How to determine which Systems will run Win98

[casey.o]

Sorry for the crosspost to microsoft.public.windowsxp.general, but the
Win98 group isn't used real much anymore.

Anyhow, I've been thinking about finding a replacement motherboard for
my Win98 computer. The reason is because I regularly have to remove the
RAM and put it back. It's hard to say exactly what the problem is, but
I believe there is a loose part or solder joint on the motherboard,
somewhere near the Ram. As long as I leave it alone, it works fine, but
if I even apply just a slight amount of pressure on the motherboard near
the ram, the computer will reboot. The problem is that there is a PCI
card for USB 2 near that spot on the board, and if I push in a USB
device and push a little hard, it would reboot on occasion. By jamming
a plastic spacer under the board in the center, seems to have eliminated
this problem (at least for now). The computer (M-board) is a IBM
6341K6U. P3 - 1.0 ghz processor. Rather than screw around with this
m-board, which has gotten a lot of use, it makes more sense to just buy
a replacement board, which can be gotten for as little as $20 on ebay
incl the shipping.

But, I got to thinking about it ,and for $30 I can get a much faster
M-board. Also an IBM with intel chipset (I like IBM systems and want to
stick with the same type of chipset, so transplanting my hard drives
dont cause too many driver issues.

I was looking at a complete computer tower (no keybd mse or mntr), for
about $50. Since I need both a floppy drive and CD drive for another
computer, this could be the best deal of all, because I can use the
drives from my old computer case for the other machines that need them.
That computer is a IBM Think Centre M50 8289-E1U. Intel chipset P4 with
2.5Ghz Processor, and has 1GB of ram (I only have 512MB ram now). On
top of that, the case on my old computer was always too small to put the
cover on, since I replaced the inadequate power supply it came with.

Needless to say, this seems like the ideal solution to get rid of that
failing motherboard, and solve my ned for floppy and CD drives for other
machines. Plus get the benefit of a nicer case. I'nm sure buying all
those parts separately would cost at least $50 anyhow.

However, I dont know how to determine what systems will run Win98. I
may be wrong, but it appears that all P3 computers (and lower), will run
Win98. But once it gets into the P4 series, its' questionable.

I've been searching the web for driver lists and for other terms to try
to find out if THIS computer will run Win98, or if not this one, which
of the faster systems will? Does anyone know how to determibne this,
and if there is a website that specifies compatibility with
motherboards/ systems????

Thanks

 

[Mayayana]

I don't know about specific issues, but I can think
of two limitations that you'll probably run into:

* You probably won't be able to get drivers for any
recent video/audio/motherboard.

* While a multi-core CPU might work, Win98 will only
see one core.

I used to have 2 or 3 patches for Win9x. I think one
was needed by Win95 to run on a CPU over 1 GHz. It's
so long ago now I can't remember the details. But I
wonder why you really want to do it. XP is more stable
and it's faster on the same hardware. Most software
that ran on Win98 runs on XP, except for networking
software. The only thing I miss about Win98 is the
customizable Active Desktop folders. I made myself an
Explorer bar to replace that. Everything else annoying
in XP is pretty much fixable.

| Sorry for the crosspost to microsoft.public.windowsxp.general, but the
| Win98 group isn't used real much anymore.
|
| Anyhow, I've been thinking about finding a replacement motherboard for
| my Win98 computer. The reason is because I regularly have to remove the
| RAM and put it back. It's hard to say exactly what the problem is, but
| I believe there is a loose part or solder joint on the motherboard,
| somewhere near the Ram. As long as I leave it alone, it works fine, but
| if I even apply just a slight amount of pressure on the motherboard near
| the ram, the computer will reboot. The problem is that there is a PCI
| card for USB 2 near that spot on the board, and if I push in a USB
| device and push a little hard, it would reboot on occasion. By jamming
| a plastic spacer under the board in the center, seems to have eliminated
| this problem (at least for now). The computer (M-board) is a IBM
| 6341K6U. P3 - 1.0 ghz processor. Rather than screw around with this
| m-board, which has gotten a lot of use, it makes more sense to just buy
| a replacement board, which can be gotten for as little as $20 on ebay
| incl the shipping.
|
| But, I got to thinking about it ,and for $30 I can get a much faster
| M-board. Also an IBM with intel chipset (I like IBM systems and want to
| stick with the same type of chipset, so transplanting my hard drives
| dont cause too many driver issues.
|
| I was looking at a complete computer tower (no keybd mse or mntr), for
| about $50. Since I need both a floppy drive and CD drive for another
| computer, this could be the best deal of all, because I can use the
| drives from my old computer case for the other machines that need them.
| That computer is a IBM Think Centre M50 8289-E1U. Intel chipset P4 with
| 2.5Ghz Processor, and has 1GB of ram (I only have 512MB ram now). On
| top of that, the case on my old computer was always too small to put the
| cover on, since I replaced the inadequate power supply it came with.
|
| Needless to say, this seems like the ideal solution to get rid of that
| failing motherboard, and solve my ned for floppy and CD drives for other
| machines. Plus get the benefit of a nicer case. I'nm sure buying all
| those parts separately would cost at least $50 anyhow.
|
| However, I dont know how to determine what systems will run Win98. I
| may be wrong, but it appears that all P3 computers (and lower), will run
| Win98. But once it gets into the P4 series, its' questionable.
|
| I've been searching the web for driver lists and for other terms to try
| to find out if THIS computer will run Win98, or if not this one, which
| of the faster systems will? Does anyone know how to determibne this,
| and if there is a website that specifies compatibility with
| motherboards/ systems????
|
| Thanks
|
|

