98 (FE), 98 SP1, 98 SE + ME SHELL32.DLL fix

[noguru]

but unfortunately for me anyway I'm sorry to say it did not fix it

The patch didn't work for me either...

I, too, went back to the last 5.5 SP2 versions of the brows*.dlls (placed in the System folder)... with the latest 6.0 SP1 versions of the brows*.dlls placed in my IE folder.

Sorry to hear this. But I just did the 2500 text files test and it went fine. I even doubled the number of files by copying them to a second drive and deleting them all at the same time. Deleting took a while, offcourse, but the recyclebin didn't hang. Since installing this fix I notice a short delay ( 1sec) when the recyclebin is closed also when deleting small amount of files. But that's all.

[Rick Chauvin]

MDGx, erpdude8, etc

ps to my yesterdays post...

fwiw, the only non-ms patch I've ever installed so far was from this forum yesterday, which was the Shell98.exe (and later did the Copy2gb.exe which I thought maybe should go with it too?)

..My point is maybe you all already do when you tested this, but I do not have the unofficial service pack nor the killer replacements or any other files from here installed - if that was suppose to matter up front for this Explorer Lockups SHELL32.DLL fix to work?

Rick

[Max_04]

Practically shell32 of this fix is impossible to localize, when I translate strings in italian with restorator and click on "save" or "save_as" gives "corrupted resource, probably file encryped or compressed".

Result is a crash of restorator.

[Petr]

Practically shell32 of this fix is impossible to localize, when I translate strings in italian with restorator and click on "save" or "save_as" gives "corrupted resource, probably file encryped or compressed".

Result is a crash of restorator.

Yes, it seems the "Anonymous author" made some mistake.

I just tried to load this file by Heaventools PE Explorer (not free), saved it, the size has decreased and Restorator works fine.

The best would be if MDGx could ask "Anonymous author" to repair the shell32.dll file, I'm not sure that shell32.dll repaired by PE Explorer is 100% functional (I have not tested it)

Petr

Edit: I have tried to use shell32.dll patched by "Anonymous author", re-saved by PE Explorer and all resources replaced by Czech resources by Restorator and the system booted and did not crashed (yet). No deep testing.

Edited December 17, 2006 by Petr

[Max_04]

Practically shell32 of this fix is impossible to localize, when I translate strings in italian with restorator and click on "save" or "save_as" gives "corrupted resource, probably file encryped or compressed".

Result is a crash of restorator.

Yes, it seems the "Anonymous author" made some mistake.

I just tried to load this file by Heaventools PE Explorer (not free), saved it, the size has decreased and Restorator works fine.

The best would be if MDGx could ask "Anonymous author" to repair the shell32.dll file, I'm not sure that shell32.dll repaired by PE Explorer is 100% functional (I have not tested it)

Petr

Edit: I have tried to use shell32.dll patched by "Anonymous author", re-saved by PE Explorer and all resources replaced by Czech resources by Restorator and the system booted and did not crashed (yet). No deep testing.

Please localize me shell32.dll basing on italian shell32 here:

http://uploaded.to/?id=10e067

After give me new shell32.dll localized in my language, so I can try in my win98.

[Petr]

OK, it is here: http://old.winpack.org/petr/SHELL32-ITA.zip

Petr

[Rick Chauvin]

Petr, with what you and Max_04 found, is that problem just a testing issue with Restorator, or would that also effect the files opertion itself - and would it have to be redone?

[Rick Chauvin]

An update on my previous post is that since I first installed the Shell98.exe fix which did not work for me at first, but then later after I had read more of the threads and noticed it also suggested in conjunction with the Shell98.exe to also install the Copy2gb.exe just in case, and so I did - well that appeared to solve the problem for me. I've deleted the 2500 files and restored them back from the recycle bin over and over with no abnormal hang problems. I need to test it a few more times but at the moment it looks like it may be a good alternative instead of using the IE v5.5 Browselc.dll & Browseui.dll's to solve the large file quantity delete problem.

