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

[PROBLEMCHYLD]

I just had a chance to test it

and i have to say thank you and Mystery person for this patch.

Win98SE aint never gonna die as long as we got people like you and others

who contribute to a everlasting OS like Win98/SE/ME

thanks again.I also notice files are opening up a lil bit faster.

Edited November 12, 2006 by PROBLEMCHYLD

[MDGx]

Hi Guys,

Your questions have been answered by anonymous author:

Here are the few answers I can provide:

'eidenk' wrote on Nov 7 2006, 09:37 AM:

> Unless it has just been updated, I had missed that so far.

This information has not been posted before.

> So, any more information please ? You say the size of the 32bits

> segments could be enlarged simply by modifying hidden system settings.

> Which ones and where please ?

I suggest posting screenshots from Microsoft's System State Monitor

(http://www.osronline.com/ddkx/w98ddk/amildbug_83ol.htm) in this forum

first before I spend some considerable time digging up the settings. I

used them very briefly several years ago and unfortunately have not kept a

reference to them as I typically found more than 90% of the 32-bit

resources to be free. These screenshots should show that only less than

*25%* or so of the 32-bit resources (not to be confused with the 16-bit

resources, which can be depleted easily!) are *free*.

'noguru' wrote on Nov 7 2006, 05:20 PM:

> Would it be possible to create a fix that patches the original

> shell32.dll so that different language versions are not needed?

As MGDx probably already hinted at, M$ never provided a Win98 patch for

Q313829 (4.72.3812.600) in any other language but English although such

localized patches should have been made.

'hp38guser' wrote on Nov 7 2006, 08:52 AM

> However aren't there still some open security holes in the Windows

> Shell? Will these get patched also sometime?

I am afraid the answer is: I have no plans for several reasons. (1) Utter

lack of time (and interest = I know what Win98SE is still good for, but I

am acutely aware of its serious and major shortcomings). Sorry. (2) As

indicated by Microsoft's security posts, some of the vulnerabilities can

be mitigated by closing the NetBIOS ports on a Win98 machine (should be

done in any case!). This can be done easily by 'disabling NetBIOS over

TCP/IP' etc. (http://www.grc.com/su-rebinding9x.htm). (3) Porting code

from the Win2k/XP architecture back to the Win9x architecture requires

either a team of software engineers that has access to the source code or

a group of very dedicated & determined hackers/reverse engineers that can

pinpoint first what was patched in the Win2k shell and then find (sic!)

(and possibly patch) the corresponding code in the Win98 shell and also

the WinMe shell.

'erpdude8' wrote on Nov 7 2006, 09:21 PM:

> How about patching the WINME SHELL32.DLL v5.50.4134.100 file? the

> "delete large files" bug also occurs under WinME + IE6.x

4.72.3812.600 & 5.50.4134.100 are far more different than, for example,

GDI.EXE 4.10.2225 & 4.90.3001. I have no WinME installation to find out if

the same workaround still applies. The bug is most likely not in

SHELL32.DLL and it is not clear if it is a real bug (like wrong parameters

passed to SHELL32.DLL) or some functionality that was implemented with the

Win2k/XP platform in mind and then caused those problems on the Win9x

platform. It would be far better to determine this and then create the

appropriate patch for whatever DLL is the culprit. However, there are too

many other DLLs that play a critical role, BROWSEUI.DLL, SHLWAPI.DLL,

SHDOC401.DLL (!), and SHDOCVW.DLL to name a few. I will check if

5.50.4134.100 even has code similar to what I patched in 4.72.3812.600.

I hope this helps.

Best wishes.

HTH

[Petr]

As MGDx probably already hinted at, M$ never provided a Win98 patch for

Q313829 (4.72.3812.600) in any other language but English although such

localized patches should have been made.

But Q313829 exists in many languages:

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4...-US/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../AR/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4...-BR/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../CS/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../DA/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../DE/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../EL/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../ES/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../FI/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../FR/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../HE/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../HU/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../IT/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../JA/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../KO/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../NL/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../NO/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../PL/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../PT/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../RU/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../SK/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../SL/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../SV/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../TR/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../TW/q313829.exe

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4.../CN/q313829.exe

Petr

[noguru]

As MGDx probably already hinted at, M$ never provided a Win98 patch for

Q313829 (4.72.3812.600) in any other language but English although such

localized patches should have been made.

But Q313829 exists in many languages:

...long list

Petr

Thanks for this list. In the dutch version there is a 4.72.3812.600 shell32.dll, exactly the same that I originally had on my system before I installed the 98SP1+98se shell32.dll fix. Only difference is that mine is dated 7-10-2004, because I got it from sesp2nl ver 1.6 (I never updated to 2.1, installed everything seperate from MDGX's site since then)

However, if it's not possible to create a universal fix for all of these versions (I have no clue, I know almost nothing about programming) just like for instance KUP patches all file versions and language versions of kernel32.dll than we just have to live with the fact that there is only a US fixed shell32.dll. You can't ask anybody to fix them all seperate. I'm very happy with this fix anyway, also in english.

[Petr]

However, if it's not possible to create a universal fix for all of these versions (I have no clue, I know almost nothing about programming) just like for instance KUP patches all file versions and language versions of kernel32.dll than we just have to live with the fact that there is only a US fixed shell32.dll. You can't ask anybody to fix them all seperate. I'm very happy with this fix anyway, also in english.

I think it is possible - at least for most of languages.

Every executable file in Windows 98 has two portions - binary code and resources. While resources are different for all languages, the binary code has only a few variants:

United States (single byte character set)

Middle East (single byte character set, right-to-left writing)

Far East (double byte character set (DBCS))

Thai

More details here: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/archive/w...t7/wrkappa.mspx

An analysis for files contained in sesp21a is here: http://old.winpack.org/petr/win98_internat_files.html - this table contains the information about files on distribution CD for specific language.

And regarding the shell32.dll fix. I have not looked at it yet but there are two possibilities in general:

- duplicate the binary patch to the localized file (the binary portion should be the same)

- move all language dependent resources from the original localized file to the new fixed file. With Restorator it means just few cliks (maybe with other resource editors too).

So it is not really big problem.

Regards,

Petr

[erpdude8]

-hmm, seems like a lot of effort to fix a prob which has a very easy (and completely successful/reliable) workaround...

-when I delete 9000+ files (copies of windows or progfiles dirs), all I need to do is "cancel" the deletion process every 5-7 seconds, and repeat... takes maybe 4 cycles to finish, and no hang/corruption/etc at all... a very easy/simple/quick/reliable workaround, I've done it many many times for years now, no problems...

[sticking w/IE5.5sp2 (+98se2me #3), of course; -never infected, will NEVER "crap-out" my w98se OS w/IE6+]

>;]

.

-ps: I would like to invite anybody to try to "hack/infect" my IE5.5sp2 w98se OS, just out of curiosity... (and I don't usually run an antivirus, except on rare occasions when surfing "dangerous" sites, and even then it's never alerted me to any hack/virus attempts)... so, go ahead, please, attempt to infect me, I don't even believe it's realistically possible, so prove me wrong...

>;]

.

-pps: use Firefox 99.9% of the time; but for the sake of this test, I'll go ahead and use Internet Excrement, see if I get infected...

darn it, PsycoUnc! what the hell is wrong with you!

[eidenk]

Hi Guys,

Your questions have been answered by anonymous author:

Here are the few answers I can provide:

'eidenk' wrote on Nov 7 2006, 09:37 AM:

> Unless it has just been updated, I had missed that so far.

This information has not been posted before.

> So, any more information please ? You say the size of the 32bits

> segments could be enlarged simply by modifying hidden system settings.

> Which ones and where please ?