 

[casey.o]

Any computer / motherboard with an Intel 8xx series chipset will have
windows-98 drivers. This includes 845, 865 and 875.

What chipset is this one?


It says the VIDEO chipset is 82865G, does that mean the whole system is
an 828 chipset? You did not list 828 (above), but it's in the "8"
series.....

(Specs - Copied from ad)

Model ThinkCentre M50 8189-E1U
Processor Type Intel Pentium 4
Processor Speed 2.5Ghz
RAM 1GB
Hard Drive 40 GB
Optical Drive 1 DVD-ROM
Optical Drive 2 CD-ROM
Additional Media Drives: 3.5" Floppy
Video Chipset/Memory
Intel 82865G
Sound
8000KB
LAN
Integrated
Wifi Intel Pro/100 10/100
USB 8 ports
Firewire None

----------- end of specs ---------


I doubt this is a dual core. It does not say what socket the CPU is, or
if it has an AGP slot. It just says it's a Pentium 4. My current
computer has an Intel Celeron Coppermine CPU, and I've always been
impressed with the performance I get, especially for a 1.0ghz.

I dont want to reinstall Win98 (or if possible my dual booted Win2K).
Just move the harddrives, install some drivers and be ready to use.
Actually, I'm not too worried about it, as lonmg as I can get the
drivers. Thisd installation of Win98 has moved thru at least 6
computers without being reinstalled.

Here is the Ebay link ot it.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/IBM-Think-Centre-M50-8289-E1U-Desktop-Computer-inv14041708-/131173514510?

I have not bid on it, and wont till I know for sure I can get drivers.
Like you said there are other IBM Thinkcenters for a low cost, bvut if
I can get it for close to the asking bid, plius shipping, I'll buy it.
It's not the fastest but a large gain over what I now have. I also like
the tower case. I hate my current flat case, which like I said, wont
fit my 300W power supply. And since I needed to buy a floppy drive and
Cd drive, I cna use those from my old computer and just use this tower
as it comes, other than swapping the hard drive. (It comes with Ubuntu
Linux on a small 40g HDD, but that's ok, because I've been playing with
Puppy linux lately, so I can play with this one too. It's easy enough
to swap hard drives.

I had found a site that listed drivers for a M50 system, but it did not
specify the rest of the numbers (chipset I guess is what I mean). I
would have posted that URL, but another goddamn script error crashed
Firefox. (I'm about ready to just turn that damn Java Script off and
leave it off). but that's another story.....

I'm still trying to determine the approx . year this system was
manufactured. It dont look like it's beyond 2006 ???? More
googling....

 

[98 Guy]

Anyhow, I've been thinking about finding a replacement motherboard
for my Win98 computer. The reason is because I regularly have to
remove the RAM and put it back.

Any computer / motherboard with an Intel 8xx series chipset will have
windows-98 drivers. This includes 845, 865 and 875.

There is some evidence that the 910/915 chipset also has win-98 drivers.

Quite a few VIA chipsets will also have win-98 drivers. The Via PT880
(pro and ultra) was still in production as recently as 2 or 3 years ago
and has win-98 drivers. This chipset supports socket 478 and socket 775
cpu's.

Generally speaking, if the motherboard takes an Intel socket 478 CPU or
has an AGP slot, you will be able to get win-98 drivers for it.

If it has a Via chipset it might also have an Intel socket 775 cpu and
also have full win-98 support at the driver level.

