[Multibooter]

Multibooter, on Apr 28 2008, 09:13 PM, said:

Did anybody find 2GB-memory-bugs in other Win98 software? It might be useful to set up a list of software running bug-free, and software which is buggy/unreliable with 2GB.

The Advanced Troubleshooting Settings page of the MS System Configuration Utility msconfig.exe is problematic with 2GB of RAM:

If you make ANY changes on this page [e.g. about ScanDisk] & then click Apply - Ok:

If the entry "Limiting memory to (max.possible:) 999MB" was selected: this will cause a change in System.ini
- the previous entry for MaxPhysPage will be remmed out: ;Rem TShoot MaxPhysPage=48000
- a new entry will be put into System.ini, e.g. MaxPhysPage=3E6FF
- there is NO notification by the system about the change in available memory, RAM will be reduced to 999MB
and a week later you may ask yourself: "Why did the additional 250MB of RAM disappear?"

If the entry "Limiting memory to (max.possible:) 999MB" was NOT selected
- in System.ini the previous entry for MaxPhysPage=48000 will be deleted by the system
- you will not be able to boot into Win98 anymore [until you re-enter under DOS the value of MaxPhysPage in System.ini]

LIST OF SOFTWARE WITH ISSUES WHEN 2GB OF MEMORY ARE INSTALLED:
Fast Defrag v2.30 [by AMS] cannot use automatic memory cleanup because of 2 err msgs after each cleanup
msconfig.exe changes in Advanced Troubleshooting Settings either delete MaxPhysPage entry or replaces it with 999MB, without notification
xmsdsk [RAMdisk software] when using the RAMdisk for the swapfile; when running programs from RAMdisk (e.g. games)

This post has been edited by Multibooter: 23 May 2008 - 03:21 AM

[rloew]

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LIST OF SOFTWARE WITH ISSUES WHEN 2GB OF MEMORY ARE INSTALLED:
Fast Defrag v2.30 [by AMS] cannot use automatic memory cleanup because of 2 err msgs after each cleanup
msconfig.exe changes in Advanced Troubleshooting Settings either delete MaxPhysPage entry or replaces it with 999MB, without notification
xmsdsk [RAMdisk software] when using the RAMdisk for the swapfile; when running programs from RAMdisk (e.g. games)

I tested Fast Defrag 2.3.1 (reports 2.3) with my Patch to see if the problem was memory or the MaxPhysPage workaround.
I did not get error messages but the Cleaning Command would not display it's wait message and would never complete when there was too much memory.
Between 1280MB and 1664MB it would work once. With 1664MB or more RAM, it would never work.
This indicates that Fast Defrag has a problem handling large amounts of RAM.

The other two Programs have problems when used as a workaround. These problems do not exist when using my Patch instead of a workaround.
The problems are not related to the amount of memory.
My Patch enables all RAM to be used so MaxPhysPage is not needed. This eliminates the issue with MSCONFIG.EXE
Since the Patch enables all RAM to be used, there is no reason to use XMSDSK for Swap since better performance would be obtained by disabling Swap entirely.

[Mijzelf]

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I have developed true 48 Bit versions of my Patches and a couple of workarounds to enable Windows 98 to utilize up to 52TB.

Doesn't W9x use a 32 bit sectoraddress internally?

[rloew]

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Doesn't W9x use a 32 bit sectoraddress internally?

Device Drivers such as IOS.VXD and ESDI_506.PDR use 64-Bit Sector Arguments. The Interrupt 13 Extensions (DOS) also use 64-Bit Sector Numbers.
The existing ESDI_506.PDR files, including LLXX's version and my High Capacity Disk Patch, ignore the upper 32 Bits.
I created versions of my High Capacity Disk Patch and BOOTMAN Overlay to use the additional 16 Bits supported by the 48-Bit LBA Protocol.

