Drugwash

Not to mention the sometimes misleading (or completely lacking) information in older versions of MSDN that used to account for 9x compatiblity. For example in MSDN 2005 they say GetInterfaceInfo() in iphlpapi.dll returns WCHAR for Name in the array of IP_ADAPTER_INDEX_MAP structures within the IP_INTERFACE_INFO structure. Well, not so much in Win9x (tested in 98SE with iphlpapi.dll v5.0.17171.2) - it always returns CHAR (ANSI string). Now, if one would trust the docs and always perform a WideCharToMultiByte conversion when the result is required in ANSI format… Calling arbitrary code in other libraries could be their attempt at protecting some delicate operations or just an ugly hack performed in the last minute before shipping the product. Either way it's bad, very bad, because it can break a whole line of products on an occasional upgrade (be it official or not). Have you replaced/upgraded any system files after installing uSP3? Installed drivers or (older) software that could have replaced system files without notifying the user? There may be a mismatch somewhere leading to such errors, try to reinstall uSP3 if such errors continue to pop up. If uSP3 asks for downgrading certain system files, allow it to do so - sometimes there are good reasons to use older files. Let us know if there's any more problems. Oh and don't forget to back up any valuable data before further fiddling with the system.

I've learned the position of the keys since 1999-2000 and I don't even have to use any key combo when layout is set to RO, but it would still be nice to see those letters on the keyboards, same as spanish, french, german, danish and other people (even chinese, japanese, korean) see their native alphabet on their personalized keyboards.

The only problem in the IT world as well as everywhere else is the complete lack of (sane) choices. They just want to sell, sell, sell. They don't care about users' needs or desires. They know there's no real competition in their market segment. Now you, Jorge (or anybody else), try to build up a business that produces say Windows 9x or OS/2 hardware complete with drivers and whatnot. How long do you think you'll stay alive after you refuse their "proposal" to back the […] off of the market? Why would almost everybody remove Win9x drivers and compatible software from their servers, considering (at least theoretically) almost nobody would care for that stuff so they would (theoretically) generate (almost) no traffic? Wasted space? C'mon, we're in 21st century! So? I guess someone said "do it or else". And chicken comply. That's the world we're living in and the bullies are not where some say they'd be. @jaclaz: Thanks, I know about that company, but I don't trust current products, for one, and then I just can't afford ordering over there even if I wanted to. Besides, they still don't make custom key caps for the Romanian language, I need to use a black marker for ŞŢÂĂÎ.

I assume you're talking about the good ol' IBM Model M keyboards. I still have three working pieces (see here), I've accidentally broken another one few days ago when a bottle of beer spilled all over it. It was my first keyboard ever, bought second-hand in 1999 (got my signature on a bottom sticker) and it's been manufactured in 1988 (internal sticker on that thick metal plate). Never missed a keypress and the sound (to me) is a must. Almost cried over it. They are on their way to achieve that goal, from what I read. They've acquired a starter company named Sonder that invented the e-ink system which allegedly allows changing the graphics on all keys. There are pictures on the web about this. Too bad they probably will retain the patent for the technology so I won't ever see a Windows 98SE driver for such a standalone keyboard (or the keyboard itself, for that matter).

According to the pictures I just saw on the web, that band where the function keys used to be appears to actually be some kind of touch display, whose functions can be changed (sequentially by touch or through software - dunno). So it may be able to display smileys, media functions, progressbars and even… the good ol' function keys and act accordingly on touch. MacBook Pro 2016 touch bar

Ah, so you won the lottery. Alright, build yourself a secondary computer for testing purposes; install the hardware you want, install the drivers, see how it works. When testing finished OK you may then add that piece of hardware to the main computer. Otherwise you may find yourself with a broken setup, having to take everything from scratch or waste hours/days to repair it. It's about API compatibility. Some newer APIs coming from the NT family may require or return Unicode strings instead of ANSI, others may require or return different structure sizes or formats and - knowing M$ - some may even directly call code in the middle of other libraries that may not match the intended ones. This can lead to erratic behavior, buffer overruns or at best wrong data being fetched and processed. Either way, working with an upgraded 9x system can be difficult, especially when running complex applications such as games.

It is possible that some upgraded system libraries (coming from uSP3 or manually added) could think they are running under a higher OS version and as such they may behave differently/erroneously. This is just a theory though.