Windows-98 can only use a single core, regardless if you have a
dual-core cpu. So for best power (lowest heat) you're better off to go
with single core or even celeron.

The best PC that I've built (and ever likely to build) with the best
performance and most complete win-98 driver support is based on the
Asrock 4core DUAL-VSTA motherboard. It has Via PT880 ultra chipset, has
both PCIe and AGP slots, can accept both DDR and DDR2 ram. I have 3.46
ghz Celeron-D CPU and 1 gb ram, and a mix of large SATA hard drives
attached to it (1 and 1.5 TB in size). I have Nvidia 6200 video card
(AGP) with 256 mb ram.

I've had 2 gb installed, and have had to use himemX to limit the amount
of ram that win-98 can actually "see" to 1.25 gb. You don't have to do
that if the actual amount of physical ram is 1.5 gb or less.

I have win-98 reporting 1,157 mb of available RAM - which is the max.
Funny thing that Win-ME can go up to almost 2 gb.

The only part of that motherboard that does not function under win-98
(no drivers) is the sound chip. So I have Creative sound card plugged
in.

There are LOTS of 5 to 7-year-old IBM Thinkcenter PC's that have come
off-lease and are being sold in discount electronics retailers for $50
to $100 each. You might want to look at those. They have a small
foot-print for a desktop PC.

So to re-cap:

If the motherboard has an Intel socket-478 (Pentium or Celeron) CPU then
it's practically certain that windows 98 will run very nicely on that
board.

Another rule of thumb is that if the motherboard has an AGP slot, win-98
will run just fine - at least if the CPU is made by Intel, and even if
the CPU socket-type is 775 (Core2 line of CPU). If it's an AMD
motherboard - I can't say for sure that all AMD-based motherboards with
AGP slots have full win-98 driver support.

If the motherboard has a PCIe (PCI Express) video slot (ie - in place of
AGP slot) then it will probably be a struggle to get win-98 to run,
UNLESS the board has a VIA chipset.

Side note: Video cards (AGP or PCIe) with more than 256 mb of ram are
difficult or impossible to run under win-98. PCIe cards that have the
"turbo-cache" feature are also something to avoid.

In any case, you are almost certainly looking at a motherboard or
computer sold new back in 2006. Anything more recent will probably not
have win-98 drivers.

 

[casey.o]

Any computer / motherboard with an Intel 8xx series chipset will have
windows-98 drivers. This includes 845, 865 and 875.

There is some evidence that the 910/915 chipset also has win-98 drivers.

Quite a few VIA chipsets will also have win-98 drivers. The Via PT880
(pro and ultra) was still in production as recently as 2 or 3 years ago
and has win-98 drivers. This chipset supports socket 478 and socket 775
cpu's.

Ok, I found a PDF file with all the info. It's an 865 chipset, has AGP
slot. 478 socket. At least I know that now. Seems this whole system
is similar to the Net Vista system I am using now, which is probably
good. Appears it was released in May of 2003 and sold till 2005.

If I was to get this, and download drivers, how specific to these
numbers do the drivers need to be? Meaning, the Lenovo website has all
the IBM drivers, but they may only be listed as M50, or may have the
numbers 8189, but on this page only have similar (not identical)
numbers.

http://support.lenovo.com/en_US/detail.page?LegacyDocID=MIGR-50534

Finding drivers is a royal pain in the ass for all computers. Actually
Lenovo is better than some sites, but it's still hard to use.

The model is ThinkCentre M50 8189-E1U

There are so many M50 8xxx numbers it's almost overwhelming. I'm
wondering what the last part means (-E1U). Is that just the type of
case and drives installed? According to that PDF file, it sort of looks
like this may be the case?????? So, those numbers may not be needed in
finding the drivers????? Someone who works with this stuff on a regular
basis should know this better......

This computer was sold with XP Pro. If I get it, I might just clone my
Win98 partition, and install XP on the (currently Win2000), partition,
and that way I wont have to run multiple computers anymore. The only
problem is that I have XP home, not XP pro. (CD installer).

 

[Paul]

Ok, I found a PDF file with all the info. It's an 865 chipset, has AGP
slot. 478 socket. At least I know that now. Seems this whole system
is similar to the Net Vista system I am using now, which is probably
good. Appears it was released in May of 2003 and sold till 2005.

If I was to get this, and download drivers, how specific to these
numbers do the drivers need to be? Meaning, the Lenovo website has all
the IBM drivers, but they may only be listed as M50, or may have the
numbers 8189, but on this page only have similar (not identical)
numbers.

http://support.lenovo.com/en_US/detail.page?LegacyDocID=MIGR-50534

Finding drivers is a royal pain in the ass for all computers. Actually
Lenovo is better than some sites, but it's still hard to use.

The model is ThinkCentre M50 8189-E1U

There are so many M50 8xxx numbers it's almost overwhelming. I'm
wondering what the last part means (-E1U). Is that just the type of
case and drives installed? According to that PDF file, it sort of looks
like this may be the case?????? So, those numbers may not be needed in
finding the drivers????? Someone who works with this stuff on a regular
basis should know this better......

This computer was sold with XP Pro. If I get it, I might just clone my
Win98 partition, and install XP on the (currently Win2000), partition,
and that way I wont have to run multiple computers anymore. The only
problem is that I have XP home, not XP pro. (CD installer).

Like the 98 Guy, I ran Win98SE on an Asrock board with VIA chipset (socket 775).
With an E4700 processor (dual core, only one core runs in Win98). I've run
everything between Win98 and Win8 on that board. That board had an FSB1066
limit, so I couldn't stick my FSB1333 processor in there and expect to
get additional performance. The E4700 is FSB800, and while I did do a
short overclocking experiment, it uses stock settings for regular usage.
The board just doesn't have the controls for overclocking, and I had to
use a socket mod and a jumper wire, to overclock. The BIOS code is so
bad, you can't take the clockgen off stock, without trouble.

If a motherboard has an AGP slot, that's a start. And the 865 family
would be AGP. Just don't overclock your DDR400 to DDR500, because
the AGP video screen will start to show artifacts if you do that.

You can use PCI Express video for Win98 (not on an 865 chipset),
but the selection of cards with drivers is tiny. Perhaps an X300 would
work in that case ("work", meaning the desktop would
display, not that it would play games well or anything).

Like 98 Guy, my motherboard had both AGP and PCI Express for video,
and normally an AGP card would be present in the system.

The FX5200 in that system, has a Win98 driver. Driver
support stopped for that card, around Win7 or Win8 or so.
A 6200 is also a good choice as an OS spanning card (I don't
own one). When I run Win8 on the system, while the FX5200 is present,
the OS fallback framebuffer driver is used, and resolution
stays stuck at 1024x768 (on a 1440x900 monitor). Things
are a tiny bit fuzzy in Win8 that way. A new video card would
fix that (but the card wouldn't have Win98 drivers).

AGP slots run PCI protocol, as well as AGP protocol
Even if the AGP GART stuff wasn't running, you might
still coax regular desktop operation out of it.

My system had 2GB of RAM, and I didn't use himemX. I
did the first stage of Win98 install (to the first reboot),
then booted into Linux instead of letting the installation
complete, edited the file that limits detected memory,
then went back and finished the Win98 install. And
all drivers installed cleaning. I was frankly shocked
that it worked. I didn't actually use Win98 for
anything when finished, so it was a geek experiment.
That's my backup computer, and the only time it gets
to run now, is when 7ZIP compressing large files (gives
me more CPU power to work with). My CPU collection here,
isn't all that good.

Paul

 

[casey.o]

Like the 98 Guy, I ran Win98SE on an Asrock board with VIA chipset (socket 775).
With an E4700 processor (dual core, only one core runs in Win98). I've run
everything between Win98 and Win8 on that board. That board had an FSB1066
limit, so I couldn't stick my FSB1333 processor in there and expect to
get additional performance. The E4700 is FSB800, and while I did do a
short overclocking experiment, it uses stock settings for regular usage.
The board just doesn't have the controls for overclocking, and I had to
use a socket mod and a jumper wire, to overclock. The BIOS code is so
bad, you can't take the clockgen off stock, without trouble.

The first time I installed Win95, I had a guy help me, who really knew
computers. He overlocked my computer, and it was a slow one, like 166
or 200mhz or maybe 233, or something like that. That computer really
moved..... I later installed 98 on it. In fact that was the computer
my present install of Win98 originated. As I said, I've moved it to at
least 6 computers since I installed it in 1998 or 99.

Most of the computers since then dont seem to have overclocking
capabilities. At least not that I can find out how....

If a motherboard has an AGP slot, that's a start. And the 865 family
would be AGP. Just don't overclock your DDR400 to DDR500, because
the AGP video screen will start to show artifacts if you do that.

What do you mean by "artifacts" ?????