The IO.SYS and VFAT.VXD Filesystem Drivers use 32 Bits. I altered the way Logical Sector Numbers are mapped to Physical Sector Numbers. This allowed me to create Partitions of up to 2TB starting above the 2TB limit. 24 Partitions can be defined to provide a total space of 48TB.

It may be possible to redo Cluster mapping. If so, the size of a single Partition could be increased to at least 32TB using 256 Sectors per Cluster.
I have already developed Patches for IO.SYS and VFAT.VXD that support 256 Sectors per Cluster.

This post has been edited by rloew: 27 May 2008 - 11:40 PM

[vick1111]

Rloew Memory patch
_____________________

I have tried the memory patch of Rloew without success.
I have a windows98SE italian version.
It works only on english version?

CORRECTION
__________________
Ok after reading the post (following this one) of rloew I tried the demo patch again in the new version and it allowed me to see 2Gb of RAM on win98se. I started some programs in the 10 minutes and everythings seemed to work fine.

I am not buyng now this patch cause 1 GB of Ram is enough to cover all my memory needs for now in win98.

I encourage rloew to write some documentation about how he solved the problem. This documentation could be more valuable than the code in itself.


(Anyway I guess there can be a way of making monney out of it for him if he decide to give out code as open source. Any suggestion or comment? )

This post has been edited by vick1111: 29 May 2008 - 05:31 AM

[rloew]

Quote

Rloew Memory patch
_____________________

I have tried the memory patch of Rloew without success.
I have a windows98SE italian version.
It works only on english version?

Try the latest version 5.0. The older versions only supported English versions of Windows.

I assume you got an error trying to install it. If the error occurred during use, please PM me.

[RetroOS]

rloew, on May 28 2008, 04:27 PM, said:

...
Device Drivers such as IOS.VXD and ESDI_506.PDR use 64-Bit Sector Arguments. The Interrupt 13 Extensions (DOS) also use 64-Bit Sector Numbers.
...
The IO.SYS and VFAT.VXD Filesystem Drivers use 32 Bits...

Thanks for the info. Very interesting!
Obviously someone at Microsoft had a little forward thinking! (except for IO.SYS and VFAT.VXD...)

[Multibooter]

vick1111, on May 28 2008, 04:43 AM, said:

Rloew Memory patch: ... I have a windows98SE italian version.... everythings seemed to work fine.

First of all, congratulations to rloew that the patch has become more generic. The real test that it works with international versions of Windows 98 would be if it also works with Arabic Win98.

vick1111, on May 28 2008, 04:43 AM, said:

I am not buyng now this patch cause 1 GB of Ram is enough to cover all my memory needs for now in win98.

Here a question to rloew: Which Win98 applications or combinations of applications benefit particularly by having 2GB rather than 1GB of RAM? What's the benefit of having 2GB of RAM available? How about some benchmarks? How does eMule on Win98 run under heavy load with 2GB vs 1GB?

[Mijzelf]

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Which Win98 applications or combinations of applications benefit particularly by having 2GB rather than 1GB of RAM?

Applications using lots of memory. I don't think eMule is one of them. Video and photo editing and things like that.
AFAIK in most cases people want to use that amounts of memory because they have a dual boot system with a more demanding OS.

[rloew]

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First of all, congratulations to rloew that the patch has become more generic. The real test that it works with international versions of Windows 98 would be if it also works with Arabic Win98.

Arabic should not be a problem. DBCS versions such as Chinese were more of a challenge.

Quote

Here a question to rloew: Which Win98 applications or combinations of applications benefit particularly by having 2GB rather than 1GB of RAM? What's the benefit of having 2GB of RAM available? How about some benchmarks? How does eMule on Win98 run under heavy load with 2GB vs 1GB?

Image and Video editing, some mathematical programs, etc. Combinations of programs only increase the need for memory. Where possible, I use 3GB of RAM or more to get additional benefit. I don't know of any Benchmarking program suitable to test this. I haven't used EMule, although I suspect it is more network intensive than memory intensive.

