How do I determine which version of Win98 on this system? If I have overlooked the obvious answer to this question, please forgive me. If this info is already available on this site, I will gladly search for it. However, I am not sure how to query this question. Thanks in advance for your help. :

Right Click 'My Computer', Select 'Properties'
Should be right there under 'System:'

Thanks for the response miko. I believe that I have asked the wrong question. What I should have asked is how can I tell which version of Win98, Win98a , Win98b, or Win98se? I may have found the answer here http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=36228. I knew that I should have read more before posting, but I get lazy. Thanks again. To mods. Should I edit first post or go to sleep?

if you have look at this -
http://www.mdgx.com/ver.htm
and compare the number in the location i told you
you'll get what you were after nailed
so for example '4.10.2222 A' for 98SE
(although it also says 'Second Edition' in this case btw)
there are other methods on the linked page as well.

If you want/need to stay with '98 and you Don't have /SE as of yet.....
It's well worth your time and effort to see if you can find an '98/SE upgrade CD and do the upgrade. It can also be done quite easily with a '98/SE OEM CD as well. Just a couple of more steps involved to fake out the OEM CD and get it to load without any error messages. lol

SE comes with greatly improved USB support and greater printer support as well as fixing quite a few bugs in ol' 98.

Installing the unofficial SP1 to your install of 98/SE finishes the job.

Finally, to put the polish-on-the-paint,,, you will want to install the latest DirectX and Internet Explorer 6.0/Sp1. The upgrade to I.E. 6.0/Sp1 is best done from the CD aquired directly from MS.

For instance,,,,most Flash drives will not work at all on ol' 98,,,,but work with drivers- loaded on SE.

My own software guru does this upgrade to SE all the time using an OEM CD and it works great.

Have a go at it mate!

Better printer support? OK, perhaps better than the 98-first ed. but otherwise unimpressive. Every time we attach the dot matrix printer (for infrequent, special purposes for which it is more appropriate than the network-attached PostScript-laser) and try to use it, 98SE says something about a time out, asking whether to "retry" or "cancel". Guess which you have to choose to get it to work. Even when only using the regular printer (the network laser), the print queue applet has a tendency to crash (fortunately not bringing the whole system down).

As for USB, Windows insists on attempting to dig that up although it's disabled in the BIOS. The same goes for the IDE controller.

On the other hand, I'm positively surprised at how easy getting the Firewire card to work, and the apparently flawless functioning of the flash (xD) memory card reader attached to it. It didn't even ask for drivers.



Is there a particular reason (other than convenience), for doing an upgrade rather than a fresh install?

Thank you all for your help. The system was for an older couple and they already know there way around Win98 comfortably. So I changed as little as possible. Their problem was not with operating system, but too much garbage on their system. An old Gateway P200, with 1.2 gb HD, with a 1gb compressed partition, (a disaster waiting to happen). Their system must have been put together when hard drives were really expensive and small. I put together some of my left over parts and they now they are in heaven. This cost me nothing and I cleaned up some of my pile o' computer stuff. I charged them one peach cobbler for my time. Thanks again.

Only a non-tech would ask a question like that.

"why upgrade instead of doing a clean install"

If you have all the driver disks laying there for all the hardware in the system, then by all means do a clean install. But if you don't and want to avoid spending countless hours on the internet chasing drivers, you do an upgrade, or even several upgrades till you get to where you're going.
You may wind up replacing a modem, but that's about it.

[/QUOTE]This cost me nothing and I cleaned up some of my pile o' computer stuff. I charged them one peach cobbler for my time. Thanks again.[QUOTE]

I hope you got some whipped cream with that.....

Sounds like a labor of love.

God Bless,
Andromeda43

I'm terribly sorry.....no one including myself ever did give the best answer to your original question. And it's so very simple.

Here's how I do it.
Click Start
Click Settings
Click Control Panel
Click System
.... Now, right there on the screen in front of you is the General tab from the System folder. At the top right of that window is the Windows version information. Further down the right side is your CPU make and sometimes even the size/speed.
Right below that is the amount of RAM memory that's installed in your PC.
If it says some odd number like 124 megs....that means that 4 megs is being used for the on-board Video circuit. If the number is a nice round 64, 128 or 256, that means that your computer is using a discreat plug-in video card.

Sorry,,,,,when I made my last post, I didn't realize that your first question had not been thoroughly answered.

Cheers,
Andromeda43