Anybody here Win95 savvy?

Post by **Trey** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 8:21 am

I've got an old Dell Inspiron 3000 laptop that I'm trying to install Win95 on. When I try to run Win95 setup it gets as far as starting to run 'Scandisk', where it stops, if you click on the 'More Information' it says 'Out of Memory'. I suppose the HDD has errors, but how can I map them if I can't get scandisk to even run. The laptop's got no floppy drive, just a CD-rom. I tried running scandisk from the CD, but I get the same error...

This is originally a Win95 machine, it's got a 4Gb HDD, and bios says it's got 640kb Sys Mem and 207Mb Extented Mem.

Anyone have any hinks they can share that might help?

Post by **hfric** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 11:24 am

haha no its not 640kb , post your real dos memory with the MEM command or if you have try using MEMMAKER , those where the default programs in Dos 6.11 to get extended memory that DOS uses ... normally you need 533kb free for Scandisk

and well M$ in Win95 had this <i>fudge</i>.d up idear they need to run Scandisk BEFORE the install so yeah

first install DOS 6.11 then do a Win95 scandisk and if you got error then your (simply put) <i>fudge</i>.ed , because Win95 scandisk needs a Disk drive to output the DAT error file .... like you would need it

Post by **Trey** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 8:47 pm

Can I install Dos 6.11 from a CD rom?

Narfous · Post by **Narfous** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 8:53 pm

setup /is

Doing that skips the scandisk in the install.

Post by **Trey** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 9:57 pm

Narfous wrote:setup /is

Doing that skips the scandisk in the install.

Tried that, install completed, but it hangs when Win95 tries to start...

Post by **hfric** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 4:52 pm

well IT will hang , if you have NOT enough extended memory = Scandisk will not run

so here you go DOS 7.1 Iso
http://ms-dos7.hit.bg/

Post by **Trey** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 7:12 pm

Here are the specs:
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/S ... /specs.htm

It's a 3000 with M233XT

Post by **hfric** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 10:24 pm

eeehhhh then why go win95 when you can easily run win98 on it !!

Post by **Trey** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 10:29 pm

hfric wrote: eeehhhh then why go win95 when you can easily run win98 on it !!

Just to be difficult...

Since it was a 95 machine I figured I set it up like it was new. When I got it someone had managed to install some version of XP in it, if you can believe that, of course it wouldn't even start up. So I wiped the HDD and started over.

Post by **Trey** » Tue Dec 15, 2009 1:15 am

Fine... I went ahead and installed Win98SE on it.

I really wanted a machine running Win95... I wonder it you can downgrade from Win98 to Win95... hummm...

Narfous · Post by **Narfous** » Tue Dec 15, 2009 1:25 am

If it's not starting up you probably have either a RAM problem, a hard drive problem, or you're trying to install the original retail Win95 and not a OSR revision.

Post by **Trey** » Tue Dec 15, 2009 3:08 am

The version I was trying to install was Win95C. Win98SE installed fine and runs. Now I've got to find the right video driver, and a way to install it without a floppy drive. All those old drivers where self-extracting-to-floppy. I'll have to use burned CDs I guess, which is a killer since the files are <1Mb Unless I can get USB jump drive support for 98SE, is that possible? Back to Google...

Post by **hfric** » Tue Dec 15, 2009 3:12 pm

ta daaaaaaaa
http://www.usbman.com/win98seusbguide.htm

USB in win98se

Arminius · Post by **Arminius** » Sat Dec 19, 2009 2:19 am

Trey wrote:The version I was trying to install was Win95C.

Is your 95C CD bootable, my copy isn't? If not then how did you get it to install without a floppy?

The reason I am asking is that some years back I made an ISO of a Win98 CD, deleted all the files and folders leaving only the boot sector, then modified the strings etc with a hex editor so that it reads Win95, then imported all the files and folders from a Win95 CD into the ISO and burned a fresh CD.

It worked, I was able to install Win95 (95B in this case) from a bootable CD. The boot sector contains a copy of the ebd.cab (which contains a copy of SCANDISK.EXE) from Win98.

Yeah, I know, I have too much time on my hands.

The bad thing about Win95 is that USB support was lousy, minimal at best.

I still have the empty ISO with the modified boot sector (made with UltraISO). I will upload it if anyone is interested.

Post by **Trey** » Sat Dec 19, 2009 3:12 am

The Win95c I've got is an OEM disc and it isn't bootable. I've seen several versions that have been married with Win98 to create a bootable disc.

The problem I was having was annoying, part of the problem was that someone had installed XP in it, which formatted the drive NTFS. Win95 and 98 can't read NTFS discs, they've gotta be Fat16 or 32. So I had to use Boot&Nuke on it and wipe it clean. Then I couldn't get the drive formated without a floppy dive...

I had 2 different machines, one I used an XP install disc to format the drive Fat32, then I unplugged it before it could finish installing XP, restarted, popped in the Win98SE and installed. I tried the same thing with Win95C, but it didn't work. I think it's an issue with Dos needing to be installed.

You don't need to uploaded the disc. :thanks:

anyway.