Quote

Applications using lots of memory. I don't think eMule is one of them. Video and photo editing and things like that.
AFAIK in most cases people want to use that amounts of memory because they have a dual boot system with a more demanding OS.

Many are only interested in compatability so they often use the workarounds such as MaxPhysPage. Unfortunately these workarounds don't work in Safe Mode.

[Multibooter]

Mijzelf, on May 31 2008, 05:13 AM, said:

AFAIK in most cases people want to use that amounts of memory because they have a dual boot system with a more demanding OS.

Yes. In a multiboot-system it is essential that the older opsys can function with the newer hardware. Whether Win98 actually can use the additional memory is of secondary importance.

[Multibooter]

rloew, on May 31 2008, 08:24 AM, said:

Arabic should not be a problem

Microsoft had a lot of problems with the Arabic version. If I remember right, there are 3 families of Windows 98: Western, Arabic and Chinese.

Quote

Image and Video editing, some mathematical programs, etc..

WinXP is superior to Win98 in these areas. Other areas where WinXP applications are preferrable include burning CDs/DVDs (better burn quality); defragmentation of FAT-cum-NTSF disks. Eventually most of my Win98 applications will migrate to WinXP, with one general exception: applications which access the Internet will stay with Win98.

Quote

I haven't used EMule, although I suspect it is more network intensive than memory intensive.

Under Win98 a heavily loaded mule (e.g. 1200-1700 files in the download list, max 99 simultaneous connections, max 400 sources, max 5000 sharers in the queue) uses all system resources to the extreme. Running a second application will very often cause the mule under Win98 to crash within a couple of hours, otherwise it runs from 3 to 10 days before crashing. I remember increasing RAM from 256 to 512MB made the mule run days longer under Win98 before crashing (there is a memory leakage problem) and allowed substantial increases in the number of files in the download list and of the max.number of sources, effectively increasing the GBs/day.

The mule is running day and night, so using an old laptop which doesn't make any noise seems the best choice. Desktops are just too noisy and too energy-inefficient. This raises the next question: Does anybody have Win98 running on a LAPTOP with 2GB of RAM? Which make and model?

[rloew]

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Microsoft had a lot of problems with the Arabic version. If I remember right, there are 3 families of Windows 98: Western, Arabic and Chinese

I requested a copy of VMM.VXD in Arabic. It Patched without any problem.

Quote

Under Win98 a heavily loaded mule (e.g. 1200-1700 files in the download list, max 99 simultaneous connections, max 400 sources, max 5000 sharers in the queue) uses all system resources to the extreme. Running a second application will very often cause the mule under Win98 to crash within a couple of hours, otherwise it runs from 3 to 10 days before crashing. I remember increasing RAM from 256 to 512MB made the mule run days longer under Win98 before crashing (there is a memory leakage problem) and allowed substantial increases in the number of files in the download list and of the max.number of sources, effectively increasing the GBs/day.

Then the extra RAM would probably help. You can test compatabilty with the Demo for 10 Minutes.

I am working on a RAMDISK that will utilize the 64-Bit RAM in AMD based Computers with 4GB of RAM or more.

[Drugwash]

It takes more than 10 minutes for eMule to get fully loaded with all sources and UL/DL connections.

I've always used FreeRAM XP Pro memory manager on my machines (and still do, as I only have 256MB RAM currently). Never had eMule crashing for lack of RAM but also never had it running for 3 days or more in a row - system gets slown down for as much as having Windows system clock running hours late.

[rloew]

Quote

've always used FreeRAM XP Pro memory manager on my machines (and still do, as I only have 256MB RAM currently). Never had eMule crashing for lack of RAM but also never had it running for 3 days or more in a row - system gets slown down for as much as having Windows system clock running hours late.

I have seen the same clock problem with Azureus even with 3GB of RAM. I generally don't run it for more than a day at a time without rebooting.

[RetroOS]

I don't recall seeing the clock problem... But I find that if I run BitTorrent client for more than a day, Windows starts to become unstable and the longer I leave it, the more likely it will crash on me.
Rebooting once a day when using BitTorrent works fine.
I'll have to look out for the clock drift...

