How do you install Windows 95?

Retro6

Retro6

Retro6

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I feel like such an idiot asking this.... lol

I am trying to restore a Dell XPS D333 PII back to original condition back to stock and this PC shipped with Windows 95. It was running Windows 98SE but its a bit under powered and more suited for Windows 95 anyway.

I made a Windows 95 start up disk some time ago and I have my original Windows 95 CD with USB Support version. Well the start up disk isn't working so I downloaded one and that one didn't work either so now my only other option is installing MS-DOS 6.22 with CD ROM Device driver.

The only problem is if I install Windows 95 from MS-DOS I will only get 2048 MB of my 20 GB hard drive. I would like to make full use of my hard drive but MS-DOS 6.22 only supports up to 2048 MB and also I will get a conflict with COMMAND.COM file if I was to do it that way...

I thought that maybe installing Windows 95 from the Start up floppy disk would be a lot easier but I guess not.

When I insert the the floppy it will say Windows 95 starting up "in text" then is displays the A: prompt... I type dir to display files on the floppy but none seem to do anything.

I'm stuck.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks
 
I really don't want Windows 98 back on this PC otherwise it wont be original. I will faff about with the start up floppy disk and see what I can do. Its formatting drive C: at the moment...

All I really need is a basic DOS that uses the entire hard drive and see drive D: then I can setup Win95 from there.
 
<Enters time machine, back to working in a PC retailer back in the late 90s...>

Win95 is a bit of a pain as you need a boot floppy with the Win95 OSR2 system files so you get FAT32 support, with the correct CD-ROM drivers installed via config.sys and autoexec.bat. There's no standard off the shelf boot floppy that I recall. Depending on what the optical drive is, if it's a standard-ish IDE one then the generic Oak drivers (as used on 98) should work. If it's got some sort of proprietary interface then that'll be pain. Win98 was easier as if the BIOS supports it you can boot straight off the CD.

As Bluecube says, that machine should run 98/98SE as fast as 95 once you disable nonsense like the active desktop.
 
Thats a shame but very useful info. It gives me some kind of idea of things I could try.

I ended up getting Windows 95 installed but I had to use MS.DOS 6.22 and as expected I only have 2 GB hard drive space which is alright for the time being until I come up with a solution. I didn't encounter the COMMAND.COM conflict on this machine so that was a relief. I might just have to get a smaller hard drive for this machine or just use the current as a 2GB drive.

Windows 95 is so iconic and it would be a shame to lose appreciation for Windows 95 especially in this day and age.
 
I didn't know Windows 95 would be such a challenge.

Now I need to find a way of transferring files because I need to install the video card drivers. There was a USB flash driver for Windows 95 but it doesn't work anymore. I downloaded and extracted the files. There is also one that is self extracting I tried them both and I just get text files and a file that is not recognized. I know these worked because there was a video on youtube about it but for some reason the files have been partially removed from the site.

I don't have any blank CD's to hand to write drivers too and this computer doesn't like CF cards via IDE adapter so right now I literally can't install drivers and they won't fit on a floppy.

I'm either going to have to dig out my old XP machine and pray that it still has the CD re writer software on it because I can not remember and buy some black CDs or spend the rest of the day looking for that Windows 95 USB driver.

I'm thinking I should probably invest in a GoTek. I do like my floppy drives plus I wouldn't want to change the original appearance of this machine but at least with the GoTek I could unplug the floppy cable and floppy power cable put the GoTek on it and then transfer all the drivers and would be all I would need it for, for this machine.

No matter what I do I'm not going to get my drivers installed. Every single thing on this machine is a major challenge and I'm not going back to Windows 98. USB driver will not install. Its starting to drive me mentally insane so I will take a break from it. I just need my video drivers installed that is all I want to do but its a major struggle I expect some else will go wrong even if I did get the USB driver installed.

Nope still nothing. I came back to it this time the USB driver installed but nothing else happens so I still can't load anything on it from USB.

For a computer that was "designed to run Windows 95" is pretty rubbish at it. The only damn thing that works on this machine is the sound. I've installed Windows 95 on old computers before with hardly any issues.

I really do not want to run Windows 98 on this piece of crap. I feel like tearing out the motherboard and getting something that is actually going to work with Windows 95.

Why is it so hard to have a Windows 95 machine in 2022.... I have plenty of computers running Windows 98 and I do not need another especially one of such crappy specs..

All I wanted was a Windows 95 machine next to my Windows 98 machine but oh no I can't have that.

I will try a few more things and then I will give up.

Here are my options.

1. Try Windows 98 drivers
2. Look for a GPU that has a driver CD with it
3. Sell the motherboard and get something more useful for Windows 95.

Its a real shame because in theory it would have made a very good Windows 95 machine.
 
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Much easier way of doing things assuming you have access to a second machine / external caddy is just to format the HDD, install the MS-DOS bootsector and then copy the installer onto it. Saves any mucking around with CD drivers.

