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Installing Win98SE on more 'recent' PC.


HardDriv'n

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You seem not to realize that what I led you to do is a horrible kludge. But I never said or implied it wasn't. With 512 MiB of Video RAM, 3.5 GiB of RAM, running a SATA disk in compatibility mode and having no mobo drivers, your system is in a *very* unstable state, on the very brink of crashing all the time.

Well it's been a pain but, I finally go the Intel mobo chipset drivers to install. Talk about an IRQ, and I/O, nightmare...

I started with a fresh install to see if I could troubleshoot the shutdown issues.

1. I had to disable BIOS IRQ assignment of the Intel USB, and SMBus, controllers to fully install the Intel Chipset Software utility. After that, I reset the BIOS without issues.

2. I installed the VBE9x VESA drivers, using the Miniport VGA driver from the set. DXDIAG reported the video memory at 1.5 MB (LOL), and the screen refresh/scrolling rate for Windows apps was pretty bad. I followed that up with an install of MDGX's unofficial DirectX 9.0c silent installer. The preformance increase was slight but present, and DXIDAG now reported the video memory as unknown. DirectDraw seems to be functioning.

3. So far up until this point, Windows had been restarting/shuttting down properly. I then installed the Ethernet drivers for the mobo onboard ethernet port, and also installed the offline installer of IE6 SP1. After rebooting, I decide to take a break, and shut the PC off. But... the shutdown hang was back. My uneducated guess would be another IRQ, or I/O, conflict was created when I added the device.

4. I installed the drivers for my sound cards, and well... that was a lot of fun trying to find drivers for them. In the process of searching for them I found an article detailing a patch from Microsoft for Win98 shutdown errors. After applying it, the PC shutdown without any hang. But upon restart, I had a new problem. I was getting a non-specififc 'Windows protection error', which kept the system from booting. I could either let the error happen, and after manually powering off, select the normal mode from the safe mode menu. Or, I could hold the CTRL key down from boot, and select step-by-step, saying yes to all with the exception of 'process windows startup drivers'.

With the added note that I haven't been able to 'reboot' into DOS at any point without the system crashing, that's where I'm pretty much at. I'll probably have to troubleshoot the drivers loaded by windows on startup, but I don't know where to find docs on how to add/remove them from the process. In all actuality, it could be any number of the following causes - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/149962 .

My original plan was simply to use DOS. But either... there weren't any drivers for my sound cards, or my mobo didn't have the support needed for them to function in real DOS mode. In the process, I noticed that DOS (as an industry standard in some places) has actually seen improvements in USB, SATA HD, and SATA optical drive support. http://johnson.tmfc.net/dos/driver.html , http://bretjohnson.us/

Windows 98 has worked great for me as a DOS with GUI, running all the DOS apps I've thrown at it with sound. Much better than say running OpenGEM, without sound.

But while the SATA HDD works capably enough in compatibility mode (at least for DOS programs), I have no access to my Dvd-rw drive at all. In DOS, I had all my USB, HDD, and optical drives working. Is there any way I could load those DOS drivers at the Windows 98 boot, and have that support persist into the GUI aspect of OS?

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Get a DOS driver for SATA DVD and load it through CONFIG.SYS

So there's no way to load drivers up in the Windows startup files? I guess I'll try it here in a few minutes.

When I've been going through the step-by-step boot option, I've noticed drivers that aren't listed in the System.ini, or Win.ini. Are the options embedded into the kernel itself?

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If I recall correctly, dencorso's fixes to system.* are not complete. That's why you still have troubles with shutdown.

1. For AGP cards you must add exclusion for AGP memory window c000-cfff

2. There may be more exclusions needed for ACPI and other BIOS extensions, in many cases it is e000-efff window.

For both exclusions you should add a line

EMMExclude=c000-cfff e000-efff ; exclusions for AGP and ACPI BIOS extensions

to [386Enh] section in system.ini and system.cb

If you load EMM386.EXE in CONFIG.SYS, you should add those exclusions too, for example

device=c:\windows\emm386.exe noems x=c000-cfff x=e000-efff

3. It is required to add both min and max values in [vcache] section of system.ini and system.cb. I recommend to set the size of HDD internal cache for MinFileCache value, so you should

have something like that:


[vcache]
MinFileCache=16384 ; your HDD cache size
MaxFileCache=393216 ; size recommended for 1+ GB RAM

Edited by Usher
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dencorso said *do* *NOT* load EMM386.EXE on the config.sys. I should have said "do not load EMM386.EXE in your machine ever, if you intend to run Win9x/ME". It's not needed at all, and it'll only help make Windows even more unstable.

However, adding both the EMMExclude line and the MinFileCache line to SYSTEM.INI and SYSTEM.CB can do no harm, so do it, just in case. I doubt they'll help any, but, then again, why not?

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1. For AGP cards you must add exclusion for AGP memory window c000-cfff

2. There may be more exclusions needed for ACPI and other BIOS extensions, in many cases it is e000-efff window.

For both exclusions you should add a line

EMMExclude=c000-cfff e000-efff ; exclusions for AGP and ACPI BIOS extensions

to [386Enh] section in system.ini and system.cb

If you load EMM386.EXE in CONFIG.SYS, you should add those exclusions too, for example

device=c:\windows\emm386.exe noems x=c000-cfff x=e000-efff

I've never been able to afford to build a custom PC from scratch, and I have always pieced together what I could for dirt cheap/free.

This PC has...

- Pentium 4, 3.4 Ghz (Prescott w/HT)

- Nvidia Geforce 8400GS (512 MB)

- DDR2 SDRAM (3.5 GB)

- XW4200 motherboard (HP)

- North Bridge: Intel Alderwood i925X

- South Bridge: Intel 82801FR ICH6R

- Intel 82801FB(M) ICH6 (AC'97)

Working WDM drivers, without DOS app sound support

- Creative Sound Blaster Audigy SE (PCI)

Non-functional in Windows 98. It's the main sound card in Vista, Linux, and FreeDOS.

