It's time to Quit using Win98

On Sat, 11 Jan 2014 03:53:55 -0000, 98 Guy com 98@guy. wrote:

While unnecessarily full-quoting, Stanley Daniel de Liver wrote:

I tried loading w98 on an XP laptop yesterday - got blue screen
during "initialising drivers", so somethings got broken (it maybe
that w98 doesn't know about the widescreen, or USB mouse)

You don't start installing win-98 on a given machine until or unless you
have tracked down and obtained all available drivers for the various
hardware components (video, motherboard / chipset, southbridge, audio,
network, wifi, etc).

Maybe that's the correct order, but this was just the install of w98 (2nd?
screen after copying files "Running Windows for the 1st time").

The only laptops that you will be able to run win-98 with sufficient
driver support are ones that were sold new no later than the fall of
2005 or spring of 2006.

Just getting a screen I can do stuff with would be nice! (OK I can get to
Safe Mode).

I think the best example of a laptop that had *almost* full driver
support for win-98 was the Dell Inspiron 600m. It was released in
mid-2003 but was still being sold new well into 2005. But there were no
wifi drivers for win-98. That's going to be the main problem for pretty
much any laptop you can find.

Sure. I doubt I'll get wifi, but a quick boot to w98 and some games would
have been nice.

--
It's a money /life balance.

tangerine3 wrote:

On Fri, 10 Jan 2014 18:28:13 +0100, Axel Berger
wrote:

You have made a decision about popular OSs, why not do the same about
"popular" software? If and when the time comes for me - up to now I
don't tough a running system, but I may be forced - it will certainly be
Linux.

Is there a linux type that looks and works like Win98?
Which one? Will it run older software made for 98?

Any Linux distribution can be set up to look like Windows(-ish). It's just a
setting in the window manager. Specifically making it look like 98, that's
the hard part. Recent distros are going to try to look like recent versions
of Windows... if they try at all.

As for running Windows software (regardless of which version it's designed
for), as long as you have a recent version of Wine installed, there's at
least a *chance* that a given program will run. Wine has a user-reported
program compatibility database he

http://appdb.winehq.org/

The appdb rates programs platinum, gold, silver, bronze, or garbage. (The
real joke is that even though the *apps* are rated as such, it's really a
rating for *Wine's compatibility*.)

If there are Windows programs you just *can't* live without, then as long as
the app works in Wine, you can probably make do. (But note that keyboard
shortcuts differ between Windows and Linux. For example, ctrl+F4 is "close
document" for many Windows apps; in Linux, it's often "switch to virtual
desktop 4".)

I have used Linux + Wine before, and it worked acceptably (for the most
part)... but really, when I'm running Windows apps, I'd much rather run them
under Windows. (My Linux server doesn't have Wine installed. Don't need it.)

--
Free yourself! Free it fast and hard!

dadiOH wrote:
wrote in message


The bottom line is this. Either kiss Microsoft's ass, or
toss your PC in the nearest garbage can. Well, I have
given this considerable thought, and decided that I will
never give Microsoft another cent. Particularly when I
hate every OS they have made since Win98. I can still
continue to use WIN98 for my personal uses, but in order
to go on the internet, I have decided to spend some money
and buy a Macintosh computer. I never thought that I'd
make that switch, and being elderly, I really hate having
to relearn to use a completely different computer system,
yet, there really is no other option.

Actually, there is.

My PC has WinXP; it looks and behaves just like it did when it had Win98.
The main difference is that it never crashes.

+1

wrote:
On Fri, 10 Jan 2014 18:28:13 +0100, Axel Berger
wrote:

You have made a decision about popular OSs, why not do the same about
"popular" software? If and when the time comes for me - up to now I
don't tough a running system, but I may be forced - it will certainly be
Linux.

Is there a linux type that looks and works like Win98?
Which one? Will it run older software made for 98?

You might look into Linux Mint (Cinnamon). I would have suggested good old
venerable Ubuntu in the past, but I can't stand its new Unity desktop design
(nor do many others, from what I've been reading), nor the direction it
seems to be going.

As for looking and working like Win98, well, just sorta, I'd say. Running
software made for Windows requires installing Wine, as Auric pointed out,
and it may or may not work depending on the software (IOW, it's a bit of a
crapshoot). And tweaking Linux is a bit more challenging, unless you don't
mind spending a lot of time at the command shell line.

Stanley Daniel de Liver wrote:

You don't start installing win-98 on a given machine until or
unless you have tracked down and obtained all available drivers
for the various hardware components (video, motherboard / chipset,
southbridge, audio, network, wifi, etc).

