test it out and also check out the new navigation and layout, please download the attachment and install to the program directory. I highly advise making a test copy of the program and using that to test ... PLEASE DO NOT ATTEMPT TO INSTALL ANYTHING, just muck about as much as you want with the report function, especially from within the modules section --- the code is for the latest updates so you might get a few surprises. I'll upload the attachment in just a sec ... and i will offer an upgrade pack as well... the attachment is now available to download .... i tested the zip contents by installing a fresh copy of v1.8 and then overwriting with the contents of the zip file. All the report functions seemed to work remember: its not a good idea to try to use the alpha to install anything, unless you are inside a VM or are using a test machine. you can go as far as the 'Are you sure' screen and its a good idea to do so, so you can read the extra messages when you use the 'Force re-installation' and 'registry tweak undo' functions. Also try to select the NUSB30 update, and try the Select All function. Have fun !!! And lots of feedback is great ... REMEMBER: 1) use the alpha to do anything but install. 2) the navigation letters are all different ... sorry. Autopatcher1.95_Alpha.zip

MDGx: re: NEW 2-19-2007 DXM for IE 5/6: http://www.mdgx.com/dx.htm#DXM Added newer DXTMSFT.DLL + DXTRANS.DLL 6.0.2800.1590 from Win2000 SP4 IE 6.0 SP1 Q928090 security fix: * Unofficial Windows 98/98 SP1/98 SE/ME DirectX Media (DXM) 6.0 Runtime for Internet Explorer 5.x/6.x: DirectShow, DirectAnimation + DirectX Transform Control APIs AMSTREAM.DLL, DANIM.DLL, DATIME.DLL, DAXCTLE.DLL, DXTMSFT.DLL, DXTMSFT3.DLL, DXTRANS.DLL, LMRT.DLL, LMRTREND.DLL, QCUT.DLL, DAXCTLE.OCX + PROCTEXE.OCX Updates you meant to say DXTRANS.DLL 6.3.2800.1590 i thought it a bit strange the file version was going backwards but, as always, we can't thank you enough for all your work for the W98 community here at MSFN

Change log for v1.95: *NOT YET RELEASED* - i plan this to be another preview release, available on public server - code for the Root Certificate Update improved - uses maths now and so is future proof -- the file is also more recent - code for the Windows 98 Second Edition Shutdown Supplement (q239887) has reverted back to what it was circa v1.7 - i knew there was a reason i stopped using the INF file, its probably the worst packaged hotfix Microsoft ever released (apart from DUN14) and doesn't play well with ANYONE! Stupid brat hotfix ... needs a good smack is what it needs. - the program now uses the default web browser to take you to the homepage. If you aren't using IE then it doesn't matter now. - the report function has been vastly improved - you can search for missing updates based upon your selections in the modules section, the process is quicker, and the results are numbered and broken down into which modules they came from, and the total number of missing updates is recorded at the end. I repeat, the report function has been VASTLY improved. - Ummmm ... in what may be a slightly controversial move, i've changed around all the navigation letters in the module menu pages. eg. '(T) Toggle - more options' is now (U) Use more options, (S) will now save your choices, not start the installations, (I) will start the installations, and so on. This was done after lots of thought and not on a whim. The letters were simply all over the place because i only started out with a few and just kept assigning new ones to what was left. I hope you all agree it was worth it and that its not too much of an inconvenience having to re-learn the navigation letters! - (more to come...)

Really? All the updates? dam*, why did I go to the trouble of developing Auto-Patcher for Windows 98 SE? Stupid me ... If only i'd known !! Virtually every update Microsoft has ever released has that phrase somewhere in the kb article --- its got more to do with protecting their hide than being technically correct. There shouldn't be any problem installing these but then again you probably won't notice any difference after doing so. I have installed all the hotfixes in AP many many times and never encountered a problem due to this (that I could tell).

thank you Tihiy ... i was using everything except START

i can't really add much more to the title and sub ... it would make my URL links in AP friendly to those who may have gone to the trouble of going to the point of removing or moving Internet Explorer so it can't be run from its normal location. thanks in advance to you helpful people ... sop.

from first post: Qs: 1) i never noticed the 'must reboot twice' notice for the Q918547.EXE update --- i've only got it rebooting once at the moment, but the user will invariably end up rebooting again anyway during the Auto-Patcher process --- my question is: is this sufficient, or should I force another reboot before continuing with any other updates -- this is easily done but i'd prefer not to if not necessary 2) do i need to update any of your hotfixes that have been changed as per above (added prompt for restart) for the needs of AP? I wouldn't think so as the unattended switches all seem to work, I just thought i'd ask ... maybe its good to update them anyway just in case people want to use the AP hotfix collection outside of AP ... you wouldn't happen to have a full list of which hotfixes you adjusted by any chance? cheers, and thanks for keeping an eye on the complete updates list...champion effort! Sop.

27th Feb, 2007: Updated in main list: RootsUp (thanks to MDGx)

Does anyone have any guesses to what could cause a new 10 second delay as above ?? I'll look into a torrent ...

23rd Feb, 2007: Added to main list: kb928090 Moved to obsolete list: kb925454 Renamed & updated in main list: HHUPD (was HHUP141), OLEUP (was OleUp240), DXM9x (was DXMedia6) New versions of files: SHELL98, OLEUP, HHUPD, RichEd9x, DXM9x

Thanks for your wealth of information -- i sort of knew that was the problem with WU but its good to have it spelled out exactly what's happening. I'm not sure I'm going to do much with the info, either I embark on the project to make AP in complete harmony with WU, or not, and frankly i'd anticipate it taking quite a bit of time and I promised myself that my music side would get a go this year, taking off my propellerhead hat and hanging it up for a bit. But who knows, maybe even arranging some of the modules will help -- now that I know that it is IE that causes the mayhem i can work around that. See, you've helped already. There are 4 links on the page - 2 for the update and 2 for the main program v1.8 --- how can you only be seeing 2 links? Have another look... i used the link from your post and started the download within 10 seconds ... just letting you know

just announcing that I can see the light at the end of the tunnel i've been in the last week or so while on another project, and so will resume work on AP soon. MDGx has sorted thru MSs latest hotfix horror alerts and given us what we can use, so those will be in the next preview release due in about a week i'd say. Thanks to everyone for their feedback, i will be going over it all and answering any queries i've missed.

