Flash 9 not working on NT 4.0? (consolidated thread)

[ironman14]

I have tried Flash 11 on Windows 2000, and I needed DirectX as well. Guess it needed an extra function from directx.

 

Flash 9 is good under Windows NT 4, but it is limiting in general. Not much content will play with it anymore. So, I tried Flash 10 (in particular 10.0.32.18. I thought if that version worked, others may work as well. It installed correctly, but I ran it with Dependency Walker just to check (better safe than sorry) and found that there were 4 missing DLL functions. They are:

 

MonitorFromWindow, GetMonitorInfoA, GetFileSizeEx, SetFilePointerEx. 

I opened up NPSWF32.dll in HxD and renamed the functions as following:

 

MonitorFromWindow ->GetAppCompatFlags (Flash 9.0.280 for windows NT 4.0 topic said this was OK.), GetMonitorInfoA -> GetWindowInfo, GetFileSizeEx ->GetFileSize, SetFilePointerEx ->SetFilePointer.

 

There were no problems with the DLL, so I saved it to the desktop, uninstalled and reinstalled flash, then put the modified NPSWF32.DLL in the plugins directory of each browser (I use Opera 10.63 and Firefox 2.0.0.20). But I was greeted by some error messages when I search a Flash video site.

 

Opera: "The Shockwave Flash plugin failed. A restart of Opera is recommended."

Firefox: "The plugin performed an illegal operation. You are strongly advised to reinstalled Firefox."

 

I haven't been able to get the page loading on Opera, but on Firefox the Adobe Flash version checker works and the animation plays to show Flash working. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

 

MonitorFromWindow is only available in Windows 98 and later.

GetFileSizeEx is Windows 2000 and later.

SetFilePointerEx is also from Windows 2000 and later.

This is true. That's why I replaced those API calls with calls present in NT 4.0 that are simpler but still do the same thing. But while there are no errors with Flash 10 itself, it won't play video and instead gives error messages.

[sdfox7]

A year or so ago, Youtube updated their video interface and the controls disappeared for all versions of Flash 9.0.*.

Earlier today I tested over a dozen Flash versions (from 9.0.47 through 11.1.102.63) and confirmed that to see the controls, you will need Flash 10.0 or later. That means no more Youtube video controls in NT4.

YouTube video controls work in Flash 7 (I have tested) as long as you use the Flash Spoofer for Windows 95 and NT 4.0, thanks to Toasty Tech's Nathan Lineback.

http://toastytech.com/files/95browsing.html

In the attached picture I am running Windows 95 and Firefox 1.5 with Flash 7 on a Pentium II system with 128MB RAM. All controls are visible and functional.

http://sdfox7.com/win95/files/flashspf.jpg

[jholt5638]

I know this is a old thread but I wanted to confirm that changing MonitorFromWindow to GetAppCompatFlags in the 9.0.280 plugin allows it to run on NT4 and with it youtube does work as of this morning where the 9.0.47 plugin does not 
 

[Leokids123]

Sorry if this is necropost but...

 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/174IHPJVd2AshHT0atFRC7e1mIfT3lqxz/view?usp=drive_link

 

I've taken the last 98/ME version of 9.0.289.0 and patched out the MonitorFromWindow...

 

Here's the zip above this. Make sure you copy to the folder where it installed to...

[Leokids123]

As for Flash 10 and potentially even 11,what's the last version of Flash that has the old installer? I want to find the last version of Flash that potentially works without having to deal with the installer throwing the error "is not a valid Windows NT application"...

 

Besides,extracting the 9.0.289.0 installer turned out to be rather easy...

Edited 3 hours ago by Leokids123

[Leokids123]

I've tried 10.0.45.2 and while it succeded to install,it seems to have failed to run with Retrozilla...

 

I'll try the older versions,and if any of them work or don't work,i'll tell you,but...if it doesn't work,i'll give up...

 

[Leokids123]

I give up,no versions of Flash 10 actually worked...The Helper when i try to open it throws a incompatible with NT 4.0 error that typically happens if it's a Windows 2000 app linked dynamically (and not statistically,it would be easier for me) so i'm assuming it requires Windows 2000 and there's nothing i can do to fix this...

[Start Me Up]

34 minutes ago, Leokids123 said:

The Helper when i try to open it throws a incompatible with NT 4.0 error that typically happens if it's a Windows 2000 app linked dynamically (and not statistically,it would be easier for me) so i'm assuming it requires Windows 2000 and there's nothing i can do to fix this...

I think you are facing the problem that there is a specific version as a minimum requirement in the exe file. exe files, dll files and sys files are in the portable executable 32 file format.

1. Open the file with a hex editor.
2. The first byte (at the offset 0x0) should have the value "0x4d" ("M").
3. The second byte (at the offset 0x1) should have the value "0x5a" ("Z").
4. The 4 bytes at the offset 0x3c should contain a little endian encoded integer. Something like "12 34 56 78" which is 0x78563412.
5. Use the integer as an offset in the file. The offset should point to a byte with the value "0x50" ("P").
6. The next byte should have the value "0x45" ("E").
7. The next byte should have the value "0x00".
8. The next byte should also have the value "0x00".
9. Check the 4 bytes starting at the offset from the integer + 0x40. If the file is for Windows 2000, then it should have the value "05 00 00 00". If the file is for Windows XP, then it should have the value "05 00 01 00".
10. Reduce it to "04 00 00 00" to reduce the requirement to Windows NT 4.0.
11. Check the 4 bytes starting at the offset from the integer + 0x48.
12. Reduce it to "04 00 00 00".
13. Save the file.

Do not reduce the value below "03 00 01 00".

---

Description of the file format:

http://ontheserver.de/Downloads/entpackt/Dokumentationen/Programmierung/Betriebssystem-spezifische/Windows/Dateiformate/ausführbare Dateien und Bibliotheken/deutsch.htm

Edited 2 hours ago by Start Me Up

[Leokids123]

1 hour ago, Start Me Up said:

I think you are facing the problem that there is a specific version as a minimum requirement in the exe file. exe files, dll files and sys files are in the portable executable 32 file format.

1. Open the file with a hex editor.
2. The first byte (at the offset 0x0) should have the value "0x4d" ("M").
3. The second byte (at the offset 0x1) should have the value "0x5a" ("Z").
4. The 4 bytes at the offset 0x3c should contain a little endian encoded integer. Something like "12 34 56 78" which is 0x78563412.
5. Use the integer as an offset in the file. The offset should point to a byte with the value "0x50" ("P").
6. The next byte should have the value "0x45" ("E").
7. The next byte should have the value "0x00".
8. The next byte should also have the value "0x00".
9. Check the 4 bytes starting at the offset from the integer + 0x40. If the file is for Windows 2000, then it should have the value "05 00 00 00". If the file is for Windows XP, then it should have the value "05 00 01 00".
10. Reduce it to "04 00 00 00" to reduce the requirement to Windows NT 4.0.
11. Check the 4 bytes starting at the offset from the integer + 0x48.
12. Reduce it to "04 00 00 00".
13. Save the file.

Do not reduce the value below "03 00 01 00".

---

Description of the file format:

http://ontheserver.de/Downloads/entpackt/Dokumentationen/Programmierung/Betriebssystem-spezifische/Windows/Dateiformate/ausführbare Dateien und Bibliotheken/deutsch.htm

Is this decimal,hexadecimal or anything? I use HxD...

[Leokids123]

I'll deal with this later,but anyways,i've sucessfully backported Flash 9.0.289.0 to 95 and NT 4.0,i've tested on NT 4.0,i might one day test it on 95...