You can use PCI Express video for Win98 (not on an 865 chipset),
but the selection of cards with drivers is tiny. Perhaps an X300 would
work in that case ("work", meaning the desktop would
display, not that it would play games well or anything).

I dont play games anyhow, other than some real old pool game that I
might play twice a year.

Like 98 Guy, my motherboard had both AGP and PCI Express for video,
and normally an AGP card would be present in the system.

The FX5200 in that system, has a Win98 driver. Driver
support stopped for that card, around Win7 or Win8 or so.
A 6200 is also a good choice as an OS spanning card (I don't
own one). When I run Win8 on the system, while the FX5200 is present,
the OS fallback framebuffer driver is used, and resolution
stays stuck at 1024x768 (on a 1440x900 monitor). Things
are a tiny bit fuzzy in Win8 that way. A new video card would
fix that (but the card wouldn't have Win98 drivers).

That Think Centre has the "Integrated Intel Extreme" video card built
in. That's the same thing in my present Net Vista (98 computer), and
appears to use the same driver, if I'm making sense of that PDF file,
except this newer computers has the version 2 of that video card. I've
always been satisfied with the picture and it plays videos well.

AGP slots run PCI protocol, as well as AGP protocol
Even if the AGP GART stuff wasn't running, you might
still coax regular desktop operation out of it.

My system had 2GB of RAM, and I didn't use himemX. I
did the first stage of Win98 install (to the first reboot),
then booted into Linux instead of letting the installation
complete, edited the file that limits detected memory,
then went back and finished the Win98 install. And
all drivers installed cleaning. I was frankly shocked
that it worked. I didn't actually use Win98 for
anything when finished, so it was a geek experiment.
That's my backup computer, and the only time it gets
to run now, is when 7ZIP compressing large files (gives
me more CPU power to work with). My CPU collection here,
isn't all that good.

Paul

That is totally amazing. How did you figure that out?
Why cant that same file be modified in a completely installed W98, and
the extra memory be added afterwards? What file gets modified?
If I just run Win98, 1G of ram is twice what I use now (this computer
has a limit of 512M). So if 98 runs fine on 512m, It shoudl fly with
1G. My dual booted Win2000 works fine with the 512M too. But if I get
this computer and use it for Win98, I might install XP to replace W2000.
Even though that still probably wont fix my dialup problem, but at least
I wont have to keep swapping downloads from computer to computer.
But if I do this, then I will want at least 2G of Ram, and will ask on
here for help with this at that time. I am clueless what himemX means.
But I know about himem.sys, which goes back to Dos.

BTW, I was looking at some new computers at Walmart and they all have
Win8. But the processor speeds are not much faster than many of these
older Pentium 4 machines. I think there was one around 3.4ghz and
aniother around 4.0ghz. I know most are dual core, so that speeds
things up, but have the hardware makers reached their limit? I would
have expecetd a pentium 6 or 7 by now, with processor speeds up around
10ghz or faster. I guess there has to be some limit, adn maybe they've
reached it. But what will MS do with their next OS, if there isn't a
faster processor for them to eat up with more bloat?

Maybe this is a good thing though. Not only will it slow MS down, but
it will save energy. I have not seen any energy usage charts for
awhile, but I know these faster computers are using a lot more
electricity than the older ones. Just looking at all the fans in them
is a good clue. My first computer only had one fan in the power supply.
This one has two (1ghz), My 3.2ghz XP machine should have 3 (I have not
added that fan on the rear of the case yet). I have heard that soem
newer ones have 4 or 5. Maybe in winter, they can be used to heat the
house, but in summer, all that extra heat sucks.

Of course there was the first computer ever made, using all vacuum
tubes. I recall reading they heated the whole building with that thing,
and had to run air conditioning even in winter to remove the excess
heat......

 

[98 Guy]

The FX5200 in that system, has a Win98 driver. Driver
support stopped for that card, around Win7 or Win8 or so.
A 6200 is also a good choice as an OS spanning card (I don't
own one).

Many computer and electronic stores are still selling GeForce 6200 AGP
8x video cards - usually for around $50. Problem is that they seem to
have 512 mb of ram - not 256 mb. While I have not tried this, they say
(on msfn) that video cards with mor than 256 mb of ram won't work under
win-98.

I've tried PCIe versions of the 6200 card on my Asrock motherboard -
that was a few years ago and I don't remember what the result was, but I
think it wasn't good.

Talking about using a PCIe video card under win-98 probably isin't
useful for the OP (Casey) but incase others are reading this, stay away
from PCIe cards with "turbo cache" capability. These are known to be
incompatible with win-98. Any 6200-based PCIe card with "LE" at the end
of it's model number will have turbo-cache.

