Win 98 v. W2K Pro

[waltcloud]

I have a new PC that came with W2K Pro installed. However, W2K Pro won't work with a Standard Text printer driver I use to print address labels at high speed on my Okidata printer. The driver worked fine with Windows 98. Is there a way to run both Windows 98 and W2K pro on the same machine, so I can use my printer? Or would it be best to simply eliminate W2K Pro and install Win 98? (I'm digitally challenged, so any help is appreciated!)

Walt Cloud

[sailgreg]

You can install both 98 and 2000 and select witch one to load when you turn on the computer, the only problem is that you need to install 98 first, and then install 2000, or it will not work. You can also just install 98, but I really prefer 2000 so I would recommend dual booting the two. So to do either of theses, back up all your important data you have on the hard drive, fdisdk your hard drive and create 2 (or more of you want) partitions (1 for 98, one for 2000) and install windows 98 onto the C: drive, once that is working boot into windows 98 and pop in the windows 2000 disk, and select clean install, when the setup gets to the dos mode that asks where you want to install 2000 put it one your D: (or any other then C: that windows 98 is on) and let that finish installing. You should have a full working dual boot set up, good job! I have done it this way about 15 times now on many differant computers and they have all worked fine, there might be a way to install 98 over 2000 as a dual boot, but I am not aware of that. Another option would be to use Virtual PC or other emulation program and just run 98 as a program in 2000, this works fairly well, as long as you have a lot of ram and a fast prosessor. if you need anymore help, you can E-mail Me at realfun@sailgreg.com

--Greg C.
http://sailgreg.com

[waltcloud]

Thanks for your help, Greg. I, too, like W2K pro, but the high-speed dot matrix printer driver I use to print address labels won't work with W2K pro. And no one seems to have a similar, high-speed driver which will work with W2K.

I've read that the dual-boot configuration is made easier by using Partition Magic to set up partitions, etc.? Have you had any experience with that product? I'm a DOS/Windows-challenged amateur, so please keep that in mind! Thanks again.

Walt Cloud

[sailgreg]

Partition Magic is a good program, I use it at my company all the time, I would highly recommend it if you want to create and resize partitions in windows, but if you are going to format your drive and setup a dual boot fdisk is good enough. You can use Partition Magic if you like witch also comes with boot magic and you can do a dual boot that way I think that would be easier you you, but Partition Magic costs $69.99 and the other way is free. It sounds like because all you want to do is print somthing from windows 98 you should try Virtual PC, a windows emulator you can download a free trial at http://www.connectix.com/ it is 17mb so you might order the CD if you dont have DSL or Cable internet. Also try looking for a windows 2000 printer driver at http://driverguide.com the username is drivers and the password is all, I have found lots of drivers converted from windows 9x to 2000 on that site.

--Greg C.
http://sailgreg.com

[waltcloud]

Thanks. I'll give that driver site a try. That certainly would be the easiest (and cheapest) solution. I have a part-time business which does bulk mailings, and I really don't want to spend $2000 for a new W2K-compatible label printer!

Walt Cloud

[sailgreg]

If you cant find a driver for w2k then I would recomend dual booting 98 and 2k, it is free, and works well, I am going to be dual boot windows 2k and XP ans soon as I buy it! If you need more help goto http://www.duxcw.com/digest/Howto/software/windows/dual/ and follow the instuctions there.

--Greg C.
http://sailgreg.com

[waltcloud]

Thanks. I posted a driver request at driverguide.com; I'll see if anyone can come up with something. Also thanks for the web address re: instructions on dual-booting (I'll need them!). While I'm thinking of it, should the Windows 98 partition be FAT or FAT32? Thanks again.

Walt C.

[BertImmenschuh]

Win98 and Win2K can both use FAT32, Win98 cannot use NTFS, cannot even see the NTFS partition.

[waltcloud]

Didn't I read somewhere that the W2K Pro partition should be NTFS though, to take full advantage of some of W2K Pro's features? Or did I just dream that?! Thanks.

Walt C.

[BertImmenschuh]

You are not dreaming, at least about NTFS. WinNT4, Win2K, and WinXP all can use NTFS file system which allows one to protect down to the file level. The advantage of Win2K/XP is they can also use FAT32 file system, offering the dual-booting of Win98 on C and 2K/XP on D. However, FAT32 does not offer any folder/file protection other than that provided by say Word or Excel. And on the down side, Win9x/ME and MS-DOS cannot see the partition that is formatted NTFS, let alone read it.

[sailgreg]

It does not really matter if you use NTFS of FAT32 for w2k, NTFS is a little more protected and you can block access to folders as the admin, but if you are the only user FAT32 should be fine, with windows 98, go with FAT32, you will need to if your drive is bigger then 2gb anyway, when you use fDisk, it will ask if you want to enable support for large drives, press Y and it will be fat32.

--Greg C.
http://sailgreg.com

[waltcloud]

Thanks for the info...and for confirming that I still have a few bytes of reliable grey matter in my head!

Walt C.

[waltcloud]

Thanks. My wife and I are the only users on the PC (the kids inherited the old one), so if FAT32 is the easier route, I'll probably just use that.

Walt C.

[BertImmenschuh]

You're welcome. Glad to help. Happy New Year from Buffalo, Wyoming.

[sailgreg]

you can always convert the windows 2000 partition from fat32 to NTFS by typing convert /? at a command prompt, That will give you instructions and the conversion should only take about 5 min or less to complete.

--Greg C.
http://sailgreg.com

[waltcloud]

And a Happy New Year to you, too! I now have a fully functioning dual-boot 98/W2K Pro system. Thanks for your help on that issue. Now, if I can just get Win 98 to let me change my display resolution and colors, I'll be all set. I'm running a Dell M781s monitor with a 64MB Nvidia GeForce2 MX graphics card with TV-out. Works fine under W2K Pro, but not under Win 98. Not sure which Dell CD might contain the driver, or whether it will install on Win 98. Any help will be appreciated. Thanks.

Walt C.

[waltcloud]

Thanks for your help on the dual-boot problem. I finally got it working yesterday. The newest issue is getting Win 98 to let me change my display resolution and colors. (It's stuck on 16 colors, with no other choice except 2-color, and it won't let me resize the desktop at all.) I'm running a Dell M781s monitor with a 64MB Nvidia GeForce2 MX graphics card with TV-out. Works fine under W2K Pro, but not under Win 98. Not sure which Dell CD might contain the driver, or whether it will install on Win 98. Any help will be appreciated. Thanks.

Walt C.

[BertImmenschuh]

Did the computer come with Win98 and the Nvidia GeForce2 MX graphics card? If so, the software should be on the CD. Maybe Dell has new drivers on their site.

If you added the card later, you may have to go to www.driverzone.com and try to find new drivers.

[sailgreg]

Goto http://nvidia.com and download the windows 98 drivers for your gfx card, w2k has a huge file of drivers for hardware and you rarely need to get drivers for new stuff, that is one of the resons I like it more. You can goto http://nvidia.com in windows 2000 download the drivers for windows 98 (the might have new ones for w2k also) And then boot into 98 and install the drivers, reboot again and you will be able to use 24bit color on a high resolution like in w2k.

--Greg C.
htto://sailgreg.com

[waltcloud]

The computer came with the video card and W2K Pro installed. I tried the Dell monitor CD and the Dell Resources CD, but the PC wouldn't let me install any of those drivers under Win 98.

Walt

[waltcloud]

Thanks. I was on NVIDIA's web site today, and didn't find anything, but perhaps I was looking on the wrong page (nothing new there!). I'll check again.

Walt C.

[sailgreg]

I found the drivers on there site, here is the URL: http://www.nvidia.com/content/license/location.asp?url=ftp://205.158.109.140/Windows/23.11/Win9x-Me_23.11.exe

--Greg C.
http://sailgreg.com

[waltcloud]

Thanks, Greg. I downloaded/installed that driver (successfully!) just before I signed back on to send this message. I just hadn't gone deep enough to read the documentation that said the driver was compatible with the GE2 MX series. It works great, and I can now resize my desktop to a manageable size. Thanks for all your help on this. I really appreciate it!

Walt C.

[waltcloud]

I revisited nVIDIA's web site, did a little more clicking, and found that one of their featured drivers is compatible with myGe2 MX card. I downloaded/installed it, and my monitor now works fine under both Win 98 and W2K Pro. Thanks for all your help on these issues. I really appreciate it, and I've learned a lot more on this forum than I have from Dell!

Walt C.

[sailgreg]

Nivida uses one driver for most of there gfx cards, that is a nice feature. No Problem for the help, I can answer most of your computer questions anytime!

--Greg C.
http://sailgreg.com