Windows 98 and Windows 7

I just found out today that where i got to school, the Veterans house has an older computer that is still running Windows 98.
First off, would this computer serve any purpose with todays level of Technology?

I don't think that its been turned on in several years, but i got it running today. It has on the label printed on the case

64MB of RAM
AMD 100mhz CPU
6GB Hdd

So, i do know that Microsoft does not support Windows 98 anymore. So how would i be able to find out and obtain the last updates and patches that came out? This machine does have a network card, and i am able to connect to the internet.

It also has two USB ports, and i do plan on connecting a scanner (there is one but cant find the power cord). I also plan to find a printer and attach it as well.

So my main thing is machine able to be networked with Windows 7? I have that installed on my laptop. The Veterans house has a Wireless router, and i would like to be able to network the Printer via the Win 98 machine, and sent a print job from my Win 7 laptop.

So, basically is thing more for vintage keepsakes, or it there still any usefull purpose with it?

Its been a while since I used a windows 98 computer.

Last I knew, the last set of windows 98 updates Microsoft released before its support was dropped are still available through windows update.

I do not know if they still are or not, but it wouldn't hurt to try clicking windows update to see if those updates are still available.

When it comes to windows 98 versus windows 7 I know one is FAT32 while the other is NTFS.

You should be able as far as I know (perhaps someone can shed more light on the subject) be able to network them together, even if you have to use the communications port on the motherboard.

Bruce.

Edited by MrBruce1959, 10 September 2010 - 10:16 AM.

It's great for running old games!

Everything is 64-bit now though (mostly). Trying to do anything developed today would be a

Although I have never done it, I see no issue networking the two
I would disable the browse master on the 98 machine and make sure that TCP/IP is the only protocol installed

Thanks for the tips.

Like i said i really want to set this up more for a "hub" computer, such as attach a printer, or even an external Hdd and use it as a basic storage media.

I think that most other people would prefer to use their own newer laptops for everyday tasks.

I didnt get a chance to see it today, but the basics of what i am going to do is

try to get updates from Microsoft
Defrag the Hdd (i think its severly fragmented right now)
install and/or update Antivirus
make sure that all drivers are updated for everything on it
upgrade the RAM and Hdd (thats if i can still find them)

Another thing that i want to add here

i am going to try and find a Windows 98 Disk and product Key and attempt to do a reinstall of the OS. This might be the best way to get rid of all the bugs and flaws that might have occured over the years.

Also, how practical would it be to try and upgrade to Windows 2000, or even perhaps Windows Xp?

64MB of RAM
AMD 100mhz CPU
6GB Hdd

With the specs above Windows XP would run fairly slow and take up most of that 6 GB hard drive.

100 MHz is a fairly slow processor, I just got by using a 500 MHz AMD-K6 processor and 256 MB of SDRAM.

So I do not think you would get suitable computing results if your stuck with the 100 MHz processor, and only 64 MB of RAM, your hard drive will be closed to maxed out and with the swap file needing space, the hard drive would be lighting up more than the lights of lower Manhattan N.Y. on New Years Eve day night.

Bruce.

Best thing may be a clean install. That way you are certain its clean.
Make sure you can get the drivers first and have them ready to go.

In device manager make note of the IDE controller (might need the Via 4 in 1 drivers), display, sound, modem and NIC so you know what they should be. Post make/model etc if you need assistance with drivers.

Also make sure to copy the *.cab files from the CD to a \win98 folder on the hard drive and install from there.

You may have an issue with the printer potentially as different versions of Windows require different drivers.
Pls post make\model

I wish i had written down the model name ( i didnt have a pen or paper handy)I will get it on Monday.

I am going to do some research on my own computer first, about the the system specs (CPU, RAM) and see what is the biggest Hdd (and everything else) Windows 98 can handle. I will also find the drivers and put them on a CD.

I hope i can get this thing in decent running shape for around $100 or less.

Anyone have a good website that i can look at and/or order older vingtage compter parts?