When I run Win8 on the system, while the FX5200 is present,
the OS fallback framebuffer driver is used, and resolution
stays stuck at 1024x768 (on a 1440x900 monitor). Things
are a tiny bit fuzzy in Win8 that way. A new video card would
fix that (but the card wouldn't have Win98 drivers).

Do you know if there are win8 drivers for the 6200?

AGP slots run PCI protocol, as well as AGP protocol
Even if the AGP GART stuff wasn't running, you might
still coax regular desktop operation out of it.

Or use a PCI video card.

 

[Paul]

The first time I installed Win95, I had a guy help me, who really knew
computers. He overclocked my computer, and it was a slow one, like 166
or 200mhz or maybe 233, or something like that. That computer really
moved..... I later installed 98 on it. In fact that was the computer
my present install of Win98 originated. As I said, I've moved it to at
least 6 computers since I installed it in 1998 or 99.

Back in those days, you could overclock a 300MHz Celeron to 450MHz,
with nothing more than a clock speed adjustment in the BIOS. That
particular Celeron would do that, because it had no cache of any
significance. I only cranked mine up, just to prove it would
do it, and then set it back. Being a Celeron, even sped up it
was still gutless.

Most of the computers since then dont seem to have overclocking
capabilities. At least not that I can find out how....

OEM computers, the non-enthusiast kind, don't overclock. No VCore
adjustment, no setting the clock speed in 1MHz steps. That's to
keep Mom & Pop from getting themselves in trouble, while playing
in the BIOS screen. As an example, my Acer laptop has a grand
total of *one* BIOS setting How cheesy can you get ? The Asrock
board probably had a 100 different things you could play with. And
turning some of them, caused the board to crash.

What do you mean by "artifacts" ?????

The 865 causes "dots" to appear on the video card screen. It's not
clear exactly how that works, because the thing doesn't crash. But
people were seeing dots when overclocking their 865PE systems. The
865G you're likely to find now, should be no different in terms
of overclocked memory. The artifacts appear on an AGP video card
screen, not on the built-in video.

That Think Centre has the "Integrated Intel Extreme" video card built
in. That's the same thing in my present Net Vista (98 computer), and
appears to use the same driver, if I'm making sense of that PDF file,
except this newer computers has the version 2 of that video card. I've
always been satisfied with the picture and it plays videos well.

That is video in the Northbridge. The chipset consists of Northbridge
and Southbridge. And on chipsets with a "G" in the name, there is
a GPU inside the Northbridge. That would likely be weaker in games,
than my sad little FX5200.

That is totally amazing. How did you figure that out?
Why cant that same file be modified in a completely installed W98, and
the extra memory be added afterwards? What file gets modified?
If I just run Win98, 1G of ram is twice what I use now (this computer
has a limit of 512M). So if 98 runs fine on 512m, It shoudl fly with
1G.

On my 2GB system, I dialed it down to 512MB for safety.
Win98 should be happy with a 512MB setting. I wasn't
willing to spend time tuning that number upwards, because
I'd already seen some weirdness on previous systems. And
being a quick experiment, the 512MB setting was perfect.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/253912

system.ini

[vcache]
MaxFileCache=524288

[386enh]
MaxPhysPage=20000 <--- hex 20000 = 512MB, hex 40000 = 1GB
(A page is 4KB, 20000==>131072*4096=512MB)

My dual booted Win2000 works fine with the 512M too. But if I get
this computer and use it for Win98, I might install XP to replace W2000.
Even though that still probably wont fix my dialup problem, but at least
I wont have to keep swapping downloads from computer to computer.
But if I do this, then I will want at least 2G of Ram, and will ask on
here for help with this at that time. I am clueless what himemX means.
But I know about himem.sys, which goes back to Dos.

BTW, I was looking at some new computers at Walmart and they all have
Win8. But the processor speeds are not much faster than many of these
older Pentium 4 machines. I think there was one around 3.4ghz and
aniother around 4.0ghz. I know most are dual core, so that speeds
things up, but have the hardware makers reached their limit? I would
have expecetd a pentium 6 or 7 by now, with processor speeds up around
10ghz or faster. I guess there has to be some limit, adn maybe they've
reached it. But what will MS do with their next OS, if there isn't a
faster processor for them to eat up with more bloat?

A Core2 at 3GHz, equals a P4 at 4.5GHz. The IPC (instructions
per clock), the parallelism of functional units, is different.
The compiler must do a good job of scheduling usage of
those resources, for best results. While the processor design
is such it usually does a decent job with old code, for the
very best results you want code generated for the specific processor.

