Why run 98?

**Fredledingue** · February 3, 2006

This thread is getting to be just like cigarettes... it's pointless and retarded, but it's gotten very addictive

I must agree with that. That's the most popular topic on msfn. Looks like they don't dare locking them up anymore.

**Lunac** · February 3, 2006

Jlo555 you said: "A lot of the main points that the pro-NT people are mostly what has made me COMPLETELY switch back to 98se."

What points? So far these points can be summed up in "XP r0x0r d00d!!!" and "wIN98 is junker!!!"

**Jlo555** · February 3, 2006

Below is a list of unsupported hardware:
Multiple processors
Dual Core processors
Large amounts of memory
Below is a list of software limitations:
No file level permissions.
No security policies.
No non admin users at all. Everyone that logs on can do whatever they want to the system.

That post in particular comes to mind. After reading that post the thought came to me that I was using (at the time) an OS (winXP) that had all of those extra features that I never used. Basically I saw no point in upgrading to a newer OS if the old one I had did everything I needed.

**kartel** · February 3, 2006

EVERY POST WITH ME!
CLOSE THIS THREAD
This thread is a sore on the face of the forum.

arrrrrrggggghhhhhhhhhhh

You know, yahoo has a rumor that big font = small p****

**LLXX** · February 3, 2006

This has become quite a thread! Over 10000 views!

I think this thread is actually beneficial, it's getting normally XP and 2K users to try 98se to see if the "disadvantages" and "inherently insecure" features that Link21 is claiming will manifest themselves, as a few users so far have posted...

Keep this thread open!

Edited February 3, 2006 by LLXX

**Chozo4** · February 3, 2006

No file level permissions.
No security policies.
No non admin users at all. Everyone that logs on can do whatever they want to the system.
That post in particular comes to mind. After reading that post the thought came to me that I was using (at the time) an OS (winXP) that had all of those extra features that I never used. Basically I saw no point in upgrading to a newer OS if the old one I had did everything I needed.

Welcome to the dark side, Jl

If you need any of those security features, just use win9x's own Policy Editor "poledit" anyway .

http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=60251&st=300#

File level permissions = allow/deny method. Only allowed programs can run.

Security Policies = Disables many portions of the users ability to use their acct.

No Non-admins = cured by editing the default account+users accounts with a policy

cancel/esc bypass= cured by a registry tweak or two (or using poledit). Require validation.

Edited February 3, 2006 by Chozo4

**modicr** · February 3, 2006

Hello!

BTW, here is new version of software that works not only in

Windows 95 / Windows 98, but also in Windows 3.1/3.11.

http://www.ghisler.com/whatsnew.htm

Roman

**Jlo555** · February 3, 2006

Heh, I guess it doesn't surprise me that Total Commander would work on Win3.1, I mean, it's basically windows explorer reloaded.

I have heard of that registry tweak, Chozo, to force logon to windows, though because I'm on a fresh windows installation, which still hasn't even frozen yet, I don't really wanna mess around with regedit right now. Perhaps in the future...

**somewan** · February 4, 2006

Dont people realize that 9x platforms cant even come close to utilizing all of the power of modern platforms?

I think everyone who has used 9x recently on a "modern platform"

has noticed that it was designed for older hardware - either the

system runs surprisingly fast, or drivers for some hardware are

nowhere to be found. Such findings are not unusual for older

systems.

Below is a list of unsupported hardware:
Multiple processors
Dual Core processors

Muli-processor PCs were extremely rare at the time Windows/386 was

designed, and multi-processor support in a kernel has a rather high

cost in terms of complexity and resource consumption. That's why

reasonable MP support wasn't introduced into any of the Linux,

FreeBSD or NetBSD x86 kernels until fairly recently, and can still

be disabled at build-time. An additional reason why MP was never

introduced into the Win/386 series is commercial: MS would rather

have you "upgrade" to NT Workstation (2 CPU) or ideally NT

Server (2+ CPU) or their modern equivalents. (Multi-core x86

CPUs is a kind of multi-processing that postdates even WinMe,

and thus not worth addressing separately.)

Below is a list of software limitations:
No file level permissions.
No security policies.
No non admin users at all. Everyone that logs on can do whatever they want to the system.

You are comparing totally different categories of operating systems -

apples and oranges, as they say.

The real-mode, 16-bit protected mode (286+) and 386-enhanced versions

of Windows were designed for single-user systems, and thus all of the

above were not worth the cost of implementation.