A 100MHz CPU won't run either Windows 2000 (133MHz Pentium class minimum) or XP (233MHz).

Ensure the Windows 98 is Second Edition, mainly because a lot of drivers require 98SE. You might have challenges trying to use USB devices even with SE.

98 doesn't implement 48bit LBA, so maximum hard drive size is 128/137GB. There's a topic regarding development of an alternative IDE driver for 48bit LBA here:

http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/78592-enab...-137gb-barrier/

FDISK and FORMAT display incorrect size information with large drives, but they work. You will also have to determine whether the BIOS on a system of that age can work correctly with large drives.

Win98 has problems utilising 512MB of memory or more, but there are ways around that if a system can provide more. 64MB to 256MB is a practical range, and maybe all that system is likely to accommodate. Some motherboard chipsets of that era could only cache 64MB or 256MB of RAM, so fitting more than the relevant amount actually made Windows run much slower.

Edited by Platypus, 11 September 2010 - 08:20 AM.

Well i got some good news...I found me a Windows 98 CD! With a product key! Anyone ever use the website freecycle.org, its a great place to get stuff that other people don't want for free.

So, what i am going to do is a complete reinstall of the OS.

Is the best way to find the drivers for this system is to google the name and model, or should i just do each individual part (NIC, sound, video, etc)? Either way i am going to write down the names of all the devices under the device manager

I am also going to do some research about getting this thing maxed out- CPU, RAM, Hdd you name- it i want the fastest and the biggest this system with Windows 98 can handle.

To add, the only thing that looked like its not integrated into the motherboard is the NIC. All other devices come directly off there, and there are no other PCI cards installed. (i think that this computer might have had dial up Internet, but was replaced with an an Ethernet NIC)

Ive also never done an OS reinstall on a system this old (Ive only reinstalled Windows Xp and Windows 7), so is there any other tips or pointers that i should do?

Edited by Derek Ellis, 13 September 2010 - 12:22 AM.

If the system is a brand-name it would be simplest to see if they still host drivers for the model. It seems from your first post that it may not be, in which case we'd need to establish what motherboard and NIC are in it. We should also be able to discover if it has relevant BIOS drive handling limits, and if so whether there's an easy way around them.

A system of that age might not be able to boot from a CD, and not all Win98 CDs were bootable, so you could need a boot floppy disk - most people download an image of a Win98 or ME boot disk with CD-ROM support from bootdisk.com

Well here is the news everyone has been waiting for-
System information

IBM Aptiva E Series 240

AMD K6 3D CPU
512kb L2 cache
100mhz FSB
64MB RAM (can expand to 256MB)
6GB Hdd
Netgear FA 310TX (NIC)

I copied all of this from the label on the front of the machine. I took a look at the back, and saw that the NIC looks fairly new, and got the model from the Device Manager.

So i decided not to attempt a reinstall yet. I did do the system Defragmenter, and that took well over an hour. I also ran the disk cleanup. After that the system seemed to double in speed, and didn't freeze up as often. I also went in and manually deleted a lot of files and programs that i thought were irrelevant. That to seemed to help speed up the system.

Also does anyone know of a good Antivirus program that can be used with Windows 98? I tried to install Avira, but the system requirements for Avria were much higher.

I also tend to notice that many programs that are out currently now wont install on Windows 98- i got a message saying something like " Please upgrade to a newer version of Windows". I tried this with Yahoo Messenger. So, does anyone know of a website or would i just google for the older versions of programs to be able to run on Windows 98?

Well that's good news, you're not dealing with a 100mhZ CPU, the standard spec for the system is a K6 II-350. That's not a performance CPU, but is certainly fine for Win98 or 2000. Especially if you can bump the amount of memory up.

If the original Quantum Bigfoot drive has still survived and never needed to be replaced with something better, they were also slow, which fits in with getting a good benefit from the defrag.

Application support is one of the potential problems with 98.

I have found i cam get 256MB of RAM for about $30 http://www.pcmemorystore.com/IBM-Aptiva-2158%5E240-ram.htm