I suggest posting screenshots from Microsoft's System State Monitor

(http://www.osronline.com/ddkx/w98ddk/amildbug_83ol.htm) in this forum

first before I spend some considerable time digging up the settings. I

used them very briefly several years ago and unfortunately have not kept a

reference to them as I typically found more than 90% of the 32-bit

resources to be free. These screenshots should show that only less than

*25%* or so of the 32-bit resources (not to be confused with the 16-bit

resources, which can be depleted easily!) are *free*.

I hope this helps.

Best wishes.

HTH

Thanks a lot for answering. No rush but if you could remember a bit more, it would be nice.

If true, what you are saying is quite groundbreaking as it is so far and to my (very limited) knowledge, totally undocumented that the size of the 32bit resource segments can be changed simply with settings.

Does this hold true for any system or only for one running with a debug kit installed ?

I have no clue of the impact, in terms of performance and stability, of running such a system with debugger but, at least for performance, maybe the impact is very low on a fast machine.

From what you are saying, I understand that for knowing precisely what is in use for both 16bits and 32bits separately, the debugger is necessary.

I have been on the page you quote and I ended up downloading some 18.000 9x related files with Web Reaper. That's a lot. I'll have a read at the specific ones you say, there aren't that many, and I'll try to get something usefull out of it.

Thanks again.

PS : I haven't seen any of the screenshots you speak about on the above quoted site but I might have so far missed them.

Edited November 13, 2006 by eidenk

[MDGx]

Replies from anonymous author to comments originated in this forum:

Good to know that there are indeed localized versions of 4.72.3812.600 as Petr noted (thanks!).

The binary file I patched is a bit different from what is in

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4...-US/q313829.exe

but it should still be straightforward for someone else to create localized versions using the method Petr suggested and described. Writing a universal patcher is probably not worth the effort.

I looked at WinME SHELL32.DLL 5.50.4134.100 briefly. It appears to have similar code, so I will not completely rule out a WinME patch - however, I have no time right now I am afraid.

I have looked at the KernelUpdate project briefly when I wrote the two patches for file copying > 2GiByte, but I am not familiar with its specifics. I understand it takes SHELL32.DLL and patches it. So I am not sure I understand PROBLEMCHYLD's question. Does Xeno86's patcher not work with 4.72.3812.610?

HTH

[Acheron]

I have converted the patch to Dutch. However I ran into problems using Restorator 2006 on the patched shell32.dll. Might be because of non-matching Resources, since anonymous patch creator used an build different than the Q313829 one.

I switched over to old Reshacker for the job, but after I finished its job I still can't use Restorator.

you can download the Dutch version here: Shell98FixNL.zip.

I will convert other unofficial patches to Dutch soon, so I can include them in next Service Pack or Intergrator CD.

P.S. Two questions:

1. Does this fix also include the over 2GB copy file patch?

2. If yes, do I also have to install the 2GB kernel32.dll patch?

Edited November 14, 2006 by hp38guser

[noguru]

I have converted the patch to Dutch. However I ran into problems using Restorator 2006 on the patched shell32.dll. Might be because of non-matching Resources, since anonymous patch creator used an build different than the Q313829 one.

I switched over to old Reshacker for the job, but after I finished its job I still can't use Restorator.

you can download the Dutch version here: Shell98FixNL.zip.

I will convert other unofficial patches to Dutch soon, so I can include them in next Service Pack or Intergrator CD.

P.S. Two questions:

1. Does this fix also include the over 2GB copy file patch?

2. If yes, do I also have to install the 2GB kernel32.dll patch?

Thanks!!

[PROBLEMCHYLD]

I have looked at the KernelUpdate project briefly when I wrote the two patches for file copying > 2GiByte, but I am not familiar with its specifics. I understand it takes SHELL32.DLL and patches it. So I am not sure I understand PROBLEMCHYLD's question. Does Xeno86's patcher not work with 4.72.3812.610?

