Dave-H

I'd already tried manually putting E1000.DOS into a folder and then modifying the path accordingly, but it made no difference. I'll try again putting the path to the source folder this time rather than the destination folder.

I tried running NET START from the DOS prompt, and tried Drugwash's suggestion of sending the output to a file. It worked, the file said that the driver was installed correctly. I then tried installing again in Windows, and before rebooting added >net.log to the NET START command in AUTOEXEC.BAT. On restart, the result was the same as before, but the generated net.log had the following content - Error loading device driver E1000.DOS.Error 7308: The driver file could not be found. The driver file may not be installed on your computer or it is not located in the folder specified in the registry. To delete the driver and then add it again, double-click the Network icon in Control Panel. For more information, type NET HELP 7308 at the command prompt.E1000.DOS was not loaded.Error 7321: Network-card drivers failed to load.So, interesting! I haven't had a chance to look at that help option yet. I wonder where it was expecting E1000.DOS to be?

@Drugwash Thanks, I'd already thought about whether the problem was because the driver files were in a sub-folder. I moved the three files to a folder directly on the C: drive, with a short name, but no difference i'm afraid. I will try to set up a logging process and see what happens. @dencorso Thanks for that link den. It refers to a NET.CFG file, which does not appear at all in the driver I downloaded. I wonder if it's necessary, but you would think it would have been included if it was! @Sfor Yes. the file copying is initiated whenever any change is made to the network configuration. In fact it happens if you press "OK" on the Network interface in the Windows Control Panel even if you haven't changed anything, which is quite annoying! It re-copies existing files, asking for the Windows 98 CD even for files that are already present, and asks if I want to over-write files that are newer (I say no). The one file it doesn't ever copy is the E1000.DOS file!

No, I do not. But Windows loads it by itself, anyways. Thanks, yes of course it does, I had forgotten that. Gosh some of this is like going back 20 years! I re-checked the files, and couldn't see any syntax errors in them. I then edited the oemsetup.inf file and put an absolute path in for the E1000.DOS file to be copied to. No joy, it just did the same as before. I really don't understand why it's making no attempt to copy the E1000.DOS file to a system folder anywhere. Regardless of any settings in the protocol.ini file as regards slots, speed etc., fundamentally I would still expect it to copy the driver file across, and if it's not doing that it's got no hope of working!

Thanks for sticking with this guys, I really appreciate it! I tried the PRO100 driver, and had the same result as before, despite the presence of the .NIF file. I will investigate Drugwash and submix8c's latest suggestions tomorrow. Sfor, do you have IFSHLP.SYS loaded in your CONFIG.SYS file? If not, I will assume it's not actually necessary and remove it, as I want to keep as much base memory free as possible. Cheers, Dave.

I did wonder about the question mark instead of the "1". My PRO1000 driver has only three files, PROTOCOL.INI, OEMSETUP.INF, and E1000.DOS, which is the driver file, equivalent of your L2.DOS. I don't have a .NIF file in the PRO1000 driver folder, but there is one in the PRO100 driver folder. Maybe I'll try the PRO100 driver next time, although it is a PRO1000 adapter. Also, what do you have loaded in your CONFIG.SYS?

And this is mine - ; OEMSETUP.INF for Intel(R) Gigabit Connection Driver 6.09[netcard]E1000$="Intel(R) Gigabit Network Connection",0,NDIS,Ethernet,REAL,E1000,E1000_ini[E1000]devdir=1:E1000.dosdevice=E1000.DOS,@devdir\E1000.DOS[E1000_ini]DriverName=E1000$There is another [PCI] section detailing the supported card IDs. Looks pretty similar!

Well I removed everything and tried again. This time I got two identical "Intel Gigabit Network Connections" in Device Manager, both disabled Code 22. Enabling both simply disabled them again when rebooted, but enabling just one gave the same result as before "device working properly" but with no driver files. One thing that is certain is that the E1000.DOS file is not being copied to the system. The relevant entry in the INF file is - [E1000] devdir=1:E1000.dos device=E1000.DOS,@devdir\E1000.DOS So, where exactly should this "devdir" be? "1:E1000.dos" doesn't mean anything to me, and searching on it hasn't helped!