Thanks, jaclaz, I think I found the culprit in Pale Moon's case: the Encrypted Web add-on (fork of HTTPS Everywhere). I've noticed that one of the images not showing up in the topic you linked to above had an address like i85.photobucket.com but in my browser's statusbar there was an s85.photobucket.com stalling the page. This sparked the idea that a HTTP address was being forced to a HTTPS that cannot be served/doesn't exist on that server. So I pulled down the Encrypted Web's menu and disabled it for the Photobucket domain. Upon reload, page loaded succesfully, including the image. Most likely Firefox users would have to do the same in HTTPS Everywhere or whatever similar add-on/extension they might have. Sorry, Tripredacus, for wasting your time - all this extra security that we're being scared into adopting sometimes leads to such issues.

In regard to crashes, maybe some other related game libraries require KernelEx compatibility to be disabled. Check the error dialog when/if it happens again, see if you get a filename that may lead to the culprit. As for upgrades, personally I'd say the less - the better. For one, any added hardware piece requires a driver and a single bad driver can take the whole machine down. The more hardware pieces you have, the more chances to get crashes/freezes/etc. Then, all this hardware takes power so your PSU may get worn up too soon. It all depends on the quality of the PSU. If you really need to add a bunch of hardware, then add them one at a time, install corresponding driver and check the machine for a few days, see how it behaves in your usual applications, at startup/reboot and so on, to make sure the new drivers and associated resources don't negatively affect machine's behavior.

Maybe Photobucket are filtering certain IP ranges blocking their access, or there are multiple servers serving that item according to geo-zone and some of them could have a non-sync'ed/corrupt database; that would explain why some can load the picture and others don't. Anyway, now it shows up from Imgur so this problem is solved. Thank you. EDIT: A possbile/probable explanation is further down, at least for Pale Moon users.

Yep, sometimes it's strange. I can get pictures from other photobucket servers but the one that serves that particular picture doesn't want to serve me and keeps my browser in a limbo. Oh well…

Yes, it's the same thing - my toy just brings together a few settings in a single window, avoiding unnecessary fuss. It's just that less-knowledgeable people may not even make it to the System Control Panel so it's a convenient alternative for them. Jaclaz does have a point with being able to do it offline by knowing the direct registry address though.

Internet works in mysterious ways…

I have a tool in my cloud folder than can take care of that among other things, it's called AFT. Go to Nags > Disable autoreboot on crash > Apply > Exit.

Besides software, keep in mind it may also be a hardware issue: - CPU cooler may get clogged with dust preventing the fan from cooling it properly, or got displaced; blow off the dust, clean old thermal grease between CPU and cooler and replace with new one, attach cooler firmly to CPU. - A failing power source unit may also lead to random BSODs. Get into BIOS, see if you have a voltage reporting item, check voltages there (depends on sensors) or check physically with a multimeter at the main power socket. - Even if some proprietary software says the HDD is OK, it may not be. Try some advanced checking tool such as HDAT2, it may find some bad sectors (or hopefully not). - RAM can also be at fault - blame it on cheap chinese materials or solar eruptions. Try a MemTest86+ scan on the RAM, you may be surprised. I have a 512MB SDRAM that errors out on only one test out of them all, enough to be unreliable. - Open up the case, get good lighting inside and look for gonflated/leaking capacitors on the motherboard and on videocard; if any, take the unit to an electronics technician to recap it or replace the faulty board.

Try to search online for forums or other discusion groups where the games you're having trouble with are/were being discussed. There may be incompatibilities between game engine and certain videocard manufacturers/models/driver versions. Some games may have been released in partnership with specific videocard manufacturers which may lead to such incompatibilities. Some games may need specific patches to fix certain issues. Personally I never fancied ATI cards myself but that's just an opinion. EDIT: Also try to manually set compatiblity mode to Disabled or Windows98SE in the KernelEx properties for main game executable(s). It's possbile some built-in routine checks for exotic APIs presence and assumes you're running a different OS, thus requiring capabilities that may not be available even with the help of KernelEx.

Your own signature here appears to contain an image hosted at photobucket and incidentally my machine is never able to load it, holding any and all MSFN pages that contain one of your comments from completing loading. For this reason I have to block photobucket for the msfn.org domain. The irony. Anyway, for people that use either Firefox (an older, sane version) or Pale Moon (same goes here), there is an invaluable add-on called YARIP (Yet Another Remove It Permanently) without which I wouldn't even think of browsing the web. It can not only remove user-chosen elements from web pages but it can also tweak the heck out of moronically flat interfaces that plague the web lately, especially in e-mail (such as AOL, Yahoo and others). Users of Pale Moon may need to modify the add-on's code in order to work properly or I could provide my own fixed version on PM request. I've been using that version on PM 25.8.1 for months already. Can't vouch for PM 26.x or 27 though. Sorry for the off-topic, guys.

