Change operating system?

T-R-A September 18, 2011 at 09:15:12

You'd need 16MB for Win95 to run "decent", but I've run it with 8MB before and it was tolerable---after doing some significant tweaking. There's not a lot out there that was "8MB-friendly". Most were DOS-based such as Geoworks or earlier versions of OS/2. Few Linux distros can handle that little ram unless you ran text-only. If you want to get into X-windows, you'd need at least 24MB of RAM for DamnSmallLinux to work decently. "Channeling the spirit of jboy..."

Is it possibe to install Windows 98 on my computer?

T-R-A September 18, 2011 at 09:26:42

Win98 requirements from Microsoft: * A personal computer with a 486DX 66 megahertz (MHz) or faster processor (Pentium central processing unit recommended). * 16 megabytes (MB) of memory (24 MB recommended). * A typical upgrade from Windows 95 requires approximately 195 MB of free hard disk space, but the hard disk space may range from between 120 MB and 295 MB, depending on your computer configuration and the options that you choose to install. * A full install of Windows 98 on a FAT16 drive requires 225 MB of free hard disk space, but may range from between 165 MB and 355 MB, depending on your computer configuration and that options that you choose to install. * A full install of Windows 98 on a FAT32 drive requires 175 MB of free hard disk space, but may range from between 140 MB and 255 MB, depending on your computer configuration and the options that you choose to install. * One 3.5-inch high-density floppy disk drive. * VGA or higher resolution (16-bit or 24-bit color SVGA recommended). And 24MB RAM is really the minimum "tolerable-level". 32MB is "usable-level". You can "force" an install with 8MB (using switches), but if you think Win95 is slow on a 486 w/8MB of RAM.... It shouldn't be that difficult (or expensive) to bump the RAM up to the maximum that the machine can hold. Still lot's of places out there that sell 72-pin SIMMS. You just gotta hunt for them. "Channeling the spirit of jboy..."

As an experiment I once booted Windows 98 on an older machine with 10 MB RAM. It was so slow I thought it had crashed. It eventually finished booting and did work but wasn't usable. You need at least 16 MB to run Windows 98 at a tolerable level (with old software) but that will be slow. With 8 MB RAM Windows 3.11 is the best you can do.

sdfox 7 September 19, 2011 at 09:38:59

I've found MemoryX.net (www.memoryx.net) to be the best for buying old memory. For example, here is a 16MB chip (only $25) for a 75MHz Dell Latitude XP laptop (XP has nothing to do with Windows XP, and it's rather funny that Dell was using that name 7 years before Windows XP came into existence): http://www.memoryx.net/3103507.html If you can't find your model in the pull-down menu, just type it in the search box in the upper right hand corner It's rather inexpensive considering the age of those laptops. iMac G5 1.8GHz PPC, 2GB RAM, 160GB, Mac OS X Leopard 10.5.8, SuperDrive http://sdfox7.com

MisterGopher September 21, 2011 at 08:29:07

As with everyone here, I have to generally agree that Windows 3.11 is probably the best for that machine. If you are adventurous, I think OS/2 might be worth a try. OS/2 is not a system for everyday hobbyists though. With OS/2 you really have to put your back into it to get things running well. It's a stable enough system and quite modern looking in comparison to Windows 3.x, but unwary users can really screw things up if they aren't careful.

I had OS/2 WARP version 3 on it before. I happened to delete it. Where can I get that CD?

what a dinosaur. you can try windows 98, but i would take that computer, take out all the parts, and out new ones in, and confuse people thinking i hav windows 7 on a really old computer. think about it, because that hardware is so old, windows 95 evn thinks, now this is a dinosaur.

Do you think i can install Windows NT 3.51 on the machine?

Is there a lite version on Windows 98?

sdfox 7 November 11, 2011 at 09:40:30

NT 3.51 is very outdated, very few people used it and very few programs were compatible with it, it had the 16-bit shell interface so while it was 32-bit, many modern programs would probably run incorrectly if they ran at all. You can get the trial version of 98lite but I believe some features are missing from it compared to the 'professional' version. http://www.litepc.com/98lite.html You have to accept the license before you can download it: http://www.litepc.com/prev_lic.html iMac G5 1.8GHz, 2GB RAM, 160GB, Mac OS X Leopard 10.5.8, SuperDrive PowerBook G4 1.33GHz, 1.25GB RAM, 60GB, Mac OS X Leopard 10.5.8, SuperDrive www.sdfox7.com

T-R-A November 12, 2011 at 08:19:53

You're not addressing the real problem here, which is lack of RAM. Until you do that, no newer operating system or GUI (whether "Lite" or not) will operate at an acceptable speed unless you cut it down to a bare (likely unacceptable) minimum. As discussed above, there's many vendors that still offer RAM for an older system so you need to significantly raise your RAM above 8MB before you can look a newer OS. "Channeling the spirit of jboy..."

windows 95 itself will work just as well as 3.1 on that machine with 8 mb, of course depending which programs you use, that goes for both systems. I once ran win 95 on a 425sx with 4mb and it ran fine, word95 was more or less ok, when I put word97 it was unacceptably slow tho... Oh and forget about NT 3.51 or 4.0 these are much more hardware demanding.