Thanks, I did the check and only PROTMAN was present, not the other two. I did a bit more research and read something that said that I needed to have IFSHLP.SYS loaded in CONFIG.SYS, which it wasn't. I think I probably removed it years ago to free up memory as it wasn't needed at the time. I re-added DEVICE=IFSHLP.SYS in CONFIG.SYS, and tried the install again. This time I got an entry in Device Manager called "Existing NDIS2 Driver" which said it couldn't load its driver with Error Code 2. The entry for the Intel Adapter was also there as before, disabled. Again enabling it worked, but there were no drivers loaded.

Thanks so much Sfor, that's brilliant! I had assumed that being an INF file it could be loaded through Device Manager, obviously not. It hadn't occurred to me to use the Network setup dialogue instead! I did what you said, and the driver apparently installed OK. When I rebooted, the "Intel Gigabit Network Connection" had appeared in Device Manager, but was disabled. I enabled it and rebooted again, and it stayed enabled. It says it's working normally, but there are no driver files loaded for it. It's not actually working of course. If I go into the Network setup again the adapter is not listed. No automatic modifications had been made to CONFIG.SYS or AUTOEXEC.BAT. I tried manually adding the NET START command to AUTOEXEC.BAT, and then just got an error message on boot saying "Error 2183: The default network services have already been started." Any ideas? Cheers and thanks again, Dave.

Thanks again submix8c! That link is exactly where the driver I've got came from. You've certainly given me a lot more food for thought, I'll come back when I've digested it all and tried a few things! Cheers, Dave.

1096 is there in the INF section OK. E1000.DOS is indeed 64592 bytes, although it seems to be dated 14th March 2014. I got the driver directly from Intel's site. It was supposed to be the latest version (19.5), and the digital signature on the downloaded PRODOS.exe file is dated 28th October 2014.

@dencorso Thanks den, I looked at that thread, which seems to be mainly about graphics driver problems, but couldn't quite work out what had been done to get the DOS network driver to work. Sfor wasn't using an Intel driver of course. The Intel DOS driver seems to consist of just three files, E1000.DOS, which I assume is the actual driver, and PROTOCOL.INI and OEMSETUP.INF. The inf file does not seem to work in Windows as a normal inf file, I can't update the driver with it for instance as it just says there's no information about my hardware there. I tried loading E1000.DOS in CONFIG.SYS, and all that happened was that the system just rebooted when CONFIG.SYS loaded, even when booting to DOS! I had to go into XP to put the file back as it was before. Also, there is already a protocol.ini file in my Windows folder, so I'm not quite sure what to do with the one that Intel supplied. I don't want to end up with my existing plugin card network hardware not working! There are a couple of readme files with the driver, but none that say anything about how to actually use it!

OK, I'll try anything once! I'll let you know if I get any joy.

Thanks all, yes I looked at all that and it does seem that I'm onto a loser here. I did look at the DOS driver, and it's good that they made that available for system setup purposes, but it's wouldn't be any use under Windows of course. Oh well, it's always worth asking. If there was any solution at all, you can be sure that someone here would know it! Cheers, Dave.

Confirmed! Let's hope it lasts...............

Thanks Drugwash! That tallies with what I found when I tried to install those drivers. The INF files contained no information about my hardware, and if I manually added it the driver appeared to install but didn't work. I don't think there are any official Intel drivers that will work on Windows 98SE with that hardware, I was just clutching at straws a bit in the hope that maybe there was a generic or modified driver somewhere out there that would do the job, even if only at a basic level to get internet access on 98SE through that connection.

I assume it would have been e1000w9x.sys. There are e100bnt.sys and e100bnt5.sys files too, but I assume they are for Windows NT 4.0 and 2000/XP respectively. @submix8c Thanks! I think I have actually already tried that PRO1000 driver, and it didn't work, but I will have another go. I have never tried the "ProXGB" driver, whatever that is, so I will give that a try too.