USB storage driver:
It's likely worked fine. The trouble is that the driver INF has to contain the bus vendor / ID for your specific driver.
Some more details:
http://toastytech.com/files/cruzerwin95.html
 
Thanks for the info. I managed to get the graphics card driver onto the system but then when installing it I get asked to insert the Windows 95 CD so I put in the CD but it keeps asking me to insert the CD when its already in the drive. As far as I know the version of Windows 95 is the latest and is the one with USB support but just encase it isn't I will either order Win95 OSR 2.1 / 2.5 or I will buy some blank CDs and download OSR2.5
 
leezer3 said:
Much easier way of doing things assuming you have access to a second machine / external caddy is just to format the HDD, install the MS-DOS bootsector and then copy the installer onto it. Saves any mucking around with CD drivers.

USB storage driver:
It's likely worked fine. The trouble is that the driver INF has to contain the bus vendor / ID for your specific driver.
Some more details:
http://toastytech.com/files/cruzerwin95.html
Click to expand...
I could try that I don't have an IDE external hard drive enclosure to do that. I'll order one of those as well.
 
Armageus said:
Also unless you have 95 osr2.1 or osr 2.5 usb probably won't work anyway
Click to expand...

... and if it does USB mass storage won't work as there's no standard drivers built in with Windows 95. You needed to source those yourself or pray the device shipped with them.

Windows 98 with the first version of WDM driver support, means it's pretty much plug and play for standard devices.
 
MagicBoy said:
... and if it does USB mass storage won't work as there's no standard drivers built in with Windows 95. You needed to source those yourself or pray the device shipped with them.

Windows 98 with the first version of WDM driver support, means it's pretty much plug and play for standard devices.
Click to expand...
There is a driver for USB flash drives for Windows 95 it wont work on every flash dive but works on some. From my research my Windows 95 CD is version B and I need a newer version of Windows 95 to do that. I've been experimenting a bit with it just for fun swapping Windows 95 and Windows 98 system files around between the two OS's I have to re format the dive anyway for FAT32 so I thought it wouldn't matter is I mess up the Windows 95 installation. It would be cool to have Windows 95 but with Windows 98 system files for better hardware support.
 
B is also known as OSR2. It adds FAT32 support, but needs a USB update installing to enable the functionality. At which point it becomes OSR 2.1.
OSR 2.1 included the USB update.
OSR 2.5 ... as above plus a later version of IE (4?) and the active desktop nonsense.

None of these were ever retail, they were OEM releases and shipped with hardware.

To be fair to the USB support, at the time it shipped I could count the entirety of USB devices on the market on two hands.
 
Another way which may be an easier way to get Windows 95 running on this using the entire hard drive and having USB support is to install Windows 98SE but modifying the system files so it looks like Windows 95. I'd need to change the Windows 98 boot screen to Windows 95 and change the start menu to Windows 95 start menu and taskbar. I don't know how easy it would be to change those things but if so that might be another option I would consider.

Two main issues with Windows 95 is having a decent DOS program to install it from to where I get full capacity of my hard drive. The second Issue with Windows 95 is file transfer which is why having USB is desperately needed so that things like drivers can be installed. The same goes for Windows 3.1.

I don't know if its possible to modify MS.DOS 6.22 to allow full hard drive capacity with FAT 32 probably not so straight forward... but something I'm going to look at later.

I bought a Windows 95 CD today that claims to be a bootable CD which was 4.99 so it interesting to see what that does. As for file transfer within Windows 95, a GoTek maybe the only solution to get things like drivers onto the system and then I can install a network card afterwards for file transfer.
 
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Boot from a 98SE boot cd (or floppy) and fdisk your hard drive with that, then whilst still in "98 Dos" swap the CD and launch the 95 OSR 2.1 / 2.5 installer from that?

Retro6 said:
Another way which may be an easier way to get Windows 95 running on this using the entire hard drive and having USB support is to install Windows 98SE but modifying the system files so it looks like Windows 95. I'd need to change the Windows 98 boot screen to Windows 95 and change the start menu to Windows 95 start menu and taskbar. I don't know how easy it would be to change those things but if so that might be another option I would consider.
Click to expand...

Seems pointless to make a frankenstein version if you are going to the length to want it to be "period correct" with 95 in the first place.
 
Armageus said:
Boot from a 98SE boot cd (or floppy) and fdisk your hard drive with that, then whilst still in "98 Dos" swap the CD and launch the 95 OSR 2.1 / 2.5 installer from that?



Seems pointless to make a frankenstein version if you are going to the length to want it to be "period correct" with 95 in the first place.
Click to expand...
Sometimes there are no other options. I would like it to be period correct but there are to many issues, file transfer is an issue plus not being able to use full capacity of the hard drive space..

Its either a period correct Windows 95 PC with no drivers 16 color bit display which is pretty useless for running anything or finding solutions for file transfer and getting things working either by installing Windows 98SE then swapping in Windows 95 system files that way I get the full capacity of my hard drive and I'm able to load my drivers from USB. I've been looking at a piece of software called 98Lite that allows me to turn Windows 98SE into Windows 95. When other options fail then alternatives solutions need to be found.

Before I got down that road I'm going to try making a DOS boot CD for Windows 95 with FAT32 support to allow me to use all hard drive space, by using and modifying a copy of DOS 7.1 and then adding in other DOS files from the Windows 98 CD. If I'm successful with that then that is one problem solved.
 
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