Win 98 Upgrade Woes

[NickBulka]

I recently replaced the hard disk in my system. The version of Windows 98 that I have is an upgrade version, so when I try to install, it doesn't find an existing version of windows, and asks for the windows 95 CD. However, when I put the CD in and point the installation to the windows 95 setup files, it says it can't find them.

Does anybody know a trick to bypass this? I can't even install windows 95 first, since it's also an upgrade, and I no longer have my windows 3.1 diskettes.




nick bulka

 

[kjonnnnn]

Souns simple to me. Since you only have upgrade disks you dont have the basic component... 3.1. You need to build up 3.1?

Can you just go purchase 98?

 

[Karl Blessing]

Actually , you dont even need 3.1 for the upgrade, the upgrade, just checks for the win.com on Win3.1, and completely installs over, this is why I didnt like microsoft too much for doing, considering the upgrade is the same as the full, just that the upgrade checks to see if you had a previous version of Windows, (Almost feels like they charge you extra for not having used their OS in the past)
Karl
kb244@kb244.com

http://www.kb244.com

Experienced in : C++(both VC++ and Borland),VB1(dos) thru VB6, Delphi 3 pro, HTML, Visual InterDev 6(ASP(WebProgramming/Vbscript)

http://www.brainbench.com/transcript.jsp?pid=629151

 

[Wiznane]

Does it really just check for the existance of win.com in the C:\Windows directory? So if that was the only file in that directory, the install would still work? Do you happen to know if it validates the .com file at all, checking for the version and whatnot?

 

[NickBulka]

I already own a legal version of both windows 95 and 98. And I did have a legal version of windows 3.1. Karl is absolutely right. Windows doesn't really upgrade, it just replaces the current version of windows (except in the case of windows 98 SE, which is a true upgrade).

Microsoft is just checking to make sure you're entitled to use the upgrade version.





nick bulka

 

[Karl Blessing]

"entitiled" sounds more like pentalizing for not being with them from the start hehe
Karl
kb244@kb244.com

http://www.kb244.com

Experienced in : C++(both VC++ and Borland),VB1(dos) thru VB6, Delphi 3 pro, HTML, Visual InterDev 6(ASP(WebProgramming/Vbscript)

http://www.brainbench.com/transcript.jsp?pid=629151

 

[Zelandakh]

it really is just win.com and it doesn't matter about the size.

Zel

 

[NickBulka]

That's pretty funny. They go to all the trouble to try to stop you from using upgrade software if you don't have the previous version, then don't even bother to verify that the file is actually theirs. Typical Microsoft.

Thanks, guys.



nick bulka

 

[Zelandakh]

Even better though, you can find what they want by scanning the setup.inf file (I think it is) which details files that are required by the upgrade.

Office SBE only installs on a Win9x machine from an OEM. Check the file and you find it looks for opkwiz.tag in c:\windows\options. Doesn't matter what the file looks like...

These things prevent most people. TT users are NOT most people...

Zel