If you wanted to know of any small differences between the two methods, the only minor difference I noticed is that with the 5.5 browse dlls in place, and after doing a 'select all' on 2500 files and pressing delete, and then when the delete prompt comes up and you press delete - then from there it only takes 10 seconds to delete the 2500 files. But with the v6 browse dlls in place from that same point it takes longer at 70 seconds to delete the same 2500 files. However to note doing a 'select all' and a restore on those files from the recycle bin, then in both cases it only takes 10 seconds to put them back and so the recycle bin restore function in each case seems to be fine, but I assume it's just the v6 dlls somehow effects a delay on the actual delete process as you watch the numbers from 1 to 2500 count up as it deletes.. I don't know if any more functions are belabored because of the v6 dll's though, it'll take more time to notice that of which I'm curious.

Nice work to everyone involved, and thank you. You have my full attention

Rick

[Max_04]

OK, it is here: http://old.winpack.org/petr/SHELL32-ITA.zip

Petr

Thx.

No deep test, but seems to work, no crash after reboot.

Edited December 18, 2006 by Max_04

[glocK_94]

Thanks Petr for PE Explorer!!! It's a good program and with it I was indeed able to modify new Shell32.dll. :

Thanks as well to MDGx and anonymous author of this great patch.

And to Max_04 who asked about the problems localizing it!

Anyway, I've made a french version of the update executable.

Download is here : win9x4ever.online.fr

Edited March 11, 2007 by glocK_94

[MDGx]

fwiw, the only non-ms patch I've ever installed so far was from this forum yesterday, which was the Shell98.exe (and later did the Copy2gb.exe which I thought maybe should go with it too?)

..My point is maybe you all already do when you tested this, but I do not have the unofficial service pack nor the killer replacements or any other files from here installed - if that was suppose to matter up front for this Explorer Lockups SHELL32.DLL fix to work?

Rick

Shell32.dll is flawed no matter which/how many service pack(s) and/or unofficial updates/patches/replacements/etc you installed.

All that matters is if you installed IE [internet Explorer] 5.5 SP2, 6.0 or 6.0 SP1.

All these web browsers are flawed [because of M$ integration ], therefore you need to install SHELL98.EXE [fixed shell32.dll] in order to fix the flaw.

COPY2GB.EXE fixes an entirely different matter:

http://www.msfn.org/board/?showtopic=81200

*but* this new SHELL32.DLL *also* fixes this bug [see forum topic above].

HTH [Hope This Helps]

____________________________________

Practically shell32 of this fix is impossible to localize, when I translate strings in italian with restorator and click on "save" or "save_as" gives "corrupted resource, probably file encryped or compressed".

Result is a crash of restorator.

Yes, it seems the "Anonymous author" made some mistake.

I just tried to load this file by Heaventools PE Explorer (not free), saved it, the size has decreased and Restorator works fine.

The best would be if MDGx could ask "Anonymous author" to repair the shell32.dll file, I'm not sure that shell32.dll repaired by PE Explorer is 100% functional (I have not tested it)

Petr

Edit: I have tried to use shell32.dll patched by "Anonymous author", re-saved by PE Explorer and all resources replaced by Czech resources by Restorator and the system booted and did not crashed (yet). No deep testing.

Anonymous author's answer:

Petr,

Please try the same with the original file 4.72.3812.600 from M$! PE

Explorer also shortens the original file on save. There seems to be

something unusual in how M$ arranged the sections of this DLL.

HTH

____________________________________

It was good to see others working on this Quantity File Delete Hang problem with Win9x & IE6, and in one way or another I have worked on testing this issue for many years too, and had even once wrote a quick webpage about it giving an easy dllswap method and offered 0byte files to try and be a help to the situation: Win98 w/IE6 Causes Freeze-ups While Doing Quantity File Deletes

Well when I saw this post write up on your forum that you and your anonymous source had been working on this issue too I was pleased and thankful, and so being more than happy to try it and so being very hopeful I installed your Shell98.exe to see if it would solve the problem - but unfortunately for me anyway I'm sorry to say it did not fix it; although it may have changed it somewhat and may have caused other anomalies, but the bottom line is that after my standard 2500 file delete it still will hang; it does come back after a minute or so; it may act a bit different in small ways - but at that point like it always did will not let you rename or delete files further without re-exhibiting the same hang flaws. And so for me it was to type 5 at the msdos prompt to instantly swap the 5.5 dll's back in place, and once again with regards to large quantity file deletes the 5.5 dlls still work very well.

I'm happy to say that the 2 GB file copy error was resolved with the shell98 fix though - and that is a welcome change - thank you for that.