This is why, with Linux, you get slightly better results from
your computer, if you recompile the kernel and set the target
processor type, to match the processor inside your machine.
When I build Gentoo, I always set it to "Core2".

Maybe this is a good thing though. Not only will it slow MS down, but
it will save energy. I have not seen any energy usage charts for
awhile, but I know these faster computers are using a lot more
electricity than the older ones. Just looking at all the fans in them
is a good clue. My first computer only had one fan in the power supply.
This one has two (1ghz), My 3.2ghz XP machine should have 3 (I have not
added that fan on the rear of the case yet). I have heard that soem
newer ones have 4 or 5. Maybe in winter, they can be used to heat the
house, but in summer, all that extra heat sucks.

Not true. My Macintosh was gutless, and it used a steady 150 watts
no matter what it was doing. Most of the motherboard ran off 5V
power, and the large geometry silicon used a lot of power at the time.

A modern Haswell system, might use 50W at idle, and more when it is
doing stuff. That's for cases, where the video GPU inside the processor
itself, is drawing the screen. Lots of power saved there.

Even my E4700, when flat out, would only draw 36W (as measured by
my clamp-on ammeter). The motherboard, the hard drive, would be drawing
power not included in that measurement. If you buy a Kill-O-Watt
meter, you can check the consumption of all your computers, and
see how good they are. The only time a modern system puts in a
poor showing, is if you use big-ass video cards, and play
games all the time. That really burns up the power.

At one time, big-ass video cards burned a lot of power at idle.
Now, the cards can drop the power to around 3W in the best of cases.
Whereas before, a high end video card might burn 150W gaming, and
75W when idle. They really improved the max to min power ratio
on modern video cards. It's pretty amazing.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/graphics/display/gpu-power-consumption-2010_3.html

It's too bad that site no longer does articles like that.

Of course there was the first computer ever made, using all vacuum
tubes. I recall reading they heated the whole building with that thing,
and had to run air conditioning even in winter to remove the excess
heat......

Many office buildings, ones with computers everywhere, can be heated
with just the computers. I worked in a building like that. The challenge,
is cooling it in the summer.

And all these new computers with the lower operating power, must
drive the HVAC guy crazy. Because it becomes hard to predict how
much "free heat" you're going to have. With our old computers,
they hardly had any power saving modes.

Paul

 

[98 Guy]

Ok, I found a PDF file with all the info. It's an 865 chipset,
has AGP slot. 478 socket. At least I know that now. Seems
this whole system is similar to the Net Vista system I am using
now, which is probably good. Appears it was released in May of
2003 and sold till 2005.

If I was to get this, and download drivers, how specific to these
numbers do the drivers need to be?

You only need this:

*********************************************************
* Product: Intel(R) Chipset Software Installation Utility
* Release: Production Version
* Version: 6.3.0.1007
* Target Chipset#: Intel(R) E8500
* Date: November 24, 2004
*********************************************************

Which can be downloaded from here:

http://downloadmirror.intel.com/8178/eng/infinst_enu.exe

That is the english-version. There is a multi-language version also
(which I'm thinking you don't need).

I don't think there is any more recent version of this Intel chipset
driver package for the 800 series chipsets.

 

[Paul]

Many computer and electronic stores are still selling GeForce 6200 AGP
8x video cards - usually for around $50. Problem is that they seem to
have 512 mb of ram - not 256 mb. While I have not tried this, they say
(on msfn) that video cards with mor than 256 mb of ram won't work under
win-98.

I've tried PCIe versions of the 6200 card on my Asrock motherboard -
that was a few years ago and I don't remember what the result was, but I
think it wasn't good.

The compatibility on the x4 wired PCI Express 1.1 standard interface
wasn't all that good. I actually haven't tested mine, having
heard enough stories about it to not bother. I guess I was hoping
I'd have replaced the motherboard by now But who can argue
with such a purchase, when it only cost $65 and provided so much fun.
It had many compromises, but it also had many interfaces. King of
the legacy universe.

Talking about using a PCIe video card under win-98 probably isin't
useful for the OP (Casey) but incase others are reading this, stay away
from PCIe cards with "turbo cache" capability. These are known to be
incompatible with win-98. Any 6200-based PCIe card with "LE" at the end
of it's model number will have turbo-cache.


Do you know if there are win8 drivers for the 6200?