The NT project did have multi-user ambitions, and although full

support was present in the kernel, it has always been used in a very

limited manner in practice. (For comparison, a typical use of the

same feature in more serious server operating systems - like VMS or

Unix - is to support multiple users logged in via serial lines or the

network and running interactive commands.)

DOS WAS a good OS back in the day, but it was not able to do
multitasking at all.

DOS offers no general purpose multi-tasking, but does provide the

concept of separate processes with unique IDs (PIDs) that the DOS

kernel uses to track resource allocations (such as file handles and

memory blocks), which is one prerequisite for multi-tasking. What it

doesn't implement is automatic context switching and time-slicing.

Nevertheless, background processes (device drivers and TSR programs)

have always been common.

And all 98SE is is a front end for DOS, it is NOT a 32 bit OS.

386 enhanced versions of Windows have always been more than front-

ends to DOS. They all build upon a modular 32-bit pre-emptive multi-

tasking kernel known as the VMM. The reason why it is often

overlooked is that implementations prior to that of Win95 multi-

tasked virtual machines only, and since all Windows tasks run in

the same VM (every DOS box is a separate one), they didn't benefit

from the VMM's time-slice scheduler.

The Win16 subsystem (KRNL386) wss the provider of the infamous

co-operative multi-tasking - it's a 16-bit protected mode (DPMI)

DOS "shell" that implements the Windows operating environment -

but it's was never the operating system.

Since Win95, the VMM supports multi-threading, and the thread control

block (THCB) has become the primary data structure for multi-tasking.

The Win32 subsystem makes the most extensive use of the facility, to

implement pre-emptive multi-tasking for Win32 apps. Another

mult-tasking improvement of Win95 was separate event queues for each

task.

As to reliance on DOS, it's mostly a matter of whether the right

drivers are installed. If not, Win9x will use BIOS and DOS

services - faced with that situation NT/2K/XP or Linux/ BSD would

fail to boot. Such flexibility make the system much more fault

tolerant, and is the means through which "safe mode" can get the

GUI loaded under conditions far beyond the point where you would

have re-installed NT.

Some may regard the fact that Win9x bootstraps via DOS a weakness,

but it isn't - on the contrary! No other operating system has such

an powerful bootstrap loader - a fully usable operating system in its

own right at little extra cost. Among other benefits, DOS services

allows the VMM to load kernel modules and configuration files from

the file system - and indeed, LKMs was a core feature of the VMM

years before its appearance in more advanced operating systems -

systems that still have to catch up fully.

And as far as security goes how can you get any less secure than 98SE.
Anyone can write a small program that can access any portion of memory
that it wants, including the portion used by the kernel. This is not possible
easily in NT+.

Yes, especially the NT series is so obsessed with it's own principles

and integrity that it obstructs even the superuser, and you may have

to write a small device driver to cut through the crap - somewhat

more complex and definitely more prone to hanging the system than a

"regular" program. At times, the same procedure is necessary on the

Unix systems, but under DOS or VMM-based Windows you always have

options, making those platforms ideal for testing special kinds

of software. When they crash, they are up an running again in a

fraction of the time of NT.

No operating system is perfect, complete or appropriate for

all imaginable purposes - not even Win9x or DOS. They do, however,

provide unique features not found in any of the systems suggested

or marketed as "upgrade" paths. That's why they stick around.

Incidentally, those features are oftem more or less exactly the

ones NT fans love to ridicule, perhaps only to divert attention

from the role of the NT series, which seems rather unclear (except

from Microsoft's point of view). Which NT features lack superior

or more cost-effective equivalents (or both) in other operating

systems?

For all uses where high reliability, security and/or multi-user

features are desired, I use (and always have used) one of the open

source Unix-like operating systems.

It seems that almost all great designs are ones characterised by

a common theme of modest (but useful) beginnings, validation

through a long period of incremental improvement, reaching heights

beyond what could be imagined or hoped for in early stages. Unix

is an excellent example - so are the IBM PC, DOS, and both the

"DOS shell" and kernel parts of classic Windows.

"Revolutionary" designs tend to face uphill battles - Intel's

Itanium architecture predated AMD64, only to be quickly surpassed

by it, leaving Intel with no other option but to clone it. NT's

share of the desktop market remained small as long as the more

sensible Windows designs were kept up to date. The history is

full of such examples.