Wow, thanks for the quick response! Unfortunately I think it's a bit more fundamental than that. When the driver supposedly installed, Device Manager said that the device couldn't start and to update the driver, and the ProSet Windows Control Panel Applet said that the driver was there but no card was detected!

My motherboard (Supermicro X7DAL-E) has two on-board Intel Ethernet connections. The hardware ID is PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1096. I was wondering if anyone knew of a driver for this that would work under 98SE. I have tried the last Windows 98 Intel ProSet drivers, and even if the necessary data is manually added to the INF file, the driver installs but doesn't actually work. Any suggestions for possible alternatives i could try would be gratefully received. I am using a PCI card for internet access under 98SE at the moment, but I would really like to free the slot for something else!

I installed the update with relative ease on my other machine. All that was needed was a run of SFC /scannow which restored the missing Start Menu folders. Why the update can't just restore the missing folders itself as part of its routine rather than just failing is quite beyond me! As I said before, if those folders are so essential, why does the system not stop you deleting or re-naming them? Surely if they are necessary system folders Windows File Protection should just restore them automatically as it does with other system files. The update also installed KB3014442 as a separate install, which I installed manually from the downloaded offline files on the other machine. What that is I have no idea, searching for information just takes you to the KB3000850 information. It's obviously part of it, but why it should be a separate download and history entry is strange. All sorted now anyway. I have simply hidden the Start Menu folders that the update needed, rather than deleting them, so hopefully everything will work OK straight away next time! Thanks for all your help everyone, and I hope this thread helps others in the same situation as I was. Cheers, Dave.

Well I finally got it installed! I did a bit more research, and found a forum post which said that running "DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup" before running "DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth" made the latter work OK. I ran "DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup" and got "Failed Error 5 Access is Denied". Tried again in a "clean boot" configuration, and it eventually worked OK. Tried "DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth" again, and it still failed on several attempts with the 80240021 time out error. Finally abandoned that and just ran "SFC /scannow" again, which this time found no errors to fix. Tried installing the update again, and finally it worked! Now I've just got to get it installed on the other machine. For goodness sake why does this have to be so hard?!

I tried SFC /scannow which seemed to repair the Start Menu folders. Tried the update install again, and again it failed, but with a different error this time 80070476. Then tried the DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth command, which also failed and said it had made no changes. Tried a second time with the same result. It returned error 80240021, which seems to be something to do with an operation timing out. Error 80070476 appears to be ERROR_TOO_MANY_LINKS ("An attempt was made to create more links on a file than the file system supports.") What's all that about? I've uploaded the logs to Dropbox. https://www.dropbox.com/s/ztsyoaydtqs0qn9/CBS.log?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/pp4vklco3b3pm9k/DISM.log?dl=0

Surely Microsoft haven't done this deliberately. The Windows Update site for Windows 98SE worked for a full five years after support for the OS ended. Anyway, automatic updates seem to still work, so there's absolutely no reason why the Microsoft Update site shouldn't! I think this is just an oversight, and once it's brought to their attention MS will fix it. After all, they do have corporate users paying them to still support Windows XP as far as I remember, so they will certainly want it working again!

Thanks MagicAndre1981, it sounds like you could well be on the right track here, as I have highly customised Start Menus on both machines. I have Classic Start Menu installed, and I don't know if that might be a factor. I've tried re-creating the folders you mention, although there seems to be a bit of confusion in the system as to whether the folder is called "Accessories" or "Windows Accessories". The names seem to be interchangeable and when you re-name using one name, sometimes you actually get the other! Unfortunately I've tried twice more with the folders re-added, and it's still failing. It's taking a lot longer than before, with much disk activity, and I was really hopeful, but at the end it's still showing "failed" with the same error number. Do you have a list of all the system default Start Menu folders anywhere? I couldn't find one on-line. I think if I can restore them all to as they were "out of the box" this might fix it. Not just the system ones, but the user ones too. Unfortunately I'm pretty sure that just temporarily uninstalling Classic Start Menu won't put the menus back to their defaults, as it actually edits the contents of the folders. Cheers, Dave.