Maybe that's the correct order, but this was just the install of
w98 (2nd? screen after copying files "Running Windows for the 1st
time").

What's wrong with you?

Just because a computer has a CD drive doesn't mean you can install and
run win-98 on it.

If the computer was originally available for retail sale no later than
2004 or 2005, then the odds are good that win-98 can be installed and
will run correctly on it. But you will need to first obtain various
hardware drivers BECAUSE THEY WON'T BE ON THE WIN-98 CD if the computer
was sold after the year 1999 or 2000.

The only laptops that you will be able to run win-98 with
sufficient driver support are ones that were sold new no
later than the fall of 2005 or spring of 2006.

Just getting a screen I can do stuff with would be nice!

Um, no.

Running win-98 in safe mode is useless. There's no point in doing that.

but a quick boot to w98 and some games would have been nice.

What - the win-98 versions of freecell, hearts, minesweeper or solitaire
are just so unique and compelling that they haven't been duplicated on
win-XP?

tangerine3 wrote:

Is there a linux type that looks and works like Win98?
Which one? Will it run older software made for 98?

Auric__ replied:

Any Linux distribution can be set up to look like Windows(-ish).
It's just a setting in the window manager. Specifically making it
look like 98, that's the hard part. Recent distros are going to
try to look like recent versions of Windows... if they try at all.

Did you ever stop and think that anyone asking if linux can run win-98
software is probably not ready for linux?

On Sun, 12 Jan 2014 21:45:50 -0500, 98 Guy "98"@Guy. com wrote:

tangerine3 wrote:

Is there a linux type that looks and works like Win98?
Which one? Will it run older software made for 98?

Auric__ replied:

Any Linux distribution can be set up to look like Windows(-ish).
It's just a setting in the window manager. Specifically making it
look like 98, that's the hard part. Recent distros are going to
try to look like recent versions of Windows... if they try at all.

Did you ever stop and think that anyone asking if linux can run win-98
software is probably not ready for linux?

Actually, you're probably right. I tried linux many years ago and hated
it. I could not get it to do anything except **** me off. But I just
thought I'd ask. I might take a spare computer and try it, since I
heard it changed for the better. But in all honesty, if I have to
relearn to use a computer, including every program, I may as well get a
Macintosh. At least that has a future. Linux seems to change and
change and there are so many types it's a nightmare just thinking about
it, and it's not used by many. I have years and years of creations on
my computer, and I need my software that I have been using to make it
work. I dont just use a computer for the internet. And add to that
that I'm elderly, and not wanting to start over.

Win98 seems to work just fine for all my software except the internet,
mostly due to that goddamn HTML5 and all the worthless flash crap they
stick on sites. None of which has made it any more useful, compared to
the websites from the 90s. If anything, it make them less useful
because they are slow to load and bloated to ****.

Maybe I'll just pull the plug on the internet, on my Win98 machine, and
just get a Mac for internet use. That way I only have to relearn to use
the internet software, not everything. Or there's my XP machine that
has been sitting in the closet for the last 5 or 6 years. But I already
know MS will soon kill XP too. They want us all to use their ugly Win8
or 9 or whatever is the latest bloated crap they sell., which appears to
consist mostly of advertising for Netflix, and other companies that they
make profits from. After all, MS is only interested in money, they dont
care what *WE* want or like.

On Sun, 12 Jan 2014 12:13:14 -0700, "Bill in Co"
wrote:


My PC has WinXP; it looks and behaves just like it did when it had Win98.
The main difference is that it never crashes.

+1

I cant remember ther last time my Win98 crashed. Browsers crash
regularly, from script errors and ****led up websites, but not my W98
OS.

I no expert, so please nobody bite my head off!

But I still have an old machine with a PC-Chips MB. It runs Win98 and Linux (Lubuntu 12.0.4.3).
I'm not claiming that Lubuntu is "like" Win98 but for simple work such as word-processing it
suffices. The nice thing I like about Lubuntu is that it runs PostgreSQL, which Win98 cannot.

Bear in mind that Linux has improved over the years. It is certainly my option now that Microshaft
has decided to end support for WinXP.

98 Guy wrote:
anyone asking if linux can run win-98
software is probably not ready for linux?

That's simplistic. In my Win98 one of the most frequently used programs
is still an Atari ST database run in an emulator -- try as I can I have
still not managed to find an even half decent replacement. So if I were
to got to Linux, one of the first requirements would be a reliable Atari
emulator.

There are better alternatives for most Windows programs in Linux, but
not for everything. Niche programs for Linux would have to be written
for a niche squared[1], i.e. probably too few users to be worth it.

[1] Not always, nerds tend to cluster.