- Yamaha YMF-724 DS-XG

It's from an older PC, and works for DOS apps.

However, adding both the EMMExclude line and the MinFileCache line to SYSTEM.INI and SYSTEM.CB can do no harm, so do it, just in case. I doubt they'll help any, but, then again, why not?

It doesn't seem to have any effect.

Is there any particular reason Rloew's SATA patches are so expensive? It' almost like they have industry/company pricing, without an option for single end-users.

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Is there any particular reason Rloew's SATA patches are so expensive? It' almost like they have industry/company pricing, without an option for single end-users.

What??? $11 dollars is expensive? :lol:

IMHO, the question here is, do you want this machine to work and be stable, or not? How important is it?

If it is important, bite the bullet and fix it right. I seriously doubt it will ever be in a usable state with this cobbled-up mess. :angel

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Is there any particular reason Rloew's SATA patches are so expensive? It' almost like they have industry/company pricing, without an option for single end-users.

What??? $11 dollars is expensive? :lol:

Not that I'd commit to getting it if it was only 11 us dollars, but.... [emphasis mine]

ORDERING

To purchase this Software or additional copies of this Software for other

Computers:

Send $99.95 US per copy to:

Rudolph Loew

506 Bieling Rd.

Elmont, NY 11003

USA

Payment can be made as follows:

1. Cash

2. Money Order drawn on a US Bank or Post Office

3. Personal Check drawn on a US Bank (Delivery made after Check clears)

4. International Postal Money Order accepted by the US Postal Service

5. Bank Account or Current Balance Payment via Paypal to rloew@hotmail.com

Credit or Debit Card funded Paypal Payments will be DENIED

6. Western Union

7. Other options may be available from the following authorized Distributors:

C. C. Anderson http://slesarc.x10host.com

http://rloew1.no-ip.com/Programs/Patchtb.htm

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And here is what you didn't quote:

CONTENTS

RFDISK.ZIP RFDISK Advanced Partitioning Program Package

RFORMAT.ZIP RFORMAT Advanced Formatting Program Package

BOOTMAN2.ZIP Universal Disk Boot Manager Package

PATCH.ZIP DOS and Windows Patches to support these Drives

TOOLS.ZIP Additional Tools to Install and Support these Drives

README.TXT This file

MANUAL.TXT Users Manual

LICENSE.TXT License Terms and Conditions

HISTORY.TXT Revision History

Meaning that's as the title in the page says, is the:

TeraByte Plus Package, which does include the SATA Patch and the > 137 GB Patch (each @ US$11 apiece), among a whole bunch of other software:

The TeraByte Plus Package is a set of Tools and Patches that provide support

for Hard Drives with Larger Capacities and/or Larger Sector Sizes than was

possible previously with DOS and Windows 98SE.

From that package you need, at most, just the SATA Patch and the > 137 GiB Patch , which are sold separately.

With all due respect, take your time to actually read your sources, before you go ahead (mis)quoting them.

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From that package you need, at most, just the SATA Patch and the > 137 GiB Patch , which are sold separately.

I followed the link you provided. Read until I saw the SATA patch mentioned, and clicked on the second link. Why would I keep reading the front page? Maybe he should mention on the page I linked to that they can be bought separately...?

With all due respect, take your time to actually read your sources, before you go ahead (mis)quoting them.

I quoted the price of what I thought it would cost to acquire the SATA patch, nothing else.

BTW, it's been so long since I starte doing it as a routine that I even forgot to tell you about it, but I'm sure your hardware is a good case-in-point where disabling both ACPI and APM would contribute to a much improved stability.

Noted. I'll post back with the results when I have them. Thanks for the heads up.

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dencorso said *do* *NOT* load EMM386.EXE on the config.sys. I should have said "do not load EMM386.EXE in your machine ever, if you intend to run Win9x/ME". It's not needed at all, and it'll only help make Windows even more unstable.

Just for the record:

Many people install Win9x in order to run old DOS apps. Many of those apps require EMM386.EXE to be loaded, some of them even create pif files with proper settings when installed under Windows. And Windows have its own database of old apps and may also create pif with EMM386.EXE on, see %windir%\INF\APPS.INF. So if you don't load EMM386.EXE in CONFIG.SYS, Windows will use settings from SYSTEM.INI when needed.

However, adding both the EMMExclude line and the MinFileCache line to SYSTEM.INI and SYSTEM.CB can do no harm, so do it, just in case. I doubt they'll help any, but, then again, why not?
Yes, sure. It's better to reduce number of possible points of failure. I would also reduce possible hardware troubles (and IRQ conflicts) starting with 1 GB RAM only, one sound card only and some older Nvidia graphic card (but with the same Nvidia drivers).
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Oh well, this turned out to just be too much hassle...

I multi-boot, so BIOS disabling of features isn't the best idea.

If Rloew ever decides to help keep Win9x alive by making his patches free, and/or making the sources to his patches open-source, I'll come back and try again. It's not like there aren't legacy, or legacy compatible, OSes that support newer hardware for free. See FreeDOS (supports modern hardware), or Linux. Not everyone has to get paid, and it's not like Windows 98 has any market value. Free, and open-source, is the superior model.

As it is, if I decided to setup an older PC this for Win98, I wouldn't need the patches, or workarounds.

If I needed modern OS support on old hardware, I'd use Linux. The only real sensible option...

My PC is somewhere between old, and new, as far as Win98 is concerned.

I'm back to the first conclusion I made. Either build a in-between PC with Windows 9x in mind, or just go new and virtualize.

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