I see the 6200 listed here, as of Jan 24, 2013.

http://www.geforce.com/drivers/results/56378

Or use a PCI video card.

Doesn't PCI mode in an AGP slot run at 66MHz ?
That should still make the AGP slot twice as good
as the stinky old PCI slot. I own a PCI video card,
for the express purpose of having a display while
flashing the chip on better video cards. And it is
really slow (stutters) when moving large unbuffered
pixmaps around. The Apple QuickTime player window used
to stutter if you moved it, with the FX5200 PCI version.
The FX5200 sitting in the AGP slot, not a problem.
(I own a total of three FX5200 cards. I'm a glutton
for punishment. Two AGP ones, one PCI one.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agp

PCI 133 MB/sec
AGP 1.0 1x 266 MB/sec <--- twice as good, "PCI like" mode
AGP 1.0 2x 533 MB/sec \
AGP 2.0 4x 1066 MB/sec \__ AGP mode for burst transfers
AGP 3.0 8x 2133 MB/sec /

There are a number of bus standards, for which I've
never been able to find good oscilloscope or logic
analyzer pictures. Just to figure this stuff out.
You can do single-cycle, register programming of
AGP video cards, and that would be done without
the burst transfer feature. But when transferring
textures (DMA/DIME), then the data bus runs at a much
higher multiple, than the clock. The burst transfer
is unidirectional, and it's "just a matter of staying
centered in the data eye", to capture the super-high-speed
data. At least one poster here, seemed to be an engineer
with some direct AGP knowledge, but all he'd do is
curse the stuff He never shone much light on
the topic (to keep his job, I suppose).

Paul

 

[casey.o]

It's too bad that site no longer does articles like that.


Many office buildings, ones with computers everywhere, can be heated
with just the computers. I worked in a building like that. The challenge,
is cooling it in the summer.

And all these new computers with the lower operating power, must
drive the HVAC guy crazy. Because it becomes hard to predict how
much "free heat" you're going to have. With our old computers,
they hardly had any power saving modes.

Paul

I usually dont tamper with the bios. I just make sure it's seeing the
drives and Ram properly, and I have often turned off some of the power
saving options, which on one of my older computers used to cause system
freezes. Aside from that, I just leave it as it was set as default.

I've never seen a need to use any of those "high-end" video cards. It
appears they are mostly for gamers. I can play videos and other graphic
apps using the built in video cards just fine.

 

[micky]

Sorry for the crosspost to microsoft.public.windowsxp.general, but the
Win98 group isn't used real much anymore.

Anyhow, I've been thinking about finding a replacement motherboard for
my Win98 computer. The reason is because I regularly have to remove the
RAM and put it back. It's hard to say exactly what the problem is, but
I believe there is a loose part or solder joint on the motherboard,
somewhere near the Ram. As long as I leave it alone, it works fine, but
if I even apply just a slight amount of pressure on the motherboard near
the ram, the computer will reboot. The problem is that there is a PCI
card for USB 2 near that spot on the board, and if I push in a USB
device and push a little hard, it would reboot on occasion.

Why not get a USB extension cord, one that is USB-A Male at one end,
and female at the other end. Then plug everything into the end of the
cord. Or get a hub, that is like an AC extension cord with 3 outlets
at one end and one plug at the other. Or a powered hub, which won't run
out of electricity if you want to charge two cell-phones at the same
time, etc.

 

[casey.o]

Why not get a USB extension cord, one that is USB-A Male at one end,
and female at the other end. Then plug everything into the end of the
cord. Or get a hub, that is like an AC extension cord with 3 outlets
at one end and one plug at the other. Or a powered hub, which won't run
out of electricity if you want to charge two cell-phones at the same
time, etc.

That is a grerat idea.....
The place they are located on the back are a pain in the ass to reach
anyhow....

Thanks

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

In message <[email protected]>,

(Most hubs I've seen are at least 4.)

That is a grerat idea.....
The place they are located on the back are a pain in the ass to reach
anyhow....

Thanks

I've sometimes found things sold in poundshops (or whatever your local
equivalent is called) that come with a short extension lead; this works
out at less than you'd pay for the lead on its own, so if a short
lead'll do you (which it might just to bring the inaccessible socket out
from the back), you can always discard (or give away) the novelty and
keep the lead.

(I've seen actual hubs in such places, but suspect some of them might
still be USB 1.1; check, and if 2.0 isn't mentioned on the packaging,
assume the worst. Though for just power splitting, that doesn't of
course matter. Or some things, such as a keyboard or mouse, where even
1.1 speed is more than enough.)