Does anyone else think Win98SE is the worst OS ever?

[bonkers325]

not in my book
i think winme is

 

[warlord]

I have my bios protection on, and the only BSOD or illegal's I've had with SE were just before my hd started making the Click Of Death. I run a winproxy, game on it, write code, basically beat the crap out of it, and as long as I reboot after really intense sessions (hours on web, then Q3, more hours on web, visual studio...), its generally fine. I will agree that it sucks having to reboot, but that is my way of avoiding the BSOD's, they really piss me off :|

I've smacking the wall a few times durring my sharp learning curve of linux , but hopefully I will learn it enough to ditch se except for when I absolutly need it.

 

[DeepSparklePupa]

Sigh. hotpepperz - I had the same thing happen to me 3 weeks ago on a similar machine, K7-700, Asus K7M. The entire Windows/system directory was screwed and, while at first the BIOS wouldn't even recognize the HDD, I could get the machine to boot once I finally extracted some files.

Ironically, I had Boot Sector Virus protection turned off for the entire life of the computer. Now, of course, I have it turned on.

I think the only way to guard against our problem is to ghost the drive. At least then you need a mere 30 minutes to reinstall, rather than 3+ hours.

-DSP

 

[ETPhHm]

I have 98 original with all the updates that are available on the MS Web Site. I originally installed it late 98, but have done a reinstall maybe twice since then (not the format c: type). I have an Asus P2B, 300 PII OC'd to 450 (one of the ones with the right date like Tom's first reported), 300W P/S, 128MB Mushkin CAS2, SBLive, Matrox 400, Internal Zip, KenWood 72X, Maxtor 27GB, Maxtor 10GB (both 7200, UDMA33), Internal Modem, USB Scanner and Printer. I have Norton 2000 Pro Installed, and about 2 years worth of software, 50+ titles (although some software has been removed). OK ok hold on to your seats, my registry is about 14MB. But hey, that is MS fault, not mine. The computer is used by myself and 3 other family members, a total of about 10 to 15 hours per day. Don't do much gaming, mostly internet (IE5), MS Office, and some multi-media educational software. Lockups have been the norm two or three times a week since about 6 months after I first built it. Starting about a month ago, lockups have increased to twice a day, sometimes more if I spend a lot of time on the web (i recently reinstalled IE5.1 thinking that might help, notta.)

The most common lock ups are when I am on the web with 4 or 5 apps running, and there is about a 75% chance that within one hour of surfing, the mouse is going to freeze. I have no resource conflicts.

Oh, and it always occurs when I leave the computer on over night, the mouse moves, keyboard is NOT locked up, but nothing is active, all dead icons and menus. Ctrl-Alt-Del tells me Msgsrv32 is not responding. Its a APM (power mgmt) system for the puter. I researched both MS and Symantec. MS is aware of the problem and suggests that you disable APM in Dev Mgr under System Devices. Did that, notta. Then I shut off APM in the BIOS and removed the device from Dev Mgr, notta.

Oh and then I always get a lot of shut-down hangs, depending on what software has been run, how long the puters been running (and yes, fast shut-down is disabled).

I recently ordered SE update from MS, haven't installed it yet. I am not to thrilled with my options at this point: Start fresh; 98, 98SE, ME, 2K. Its like, do you want the burlap or wool underwear sir?

Not much incline to change to linux or BeOS or Mac either.

 

[Looney]

I used to use Win98SE quite frequently, and didn't encounter that many illegal ops or BSOD. Maybe once a week or so, but even that drove me nuts.

Win2k is awesome. Been using it for about 6 months now, and haven't had a problem except for a couple of hardware compatibility (Fasttrak/33 won't work, and CL needs to release Liveware 3.0). All my games work, so there's no problem there.

But Win98SE wasn't that bad.. if you're having that many problems, check for some other underlying problem. Maybe drivers or IRQ.

 

[WetSprocket]

I went back to win95. VXD's and other drivers don't work correctly. I just want a simple OS that will work with all the programs that I use. I wish Linnux or Beos were further along. :|

 

[zedos]

I like Win98SE...I have win2k and win98SE dual boot and always boot to win98SE. I guess its a habit.

 

[gtd2000]

Woo - hoo! Back to a speedy system yet again - applications load fast - the machine feels snappy once more
What did I do?
Format C:
And then re-installed Win 98 regular flavour - It's like putting a new system in front of me!

 

[iceliquid]

win98 se seems stable for me. But I just use it as a gateway for a dialup I share with another computer

IceLiquid

 

[rc5]

If you reinstall Win98 every month, it should work well. Didn't Microsoft suggest to reinstall once a while?