Rick

Anonymous author's answer:

I am sorry to hear that the patch did not work for you. Please make sure

you downloaded the latest version of SHELL98.EXE and actually installed

SHELL32.DLL 4.72.3812.620 (and not 4.72.3812.610). If it is 4.72.3812.620,

please re-read the license agreement that comes with the installer MDGx

kindly provided:

http://www.mdgx.com/files/SHELL98.EXE

--------

Unofficial Windows 98/98 SP1/98 SE Explorer Lockups SHELL32.DLL

4.72.3812.620 Fix

Geek speak:

... The patch I am providing is not a fix in the true sense ... The

problem may still occur if a large number of files is deleted, moved etc,

*while* USER resources are low, say below 30% ...

HTH

[Petr]

Anonymous author's answer:

Petr,

Please try the same with the original file 4.72.3812.600 from M$! PE

Explorer also shortens the original file on save. There seems to be

something unusual in how M$ arranged the sections of this DLL.

HTH

The size change is not an issue, crashing Restorator is the issue.

I suppose that this crash is caused by improperly calculated numbers in some headers (offsets, lengths, ...), I don't know which, but if PE Explorer can rectify this problem, it should be possible to correct the origibnal file too.

Petr

[LLXX]

How exactly is Anonymous "fixing" these files?

What differs between the file deletion code between 5.x and 6.x shell DLLs?

If it has to do with resources, is there a resource leak in the code?

...yes, I'm planning to fix this one myself too.

With regard to localise, is possible just to hit several bytes with hex editor in code section to make it work...

(If I sound a bit stupid, just ignore me. I'm a bit... 'off' right now )

Edit: Just reinstalled IE6 again so might as well do the 16K files test with this Anonymous's shell32.dll, it froze for a minute after the deletion (which took all of 12 minutes) but then everything seems to have returned to normal !

I replaced it with my original shell32.dll and 5.5x browselc/browseui dlls, here are the results:

1,6384 files.

Let's select them all!

After pressing Delete, the confirmation after ~5 seconds.

Deleting.

30 seconds later. Success

For some reason the patched and original 6.x dlls make the deletion process go very slowly. 23 files per second for the 6.x browseui/browselc with patched shell32, vs 550 files per second for 5.5 browseui/browselc and original shell32.

I am typing this post up immediately after the deletion, everything is working fine - system resources 92% before delete, stayed at 92% during the delete and afterwards. Now with IE open it's at 84%.

Edited December 21, 2006 by LLXX

[MDGx]

The size change is not an issue, crashing Restorator is the issue.

I suppose that this crash is caused by improperly calculated numbers in some headers (offsets, lengths, ...), I don't know which, but if PE Explorer can rectify this problem, it should be possible to correct the origibnal file too.

Petr

How exactly is Anonymous "fixing" these files?

What differs between the file deletion code between 5.x and 6.x shell DLLs?

If it has to do with resources, is there a resource leak in the code?

...yes, I'm planning to fix this one myself too.

With regard to localise, is possible just to hit several bytes with hex editor in code section to make it work...

I'll relate your questions to the anonymous author, and I will post his answer here.

HTH

[Rick Chauvin]

..another update to my previous posts.

I'm a happy and willing tester of your fix - and btw thank you for working on it!

Here's some more info: I've found that with this quantity file delete hang problem that replacing with your new version of shell32.dll is 'much much better' than using the original of course, and it is effective, but occasionally it does still fail as stated in the 'geek speak' notes of the installer, and other less occasional instances it fails too. Also it's worth noting as has been mentioned a few times now we know that using the 5.5 browse*dlls 'in all instances' as compared to the v6 browse*dlls is a much faster moving delete process, and as we know it rarely freezes up with them like the current v6 browse*dlls do with or without the new shell32.dll (again though the new shell32.dll file is much!!! better than without it while using the IE6 browse*dlls) ...having said that though I do want to express a very big vote of Thank You's and encouragement to all the people who have taken the time to work on the shell32.dll fix for this quantity file delete hang problem, and that it is Greatly Appreciated for all of what you are doing with it, along with all the other neat stuff on this website. Thank You!

Rick

W98xIE6xQuantityFileDeleteHangBug

Edited December 22, 2006 by Rick Chauvin