Marius '95

I have lots of problems with resources and network connections. Win98 freezes when I close eMule or any other program that opens a large number of network connections and I encounter more and more programs that do not free resources when no longer needed. For me, system stability is getting worse every day.

I use Adaptec ASPI v4.7.1 and I had no problems.

DK Lite results: a dir was corrupted.

Win98 does NOT work well with newer hardware. There's no PCIe, dual-core or 64bit in Win98. About benchmarks - I have the impression that Win98 is a bit slower.

I just tried scandisk v4.90 from ME. It doesn't work. It's the same error - not enough memory. So far I could not find a tool that can scan for errors a 1TB FAT32 partition from Windows. ...or defragment it. Only Scandisk from DOS works. I also tried DiskMinder for Windows. It freezes after lost cluster scan.

Too late. I already did it with Acronis tools from XP. I am now using the disc space, so I can't format it again to test other format utilities. I tried to check for errors. Results: Scandisk from DOS - works! NDD (NU 2001) from DOS - works, but it is very slow. Scandisk from Windows - doesn't work - out of memory. NDD (NU 2001) from Windows - doesn't work - BSOD, crash, reset needed. Same problem with Speed Disk.

Fixed FORMAT.COM FreeDOS FORMAT.EXE Another question: how do I check for errors? I don't expect scandisk or norton to work...

I just created a RAID 0 logical drive using HPT372 and 2 WD5000AAJB. I have 1TB of free space and no way to format it! I just created a FAT32 partition with Ranish Partition Manager, saved it and rebooted. I was planning to format it form Windows, (Rightclick-Format...) but there is a problem. Windows tries to format it as a 98GB partition. FORMAT.COM - same problem. I could format it with Ranish Partition Manager, but it creates 16KB clusters. 16KB clusters on a 1TB partition means a VERY big FAT. I really don't want to abandon Win98. It have been my primary OS for 6 years.

Free memory means memory NOT USED! If I have a lot of memory, why not use it for disk cache if no other program needs it? Why leave it free? I have 1GB and 768MB are used for disk cache. Swap is enabled, but it's rarely used.

LFN tools don't work with RAM drives.

1) Everyone votes Win98 because WinXP users don't visit this forum. 2) Skins? 3) NO WEBVIEW! How about NO WEB at all in shell/desktop? 4) Slimmer Explorer & shell? Win95 Explorer.exe maybe? I tried it. It's fast but it only works with win95 shell32.dll, and newer programs don't work with win95 shell32.dll. 5) Biggest problem with win98 is not how it looks or how fast it is. It's hardware compatibility, especially display adapters. Why use new skins and icons and backgrounds if all you get is 16 colors in VGA mode?

Did anyone tried to run Win98 on a MB with AM2 socket?

They can be removed from registry, but it's complicated. Use ShellExView and disable the extensions.

No CLS! It's better to see if there are any errors in BIOS or boot manager (if any) or config.sys.

There is no "norm" for autoexec.bat or any other configuration files. They are written for you and your system, not for someone else. My autoexec.bat file probably won't even work in your system. I can tell you what your autoexec.bat does, so you can decide yourself if you like it or not. C:\PROGRA~1\GRISOFT\AVG7\BOOTUP.EXE <-this is added by your antivirus scanner. SET TEMP=C:\windows\temp SET TMP=C:\windows\temp <-these two lines set the location of your temp directory. SET TVDUMPFLAGS=8 <-I don't know what this is. SET PHPRC=C:\PHP <-I don't know what this is. PHP doesn't need any enviroment variables. SET PATH=... <-list of dirs where executable programs and .DLL files can be found if path is not written and program/DLL is not in current directory. It's not really necessary. You can remove it, unless you use command prompt and you don't like typing those paths. mode con codepage prepare=((850) C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\ega.cpi) mode con codepage select=850 keyb uk,,C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\keyboard.sys <-loads the files for DOS codepage and keyboard. If you only use english, you can remove them too. If you restart in MS-DOS mode with a custom config.sys and autoexec.bat written in Exit To Dos.pif, then you don't need dosstart.bat. autoexec.dos is a file created by DriveSpace. I never found out what it does. I always delete it when I see it. For more information, extract HELP.COM and HELP.HLP form a DOS v6.x setup. Run HELP.COM and you will find a description for every DOS command. My autoexec.bat: @ECHO OFF C:\2\LETASSIG\LETASSIG.EXE @LETTERS.INI /O:DRIVEMAP.DAT /CD SET COMSPEC=U:\COMMAND.COM SET TEMP=U:\TEMP SET TMP=U:\TEMP SET PATH=%PATH%;U:\PACK\UC2 SET BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 H7 P330 T6 SET SBPCI=U:\DRIVERS\SBPCI LH MODE COM1 19,O,8,1,B DEL %TEMP%\~DF*.TMP<U:\Y>NUL CHOICE /T:N,3 Options? IF ERRORLEVEL 2 GOTO Next1 CALL U:\1\SYSTEM\OPTIONS.BAT :Next1 IF EXIST C:\WINDOWS\WININIT.INI MORE C:\WINDOWS\WININIT.INI OPTIONS.BAT is a file that changes kernel and explorer.