HTH

yes it does it also works with 4.72.3812.620

Edited November 16, 2006 by PROBLEMCHYLD

[MDGx]

1. Does this fix also include the over 2GB copy file patch?

2. If yes, do I also have to install the 2GB kernel32.dll patch?

1. Yes. This shell32.dll fix [as always with all patches at my site] is cumulative, which means all previous bugs have been fixed in the current version.

There are only 2 exceptions that I'm aware of:

- LLXX's HD > 137 GB patches [all ESDI_506.PDR versions older than 4.10.2225] are not cumulative:

http://www.msfn.org/board/?showtopic=78592

- LLXX's Copy2GB patches [all KERNEL32.DLL versions older than 4.10.2225] are not cumulative:

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

2. No, that's optional.

Shell32.dll patch [older version 4.72.3812.610] is an alternative to LLXX's Copy2GB kernel32.dll patch.

But the anonymous author of the shell32.dll Copy2GB patch states that shell32.dll fix is better than the kernel32.dll fix. Your choice.

This is also specified at my site:

http://www.mdgx.com/web.htm#9SU

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

4.72.3812.620 Fix:

http://www.msfn.org/board/?showtopic=84451

Direct download [475 KB, English]:

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

BUG: This SHELL32.DLL fix breaks the ability of removing annoying arrows from

Desktop shortcut icons!

FIX: See "PATCHED SHELL32.DLL BUG + FIX" in TIPS98.TXT (included) for complete

details:

http://www.mdgx.com/98-5.htm#PSBF

This SHELL32.DLL Fix corrects Windows Explorer and similar tools lockups while

trying to copy/create/move/delete/rename large files/folders, even if Internet

Explorer 5.xx/6.xx already installed.

This SHELL32.DLL Fix is similar to KERNEL32.DLL Fix below, and both correct

same 2-4 GB files errors independent of each other.

* Unofficial Windows 98/98 SP1/98 SE 2-4 GB Files Errors KERNEL32.DLL

(4.10.2002 for Win98/98 SP1 + 4.10.2226 for Win98 SE) Fix:

http://support.microsoft.com/?id=318293

Direct download [347 KB, English]:

http://www.mdgx.com/files/COPY2GB.EXE

More info:

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

This KERNEL32.DLL Fix is similar to SHELL32.DLL Fix above, and both correct

same 2-4 GB files errors independent of each other.

Since shell32.dll is now updated to this newer version, I have installed both on my computer, anyway.

HTH

Edited November 16, 2006 by MDGx

[erpdude8]

Replies from anonymous author to comments originated in this forum:

Good to know that there are indeed localized versions of 4.72.3812.600 as Petr noted (thanks!).

The binary file I patched is a bit different from what is in

http://download.microsoft.com/download/ie4...-US/q313829.exe

but it should still be straightforward for someone else to create localized versions using the method Petr suggested and described. Writing a universal patcher is probably not worth the effort.

I looked at WinME SHELL32.DLL 5.50.4134.100 briefly. It appears to have similar code, so I will not completely rule out a WinME patch - however, I have no time right now I am afraid.

I have looked at the KernelUpdate project briefly when I wrote the two patches for file copying > 2GiByte, but I am not familiar with its specifics. I understand it takes SHELL32.DLL and patches it. So I am not sure I understand PROBLEMCHYLD's question. Does Xeno86's patcher not work with 4.72.3812.610?

HTH

memo to anonymous creator of SHELL32.DLL 4.72.3812.620 fix: I do not expect a WinME shell32.dll fix right now so just take your time whether it is several weeks or several months. make one when you are ready so that WinME systems do not remain unpatched.

[Rick Chauvin]

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.

As for the shortcut arrows, I actually so very much prefer the shortcut arrows to be visible - and so no changes needed for me there.

Thanks very much for what you do.. ..and hopefully the file delete hang bug fix can be further refined someday while it's still up front to do so..

Rick

Edited December 16, 2006 by Rick Chauvin

[whatever420]

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.