[dencorso]

RetroOS, on Jun 10 2008, 06:09 AM, said:

I don't recall seeing the clock problem... But I find that if I run BitTorrent client for more than a day, Windows starts to become unstable and the longer I leave it, the more likely it will crash on me.
Rebooting once a day when using BitTorrent works fine.
I'll have to look out for the clock drift...

Neither do I... I'll be paying attention to it also. I've let either eMule or uTorrent run for just under two days in a row many times. Sometimes Win 98SE freezes some time after the first day, but most often it will go on working OK and shut down beautifully at the end. However, every time it's already running for more than one day, if I subject it to heavy browser usage together with the running P2P it freezes quite fast. Rebooting once a day prevents these problems and is the sensible way of doing it, of course. I also have run eMule and uTorrent concomitantly many times, but never for more than about 8 h, without any perceptible problem, although two P2P clients working at the same time leave browsing somewhat irresponsive and, in particular, uploading files becomes terribly slow (but that's because I use ADSL, of course).

[Multibooter]

rloew, on Jun 9 2008, 01:36 AM, said:

Then the extra RAM would probably help. You can test compatabilty with the Demo for 10 Minutes.

I'll be in Europe until September. After that I'll run a test of the uptime of eMule under Win98 with 512MB, then with 1150MB of available RAM. If the increase in available memory from 512 to 1150MB indicates a significant increase in eMule uptime under Win98, I'll buy your patch. By the way, for getting a quick look at the uptime of a dedicated computer running only eMule, I am using a nice little piece of freeware by Donald Leavitt called Uptime http://home1.gte.net...ime/uptime.html

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I am working on a RAMDISK that will utilize the 64-Bit RAM in AMD based Computers with 4GB of RAM or more.

I am not sure a large RAMDISK would help eMule. The critical directory is that of the temporary files, which is huge. I have put the Temp files onto a separate 2nd internal 80 GB HDD. The size of this directory is currently around 60GB. eMule can get around the 127GB HDD limit, it lets you define multiple harddisks for temporary files http://www.emule-project.net/home/perl/hel...mp;topic_id=112 An old dedicated eMule laptop of mine (Inspiron 7500) can have up to 3 internal HDDs, so a max. of 240-360 GB of space for temporary files should be enough for the next couple of years.

[Multibooter]

Drugwash, on Jun 9 2008, 07:12 AM, said:

It takes more than 10 minutes for eMule to get fully loaded with all sources and UL/DL connections.

My experience has been a minimum of 30 minutes and about 2-3 hours to get the mule going, but with a large download list (about 1200 files).

Quote

I've always used FreeRAM XP Pro memory manager on my machines (and still do, as I only have 256MB RAM currently). Never had eMule crashing for lack of RAM but also never had it running for 3 days or more in a row - system gets slown down for as much as having Windows system clock running hours late.

I just checked, uptime is currently 1 day 5hrs and the system clock is 24 minutes late.
Added: uptime is currently 2 days 8 hours, system clock is 26 minutes late, very little download activity, maybe 0.5GB in last 24hrs
Added: uptime is currently 4 days 1hr, system clock is 33 min late

This post has been edited by Multibooter: 16 June 2008 - 04:20 PM

[Multibooter]

dencorso, on Jun 10 2008, 01:02 PM, said:

I also have run eMule and uTorrent concomitantly many times, but never for more than about 8 h, without any perceptible problem, although two P2P clients working at the same time leave browsing somewhat irresponsive and, in particular, uploading files becomes terribly slow

The best solution is running eMule on a dedicated old computer. I gave up on Azureus & uTorrent because they don't provide additional downloads and conflict with eMule, under Win98 at least.

Uptime >3 days is helpful for downloading rare files, sources are not always online, and queues may be very long. eMulePlus had an option to save/load sources, but not eMule, as far as I know, but since Kademlia has become the major network, eMulePlus is out.