I did go back to "Standard..." something with "PCI"... Can't remember the name, but it was the standard driver. AGP Texture Acceleration is "Not Available" in DirectX Diagnostics. That "very small performance increase" I mentioned earlier must have caused by something else. I'm going to put back the SmartGart now...

OK. I did as you advised. AGP reads/writes were still off. Then I removed SmartGart (with a tool from ATI). Now I can't tell if AGP reads/writes are on or off but there is a very small performance increase. During benchmarks the system was stable.

Sorry for the delay. I'm not using Win95 anymore because there are no VXD drivers for ATI Radeon. But I still use parts of Win95, like Personal Web Server v1.0, Network Monitor Agent, Fax, System Policy Editor, Send To X (powertoys), WinTop (kernel toys).

I just installed the VXD driver. AGP read/write are still off. I'll leave it installed for now. I'll run some benchmarks later to see if there is any difference. VXD file version (4.41.0000) is the same since Hyperion v4.49. The only difference is that the CAT file is removed in later versions. I usually don't install any VIA 4in1/Hyperion drivers. I see no improvement; neither performance or stability. I used to install VIA IDE Bus Master Miniport driver v3.20B but it didn't work with my new DVD-RW drive. If you have more experience with these drivers then please share it! Later edit: I did the benckmarks. Conclusion: no difference. I'll keep the SYS driver.

I looked inside VIA Hyperion drivers setup (v4.49) and extracted the CPU to AGP Controller drivers for different windows versions. Here's what I found: - Win95 driver is a VXD - not interested, I have Win98SE - Win98 driver and WinME driver are the same. No difference. - WinNT50 (Win2K) driver is not there. I don't know what driver is installed on WinNT50 systems. Maybe WinNT51 version. - WinNT51 (WinXP) driver and WinNT52 (Win2003) driver are the same, except that WinNT52 driver does not have the .CAT file. - Win98 driver is a miniport driver. - WinNT5x driver is a filter driver. The driver (VIAAGP1.SYS) needs NTOSKRNL.DLL and HAL.DLL, so it's not possible to install it on Win98 systems. I also looked at ATI Catalyst driver for WinNT5x. There are several SYS files. All of them require NTOSKRNL.DLL, HAL.DLL and STREAM.DLL to load. I just installed CPU to AGP Controller driver for Win98. (This is the first time I install this driver.) I'm using latest Omega drivers for ATI and Win98. I opened the Advanced SmartGART properties and pressed the "Retest All" button. After restart, AGP read & write are still off but Fast Write is now enabled.

Here's an image where you can see ABBYY FineReader, Orca and Win98.

ABBYY FineReader 8 installer (.msi file) can be edited with Orca and then installed on Win98.

LLXX was banned? May I ask why?

You mean OSR 2.5 ... Like I said, OSR 2.5 CD contains IE4 and some updates (like USB support). BTW, I don't know any USB device that works in Win95. There are no drivers for Win95. Not even a mass storage driver. Correct! But: 1) If you load LFN driver on some newer computers, you won't have enough conventional memory to start windows. BIOS producers just don't care anymore about how much upper memory will be available to EMM386. 2) No program written for Win31 can use LFNs. These programs can't use LFNs even if run in WinXP! And only some, very few, Win95 programs can run in Win311+Win32 update. 2) If you start Win31 on a FAT32 partition, 32bit disk access won't work.

There are a lot of programs and boot managers that offer good protection before windows starts. Some boot managers move partition table from it's normal location. Without the password you see no partitions on that disk. A smart person (one that knows what a partition table is) may be able to find the partitions and rewrite the partition table, but such knoledge is rare today. BTW, did you know that ATA disks have a hardware security feature? Take a look at this: http://www.fitzenreiter.de/ata/ata_eng.htm You can insert a small program into your MB BIOS and it will ask for password *before* POST is complete! No password - no HDD access.