Yes it is. Unfortunately the entire suite of Windows 98 hotfixes as it stands now don't play well together. Without going to much into it (this has already been discussed at length - go back about 10-20 posts) these are false alarms. By all means install the updates but nothing of value is actually installed on your system, all that happens is that Windows Update forces the re-installation of some hotfixes that had their hotfix info changed in some way. Because you have files with higher version numbers, none of the system files contained in these hotfixes is actually installed, but the hotfix info is replaced where it was missing. I will add this info to the readme.txt file so others aren't spooked. Or even better, provide a menu option to go to Windows Update with a short note about the false alarms. It'll be in the next version.

1.6 ???? I personally wouldn't use anything under v1.8 -- seriously, v1.6 is 2 versions before the one that I thought was accurate enough to release to the public. C'mon, v1.8 is on a reasonable server, go get it!

the one in Gape's pack is not the complete version (one of the components has been removed I forget which one), but it is still v1.4 so Auto-Patcher (AP) should still recognise that to some degree. I'll look further into harmonising this ... To be precise, AP should be telling you that you have a more recent file, and that is why the hotfix won't be installed. Some hotfixes make other hotfixes obsolete even when they are not related to each other at all, except they share a similar file. Are you sure its "about a third"? Maybe write down the offending updates next time around and I'll look into it. This was a known bug in v1.8 but v1.92 it should report that it was installed, and then found as installed. What you should do is post your log file when providing feedback, because that will telll much more of the story of what happened when you ran AP than you are telling me at present. Don't forget about the report function, it uses the same code as the installation routines so its a good way to know in advance what AP is going to do. Use CODEBOX to save space in your post ie CODEBOX text here /CODEBOX but with brackets around CODEBOX etc. No, Kb905495 should have installed, then found as installed the next time around.Thanks for posting your comments, awesome, much appreciated.

Yeah I agree. Originally it was to notify me to an error in setting up the choice function, but why should the USER suffer for my coding bugs ... I'll still notify about the error, but the program will try to continue. OK let me put this one to bed ... you are referring to making sure that vital program components exist and coding for situations where they are missing? ie all the files in the BIN directory? This is actually what v1.92 checks for to determine if v1.8 has been installed ... I will implement this fully in the next release. If this is not what you are referring to, please enlighten me Thanks, i'll check it out. And I'll also review your latest findings --- thanks heaps for this, you're making a real difference in the development - i'll have to elevate your honour roll status now Glad to see you got it working ... and thanks very very much for reporting the inconsistencies. I promise to address every single one ... re 4756US8.EXE and q239887 -- I go by the kb article number for naming the hotfixes - 4756US8.EXE is the file for the update referred to in q239887 - I just recently changed the code for checking for the existence of this update - it looks like it was a mistake to do so. I'll reveiw the code yet again. re DirectX 9.0c (October 2006) --- I'm pretty sure i got this one right, the code checks for the existence of d3dx9_31.dll which should be in the %windir%\system (ie c:\windows\system) directory. This file only exists in the October 2006 package and is not in any of the other Direct X installation packs, so if you don't have it that tells me you most likely have an earlier version - maybe August 2006? -- but I could be terribly wrong about this. Maybe. --- How about running the DirectX module by itself and see if the October 2006 update installs, and then do it again and see if Auto-Patcher thinks it is installed. If if it doesn't, then my code is wrong. re - 48BITLB2: Unofficial Update for Drives over 137gb (for IBM portables) --- do you know there are 2 versions of this update? The other one is the 48BITLBA: Unofficial Update for Drives over 137gb (not for IBM portables) --- what you report doesn't make sense because if you had 48BITLB2 installed you SHOULD be reporting that you DON'T have 48BITLBA: Unofficial Update for Drives over 137gb (not for IBM portables) installed. And, just out of interest, do you have Windows 98 installed on an IBM notebook or laptop? re NPUpdW98: Unofficial Update for Windows Notepad --- no, this is not related to MetaPad (an app of which i'm aware of) -- this update fixes a bug when there's more than 64kb of text. I was just about to point you towards my Complete list of updates for Win98 but it wasn't on the list! It's now there. Go here for more info re The core of Win98-to-Me by MDGx -- i'm sure about this one as well. The code checks for the existence of user32.dll (4.90.0.3001) -- if you have an eariler version of this file, then you don't have the core of Win98-to-Me by MDGx as I offer it. The only problem that could exist is that the report function fails to report that this update is missing when in fact it is, ie you could have user32.dll (4.90.0.3001) but for some reason none of the other two files in the update. But you are reporting the opposite. Please check the file version of user.exe (4.90.0.3001) and also explorer.exe (4.72.3612.1700) and report back.

OK OK I will add a check to make sure that the file exists, I will see if there are better alternative browsers to use, I will even make the earth spin backwards to save Lois Lane, if that's what it takes to please everybody. Just try not to use words like "dare" preceeded with phrases like "don't you" -- you sound like a nagging mother when you do that! v1.92 has been released. Change log for v1.92: - you get a message explaining what's going on if you try to run the beta upgrade without installing the main program first. - nothing else is different so if you have 1.91 working then stick with this until the next release.