It so happens that in house I have a X1130, a X1150 and a X1190. First one was the X1150 and worked fine for printing but scanner used to corrupt the image with random black vertical lines. Replaced it with X1130 which scans fine but has no usable ink cartridges. Never tested the X1190 that I found on the curb. Now, my memory being hazy I can't remember what happened back when I first installed the drivers but I have a feeling the downloadable package from the official site may not have worked well. Fortunately I have an original driver CD and I think that's what is installed since. Do you have an original driver CD for the X1100 series and did you try to install those drivers? Do you have an alternative driver package that you tried installing? Here's my files with versions and their KernelEx compatibility settings: SPOOL32.EXE v4.10.1998 (original from Win98SE), disabled KernelEx WINSPOOL.DRV v4.10.1998 (original from Win98SE), default KEx compatibility SPOOLSS.DLL v4.10.1998 (original from Win98SE), default compatibility LEXBCE.DLL v8.29, default compatibility LEXLMPM.DLL v8.29, default compatibility LMABK2PP.DLL v1.0, default compatibility LXBKPP32.DLL v2.0.2.2, default compatibility (the above are only Lexmark-related files loaded by spool32.exe, there may be much more on the system) At startup there are two executables that run automatically (unless manually disabled): lxbkbmgr.exe v0.1.1.1, default compatibility lexstart.exe v8.29, default compatibility However, please note that I also have a laser printer from Lexmark installed on the same system, an E352dn connected only through LAN not USB so it's possible some files belong to it or got upgraded. The driver installer also adds certain entries in WIN.INI: - under [Devices]: Lexmark X1100 Series=lxbkpr,USB001 - under [PrinterPorts]: Lexmark X1100 Series=lxbkpr,USB001,15,45 That's about all I can do for now.

Notifications completely stopped for me, could be a month or two ago - can't remember, I've been a mess all this time. I've reset all of them about a week ago, to no avail. Could this have something to do with AOL? They used to send about 95% of all MSFN e-mails directly to Spam despite me always marking them as 'not spam' which made me completely disable the spam check. I'm afraid to try changing the e-mail address.

One other thing that just stepped on me: where the he|| did the notification popup come from that it's showing on top of my full screen video player while not even Pale Moon X-Notifier addon's popup or POPPeeper's popup have ever dared to disturb me while watching a movie?!? This is too much! I'm outta here!

The avatar is just a small part of the issue but to reply to your question, no, I see absolutely no option to add/edit/remove an avatar whatsoever. There is also no 'Save this topic' button at the bottom as it used to be. Notification e-mails do not link to first unread post in a topic as before but to a specific post, which means some posts may get missed if notifications keep coming in a not-so-timely fashion or most of them are blocked/sent to spam as the imbecils at AOL keep doing (I had to disable spam protection in order to get MSFN notifications in Inbox, but now I'll delete the AOL account altogether due to their new moronic interface that plagued the IT world). Anyway, the interface is the big issue and is something I cannot and will not accept. Stability is what I cherish most in life and what seems to be blown up in every aspect of it lately. Microsoft and their one-size-fits-all policy that everyone seems to embrace may go to he|| for what I care.

When faced with the choice of 'my way or the highway' I invariably choose the latter. Since I'm now faceless I would like to completely remove my profile here. How can this be achieved?

I've never installed/used a localized version of 98SE so dunno if this is possible but in the the US version in Control Panel > Add/Remove Programs > Windows Setup there should be an option called Multilanguage Support with five subcategories: Baltic, Central European, Cyrillic, Greek, Turkish. You may enable them all but make sure you have the installation CD (or files) at hand. Then in Control Panel > Text Services you may add the desired keyboard layout(s). If Multilanguage Support is not available in localized Windows 98SE then you may have to install the US version and make sure Multilanguage Support is enabled at install time (choose 'Custom' installation when given the choice).

CodeStuff Starter has been good enough for me from Win95 through Win7. Unfortunately it seems abandoned and hard to find even on its official sites. Too bad there's no x64 version of it, since the 32bit doesn't "catch" the 64bit services and processes. I wonder if it still runs (correctly) under Win10… The built-in Task Manager has always been a last resort to me, used only when the system was too unstable or low on resources to run Starter. But to each their own.

Maybe they only send the notification once per user ID. I got the notification once five days ago, never connected again until a couple minutes ago when there was no other notification. The client is the same: Miranda IM v0.10.24.0. So don't get your hopes high.