Windows 98 on a CF Card

Retro6 · 4 Feb 2019 at 15:12

Windows 98 SE on a CF Card.

I have several old 90's computers two Laptops and two desktops all needing IDE hard drives. IDE low capacity hard drives can only be found online and having them posted is like a death sentence to the hard drive as many sellers would send them in nothing more than a jiffy bag that give very little protection and even the ones that are well packed can fail from being chucked about in transit. I did buy two new laptop IDE drives but both failed within a month...

I have been doing some thinking on what would be a good replacement for an IDE hard drive?

I've seen people using IDE to CF adapters to use CF cards as hard drives which might be fine for Linux but not for an old Windows OS such as Windows 98 that does not have trim for SSD let alone a CF card. I'd imagine Windows 98 would work for a short while on a CF drive but not for long.

Am I wrong or can Windows 98SE be installed to a CF drive and run happily?

almoststew1990 · 4 Feb 2019 at 15:29

Windows 98 is just fine with CF cards, it's your motherboard and bios which is much more of an issue. I've had about 80% success with my 1990s hardware ranging from 1992 to 2010 and I cant rule out the 20% as other problems e.g power supply!

I use up to 8GB to maximise compatibility but cheapy Chinese cf to ide adapters.

Retro6 · 4 Feb 2019 at 20:46

Excellent

. I already have a CF IDE adapter that I got a few years ago I remember now that I tried it out on an old Panasonic CF27 Tough Book but the BIOS didn't see it... its probably going to be the case with the Panasonic CF28 that I also have... I've still got the two vintage desktop PC's plus an old Pentium 4 to play with.

I'll be ordering a few CF adapters seeing that they are very cheap that way I'll have a variety of them to try out with some CF Cards.

I'm planing on turning the old Pentium 4 into a Windows 98 gaming PC which will have 512MB RAM a 16GB CF Card and a 2.8 GHz processor with a Sound Blaster sound card and a Voodoo AGP Video card.

On my other old computer which is an IBM 300GL borderline Pentium II with a 200MHz processor and 32MB RAM that will get a 4GB CF Card with MS-DOS and Windows 95 with USB support installed along with Office 97 (the processor now shows 120MHz due to a faulty dip switch) its no big deal 120 MHz is fine for what I want plus it will be beneficial in the long run to have it running at 120MHz and last longer and cooler.

Then for the other one which is a 100MHz 486 16MB RAM will get a 2GB CF Card running MS-DOS 6.22 and Windows 3.11

I think these 3 computers will look nice together I've already been working on a space to put them.

vanpeebles · 5 Feb 2019 at 09:29

Have you looked at IDE DOMs? (disk on modules) I use one for IDE with my QL.

Retro6 · 11 Feb 2019 at 19:36

I keep hearing that CF cards are no good for installing early Windows operating systems to because of the swap file and due to the constant read and writes the CF card dies after a short while. Things like MS-DOS on a CF card is fine but for Windows operating systems that do not support trim CF cards are no good or any sort of SSD.

Some say its fine but others say its not, due to the swap file. :confused:

pingwing · 11 Feb 2019 at 19:39

You can disable swap file really easily and force it all into RAM or a proper HD’s with the control panel

almoststew1990 · 11 Feb 2019 at 21:45

How much is this PC honestly going to be used? Even if you use it for hundreds of hours and kill a CF card, they're cheap, plentiful and reliable enough that you can just... get another. I'd say its far riskier getting a small (old) HDD thats well past its sell by date compared to running a quality (or even basic) CF card for dozens of hours.

Retro6 · 12 Feb 2019 at 12:55

Is there a minimum amount of RAM you need to have to disable swap file? I got myself a nice old Dell Pentium 350MHZ the other day and I'm planing on installing Windows 95 on it, its missing its hard drive so I was thinking a Sandisk Extreme 8GB CF card will do the job providing the BIOS accepts it or I'll have to hunt down a working mechanical drive.

jellybeard999 · 13 Feb 2019 at 11:08

I've had success with an IDE to SATA adaptor, which plugs into the IDE connector on the motherboard and allows you to use a SATA cable. Just another option

eg

www.ebay.co.uk/ulk/itm/323607945269

Retro6 · 15 Feb 2019 at 00:37

jellybeard999 said:
I've had success with an IDE to SATA adaptor, which plugs into the IDE connector on the motherboard and allows you to use a SATA cable. Just another option

eg

www.ebay.co.uk/ulk/itm/323607945269

I'll be getting an IDE to SATA adapter I have an SSD 32GB SATA drive in a mini Linux build computer which already has one of those mini SSD's clipped into the motherboard so I'll just reinstall Linux on to that one and take out the other SATA SSD drive. I keep forgetting I have that, besides an SSD is probably better than a CF card.

With computers nothing is ever straight forward and I'll probably just go ahead with a Windows 98SE install as I think MS-DOS Windows 95 will see all 32GB I'm going to be installing Windows 95 to a 2GB CF card anyway so I can always swap between the two.

One issue that I hadn't taken into account is the hard drive limitations of the old machine BIOS...