Welcome to the troubleshooting sector for Windows 98. Hopefully you will find
something in here that will solve the problem you may be having.
Please check out all pages by clicking on the next page link as there is a lot
here to view. By clicking on the underlined statement below it will take you to
the details of how to carry out the task.
You may find
this application handy for changes in the registry.
RegEditX (Registry Editor Extensions) is freeware that enhances the Windows
Registry Editor. If you edit the same keys repeatedly, this is for you!
New buttons activate frequently
used commands, and a combo box stores a history of visited keys and allows quick
navigation back to them.
The keys are saved across
sessions and available the next time you use the Registry Editor.
To solve problems with your hard disk controller after upgrading to Windows 98,
see Microsoft's Knowledge Base Article No. 189518.
If your computer contains
a PCI-IDE hard disk controller that employs serialization between the two IDE
channels, you may experience the following problems:
32-bit file system access and 32-bit virtual memory are not available
Device Manager displays an exclamation point in a yellow circle for the primary
and secondary IDE channels
Removing and reinstalling the hard disk controller does not resolve the problem.
This can occur if the protected-mode driver for the hard disk controller was not
properly initialized when you started Windows 98 previously.
When this occurs, a noide entry is placed in the registry, preventing Windows 98
from making future attempts to initialize the protected-mode driver.
This problem can occur
with an IDE controller that requires serialization between the primary and
secondary IDE channels. The protected-mode drivers for these IDE controllers can
fail to be initialized if one of the following situations occurs:
One IDE
channel has a supported hard disk, and the second channel has a CD-ROM or other
type of drive that requires real-mode drivers to be loaded.
Because of the serialization between the two IDE channels, it is impossible to
access the hard disk in protected mode and use the other device in real mode.
This causes the protected-mode driver to fail initialization, and the noide
switch is placed in the registry to prevent future errors. Both disk devices
then operate in real-mode
The driver for the IDE
controller is manually removed from Device Manager and then reinstalled, or the
protected-mode driver is disabled and then re-enabled.
Some PCI controller drivers are not designed for dynamic enabling and disabling,
and can cause the protected-mode driver to fail initialization. To force Windows
98 to attempt to reinitialize the protected-mode IDE driver you'll have to
remove the noide entry from the registry:
Select Noide.inf found in the \ tools \ mtsutil folder on the Windows 98 CD
Right-Click noide.inf or hold down the Shift key and press the F10 function key
Choose Install from the context menu to remove the noide entry
After you update the registry, restart Windows 98. Windows 98 will then attempt
to initialize the protected-mode driver for the controller.
If no problems are encountered, the file system and virtual memory will operate
in 32-bit mode, and Device Manager will not display an exclamation point in a
yellow circle for the IDE channels.
If the
protected-mode driver is not initialized properly, an error message will be
displayed and the NOIDE registry entry will be re-created. Windows 98 will use
the MS-DOS compatibility mode file system the next time you start the computer.
When your hard disk(s) are running in MS-DOS Compatibility Mode, see this
InfiniSource TechFile for more details.
After you install Windows 98, you may
be unable to access your CD-ROM drive. This can occur if you have a dual-channel
IDE (Integrated Device Electronics) controller installed in your computer. To
fix this:
Select Start > Settings > Control Panel, and double-click System
select the Device Manager tab
Double-click the Hard Disk Controllers branch to expand it, select your IDE
controller, and then select Properties
Select the Settings tab
In the Dual IDE Channel Settings box, select Both IDE Channels enabled, and then
click OK (2 times), and restart your computer
If you have 1 or more bad clusters on your hard drive, Windows 98 will not
convert the drive. There are several solutions.
You can modify the registry to have scandisk rescan bad sectors. See Microsoft's
Knowledge Base Article No. 127055.
A little
clarification on the referenced Microsoft's Knowledge Base Article might be in
order. Basically this article say to change the last digits of a specific
registry key value to 04.
While this will work and
will cause scandisk to re-check bad clusters it will also possibly re-set
scandisk options you have previously set.
To prevent this from happening you should add 04 to whatever your last digits
are instead of just changing them to 04.
In my case the last digits are normally 40 because I have Report MS-DOS mode
name length errors enabled in the advanced options.
If I follow the Knowledge Base Article and change the last digits to 04, the
re-check of bad sectors occurs but not the name length error check because it
has been disabled. On the other hand, if I add 04 to my current 40 and change
the value to 44, then I get both features.
Keep in mind that the 04 change is not permanent, it remains only until scandisk
completes, and you close it.
Then a 04 would revert back to 00, and in my case the setting for name length
error checks would be lost until I re-started scandisk and went into the
advanced options and re-enabled it,
by changing the value to
44 instead of 04, then when scandisk completes the value is reset to 40 instead
of 00 and I retain this setting.
Although this registry hack does reclaim bad clusters, I am not sure just how
good the test really is.
"Not enough memory" message when converting to FAT32
If you receive the message: "Not enough memory - change the config and the
autoexec", copy the existing Autoexec.bat & Config.sys files to a temporary
directory, then edit the original Autoexec.bat & Config.sys files, and delete
their contents, so that you have just 2 empty files.
Note: If you are loading real-mode display drivers, change the display settings
in Windows 98 to VGA, and change back after the conversion.
Restart
Windows 98 and run the FAT32 converter. When succeeded, copy your original
Autoexec.bat & Config.sys files back to the root (C:\) directory, overwriting
the empty ones you created.
If you still get the "Not enough memory" message, try the suggestions from this
Microsoft Knowledge Base Article No. 188561.
There are many reports from people having trouble with their Winmodem. Here are
some possible solutions:
Close all applications (press Ctrl + Alt + Del and End all tasks, except
Explorer and Systray)
Open Control Panel > Modems, then select the Winmodem and if you have more than
one installed Properties > Ports > Uninstall
Note: If you have a Winmodem icon in Control Panel, use that to Uninstall
instead
In Control Panel select System and select the Device Manager tab, and look for
Unknown items and delete them all
Check Ports and Modems and if Winmodem still exists select Remove for this one
also
In Windows Explorer, select
your Windows 98 CD and go to \ drivers \ modem \ 3com-usr \ winmodem and run the
wmregdel.exe file. Follow the on screen instructions
Select Start > Run > Shut Down
Turn off the power
to your computer, wait for about 20 seconds, then power back on. When you get
the New hardware detected wizard let it proceed, when appropriate select Have
Disk, and either point it to your Windows 98 CD or to the Winmodem drivers you
have on a floppy.
Realize that if you use the
drivers on the Windows 98 CD that they are generic and you'll need to update
them later
The above should get your Winmodem working.
Note: be advised
that if your (3Com) Winmodem is in the 112501 or 112502 serial group that it is
a known buggy modem. I suggest you call 3Com on voice and ask for a replacement.
After
upgrading to Windows 98, some Winmodems will lose DosBox functionality. If your
Winmodem supports DosBox, please follow these steps to re-enable this feature:
Go to the Winmodem icon in Control Panel and select the Port Settings tab and
uncheck Enable Dos Boxes, press the OK button.
Note: if you do not see the Enable Dos Boxes section your Winmodem does not
support this feature.
Repeat the process by going to the Winmodem icon in Control Panel and select the
Port Settings tab and this time CHECK the Enable Dos Boxes box and press OK
button. Restart your computer.
If you get an error message: There Is No WinModem Found in Your Computer, see
Microsoft Knowledge Base Article No. 188601.
After you install Windows
98, your PCI modem (Winmodem) may not be recognized. When this occurs, the PCI
modem may be listed as a PCI Serial Controller under Other Devices in Device
Manager.
This behaviour occurs because the Windows 98 CD-ROM does not include drivers for
PCI serial controllers. To resolve this behaviour, update the driver for the
device, here's how:
Select Start > Settings > Control Panel and double-click System
Select the Device Manager tab
Double-click the Other Devices branch to expand it, select PCI Serial
Controller, and then click Properties
Select the Driver tab, and then click Update Driver
Click Next, click Search for a better driver then the one your device is using
now (Recommended), and then click Next
Insert the driver disk or CD-ROM that was included with your modem
Click to select the check box for the drive corresponding to the media type
(floppy disk drive or CD-ROM drive), and then click Next
If you receive an Update Driver Warning dialog box, click Yes
Click Next, click Finish, and then click Yes to restart your computer
Although you have the latest version of Internet Explorer on your system
installed, IE keeps telling you that a "New version of IE available".
To fix this:
Start the Registry Editor
Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ Software \ Microsoft \ Active Setup \ Installed
Components \ {89820200-ECBD-11cf-8B85-00AA005B4383}
Delete the "Version Available" key/value (right click the key and choose delete)
Close the Registry Editor
When you enable
Thumbnail view for your folders and configure Windows Explorer or My Computer to
be viewed as a Web page, the Thumbnail images for some file types may not be
displayed.
This behaviour can occur if you remove and re-create the file association for a
file type (when you install another application that registeres that file type).
The registry entry used by the Windows Desktop Update component to display
Thumbnail images is not updated properly when you re-create the file association
(thus, if you uninstall an application which took over a files association, it
will not be restored).
To fix this:
Click Start > Run, and type the following command in the Open box:
regsvr32.exe /i shdocvw.dll - If you have Internet Explorer 4 installed
regsvr32.exe /i shdoc401.dll - If you have Internet Explorer 5 installed
Some more information for those who lost the ability to
preview certain file types:
For this to work, the folder where you want to preview the images has to have
View as Web page enabled
There's the folowing registry fix:
Verify that the following entries exist in the HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\ registry key
for the type of file you are trying to preview:
