In-game debug tool?

XP was actually released 25th October 2001 but as with any of their operating systems, takes years to iron most of the bugs. I hope they do release the SC, just to stop us moaning but i’m not holding my breath lol

lol would love to see bill gates

“GRRR! STUPID PROGRAMMERS!!! THE ONLY THING THEY EVER MADE ACTUALLY WORKING IS XP!”

Yeah, you look back at the footprint of '95 and '98 compared to the heaping, lopsided, greedy Vista’s 1GB… I definitely miss those days with only a fraction of the useless sh!t running in the background that we have now. Touch up the interface to be all round n stuff like XP, make it 64bit and flat memory addressing, and bam better than Win7 -which is really only Vista with a bunch of useless junk removed - though you can guess there’s still plenty of useless junk.

QQ I’d be all for going full on xNix but there’s just not enough driver support and base of games. It is however, nice to have endless free programs available.

hmmm lol, i didnt have that experience with win 95 and win 98, they meant reinstall every 2 week, and XP is reinstall every 8 month lol

Hrm, yeah I seem to have forgotten what a BSOD looks like since I’ve been running XP. Well, actually I got my first one in… years, while playing a game and using Windows Media Player 9 classic, like 2 days ago. But yeah, reliability goes to XP for sure. Footprint -as expected, goes to 95/98.

i got reminded what a BSOD is when i switched to vista on my laptop

Hi guys, sorry for the late bump, but I just registered today. and am perusing the forums.

An observation (or 2), and a query. I’ve been playing with computers since the Sinclair/Timex Z80, circa mid '80’s. (Couldn’t afford a Commodore64.) Anyone remember 300 baud modems? Currently have 4 networked PC’s, 3 running Win98SE, and a 4th with Win95 (a shame the monitor died).

I still use DOS programs. I hexedit in it. The only text editor I know of that lets me select text in a box is a DOS program.

Frankly, I seldom see a BSOD, cause I keep the machines pretty clean. Freelancer and many other games run well on them. I’ve even got the .NET (I think v1.2?) running without problems.

More and more, though, I find developer’s (both pro and non-pro) neglecting any kind of backward compatibility. I appreciate the allure of using the latest greatest developer’s tools. I’m a little sad, though that some of the modding tools being developed today (not just for Freelancer) require XP or better, or .NET v2.0, or Java whatever, just to install, before you can even get to a readme file.

I play Simcity4. Love it. New, great tool comes out. Everyone loves it, “ya’ gotta get it!” Multi-mbyte download, run install .exe, can’t install errors, crash. Dig through forums, others have problem, developer says, try this, that. People can’t make work. Did some more digging. Requires XP to install, requires XP to run. Contact developer, ask if tested on 98SE, “No, don’t have access to one.” Asked if he could update file description to advise others it is XP and beyond only. Wasn’t interested, didn’t bother.

I own an still-sealed copy of XP. Bought last copy at Staples, when M$ said they would no longer support 98SE. Not planning to install it anytime soon for a couple of reasons I won’t go into here.

My point: Freelancer is an old game. In the forums I see much wailing and gnashing of teeth about the players dropping off, the community dying. But there are many, many of us out here just now discovering it for the first time. Many of us, also, are running older machines & OS’s out of either necessity or choice. Please don’t forget or neglect us, we might surprise you.

All that being said, my query (apologies if OT): I’ve long been wary about installing XP on my PC, a) because of the stupid activation/registration process/limits; and b) I don’t have the capability to make sure everything I have on this machine is 100% backed up. Any thoughts or comments on the perils of upgrading the OS, should I choose to finally do it?

I’ll just say that '98 is nothing short of ancient and that unless all your computers were built pre-2000, you’re probably not taking advantage of their capabilities.

If you are scared of losing your data, I’d just suggest buying a second hard drive and either making the old one a slave drive or even putting the old one in an external enclosure so it doubles as offline backup storage. Then you can safely get Win XP on the new drive without any chance of losing your data bar hardware failure (which wouldn’t be related to Windows XP in any case).

Otherwise, your 4 networked computers should provide ample space to keep any data in them.

As for activation, I haven’t heard about that many issues with it. Vista’s is far more drastic.

@FriendlyFire:

I’ll just say that '98 is nothing short of ancient and that unless all your computers were built pre-2000, you’re probably not taking advantage of their capabilities.

If you are scared of losing your data, I’d just suggest buying a second hard drive and either making the old one a slave drive or even putting the old one in an external enclosure so it doubles as offline backup storage. Then you can safely get Win XP on the new drive without any chance of losing your data bar hardware failure (which wouldn’t be related to Windows XP in any case).

Otherwise, your 4 networked computers should provide ample space to keep any data in them.

As for activation, I haven’t heard about that many issues with it. Vista’s is far more drastic.

I appreciate the spirit of what you are saying. (If I were the sensitive type, I could take offense at something 11 yrs. old being called ancient. I was already in my 30’s in those Z80 days. Has anyone here even heard of it? 2Kb memory, cassete storage, TV monitor, $29.95 US at K-Mart? 300 baud modems? Anyway, you do the math. Old doesn’t neccessarily mean decrepit.)

And yes, all my machines are all pre-2000. And I’ve spent a lot of time maximizing their capabilities. Not the point. Try doing a batch file rename in Windows, without writing a program. I don’t believe it’s possible. It’s a simple command line in DOS using wildcards. Using 4Dos, I even have long file name support, so I’m not limited to the “8.3” DOS names. My system as it stands supports just about everything I would normally need to do on a day to day basis.

I understand that developers need bigger better tools to do bigger better tasks. I’m just asking that, while they are coding the the next great modders app, they at least try to keep backward compatibility in mind. It’s very frustrating to read glowing descriptions of a tool, dl say a 2MB installer .exe without a readme, hope the installer doesn’t do something weird to the registry, breathe a sigh of relief when it doesn’t, find a readme (or not) in the app’s folder, then discover you need to go to Micro$ucks to dl 10-20-100 MB of the latest greatest OS update that may or may not be of any benefit to anything but that app.

I don’t want to rant, just trying to make an observation. Take it for what it’s worth or ignore it. Your choice.

On the XP issue, 'fraid all my drives are packed to the rafters. Sometimes I have to make the difficult choice to delete something to make room for something else. And yes, the economics of new equipment is an issue.

My major concern is not so much losing data, 'cause all most everything could possibly be re-created. I’m more concerned with issues involving installed apps, and whether I’m going to have to spend weeks re-installing so they and XP co-operate. Just how seamless is the XP installation
in that regard?

**Ok, to speak from a programmers side of things.

Support for '95 & '98 would be great for us, it would mean our tools would work on older machines. Problem is our programming tools of choice do not allow that. They depend on the SDKs they are provided with. In the past few years since XP has come out all support for older Windows versions have been dropped in favor of new layouts. Unfortunately for us that meant either we upgraded our code or it no longer would compile. In those cases you would need to get an older version which will no longer be supported or upgrade your Windows to support the new features. Even I haven’t been immune to this. This also means you would most likely need to upgrade your hardware to something more recent.

What we are trying to say is backwards compatibility is a very slim chance, we just aren’t able to offer what we are not allowed to build…**

@Lancer:

**Ok, to speak from a programmers side of things.

Support for '95 & '98 would be great for us, it would mean our tools would work on older machines. Problem is our programming tools of choice do not allow that. They depend on the SDKs they are provided with.**

I understand and appreciate what you are saying, LS. I just find it sad that perfectly adequate, functional OS’s get kicked to the curb, 'cause they are not “young & hip”. Wrong demographic, I guess. Still, do all your tools come from M$? If not, aren’t the SDK’s being written by other programmers, who could appreciate the value of backward compatibilty. Can’t you, as the “customer” in this case, and others like you, make a case to your tool suppliers for just this kind of capability?

Well, I won’t harangue you any longer. But, hey, next time you talk to another programmer or developer, consider broaching what I’ve said. You may find your “customer” base could be a whole lot broader.

Hehe, actually I am alot like you, I did NOT want to change my code, I was forced to do it. I have been around since the Z80s, 6502, Altairs and others and it seems about once a decade I have to rewrite most of my base code to be able to use newer versions of my programming language (C++) in Visual Studio. And yes, it’s a MS product.

;D ;D ;D
… so that was the 1st ‘computer’ i got my hand on,
please let me throw 1 1/2 cent about “old” in:
Old is not necessary ‘good’ or even ‘better’.

And if you got the choice to trade that baby
which pulls ‘portable’ to it’s own dimension,
in against on oth those NEW note- or netbooks,
you might want to take that chance.

In conclusion i think support 4 win95 or 98
might be nice

• but it could be pretty much wasted time 2 work on this.
  Might make more sens 2 waste work on that stuff:
  http://the-starport.net/index.php?option=com_smf&Itemid=26&topic=1671.msg14976

@F!R:

;D ;D ;D
… so that was the 1st ‘computer’ i got my hand on,
please let me throw 1 1/2 cent about “old” in:
Old is not necessary ‘good’ or even ‘better’.

And if you got the choice to trade that baby
which pulls ‘portable’ to it’s own dimension,
in against on oth those NEW note- or netbooks,
you might want to take that chance.

In conclusion i think support 4 win95 or 98
might be nice

• but it could be pretty much wasted time 2 work on this.
  Might make more sens 2 waste work on that stuff:
  http://the-starport.net/index.php?option=com_smf&Itemid=26&topic=1671.msg14976

Nice historical reference, F!R, but didn’t Osborne beat them to the punch on that? I remember drooling over a magazine article on the Osborne back in the wild & wooly days.

And you know, I have a still-sealed copy of Red Hat I bought years ago. But at my age, it just seems like so much work, to try to get up to speed on all of that. Guess I’m turning into a fogie.

Melwoc, they (them thar Out Thair) ain’t gonna go backwards for anyone.

I’m still resisting Vista and its due for another advance in 1-2 years max.

I went to XP only after resisting it for 3 years.

Now everyone’s plugging and running dual core cpus which is what we used to use for servers serving hundreds of online users. Our mainframe computer running an entire airline’s realtime booking system had 5 MB of memory and about 1Gbyte of hard disk capacity in a room about a quarter of a football pitch, and could boot to online status in the same time as a blooming PC which we used as dumb terminals in those days.

It’s gone because everyone out there wants nicer colours and pictures on their screens.

And of course Intel needs to keep their factory running and so does Microsoft. So between them they encourage forward development and kill backward compatibility. Nobody understands the PC anymore, they just use it and want finer graphics, more colours, bigger screens, faster performance and overall better looks. Its become a consumable like the TV and games console.

My advice is keep what you have for your own satisfaction, and get just one updated machine, maybe a new(er) one, to know what everyone else is doing. But disks are cheap today, you need to rush to get one less than 500GB these days, they won’t be around for long. So cost is not a big issue any more. I can get a new desktop complete for about $600 (no I don’t want one, mine is about 5 years old and still fast enough to type with!). And I’m sticking with my 80GB disk and 1GB Ram, it’s plenty for what I do.

Years ago when you and I started out, we were told that one day computers would give us a life of leisure, and we were optimistically looking forward to wearing disposable cream-coloured clothing, taking automatic surface transport cars to where we want to go, surrounded by grassy hills and living in clear sunshine with machines doing everything around us. But nobody told us who will pay us to be idle, did they?

Here we are. We have saturated because of over-production of consumer goods such as cars and computers. Industries will also continue to slowly kill themselves because less and less people will be able to buy now that they are losing those jobs.

So who cares about Windows 98/95, or trojans or viruses or back-enders? Turn the bloody thing off and you’re safe at night! ;D

Go buy a new PC while you are still working and can afford one. ;D

Uh…

What was this thread about anyway? :?

Hijack? What’s that? ;D

Well, as I recall, I was reading it to learn about those key assignments. Somebody brought up XP vs. Vista, and was mildly derogatory to my beloved 98SE (sniff…, hanky please?) I suppose that makes me the hijacker, 'cause I started moaning about ‘bells & whistles’ modding tools. Sorry, all.

StarTrader, sad to say, I understand and agree with all you said. Starting to feel like a turn-of-the century buggy whip manufacturer. We used to call it “Planned Obsolescence”. Nowadays, I guess its “Keeping the Economy Afloat”.

I would like to get a bigger drive. Locally, its getting hard to find IDE drives. For the moment, I’m trying to archive on zipdisks, and CDs.

We’re looking into a new machine for the wife, she wants to do some part-time secretarial service. I might get something with a huge drive, and partition it off for my archive. Course, then we get into other issues, she’ll need reasonably current versions of the appropriate business apps, etc. The costs escalate.

My personal pet peeve? Disposable plastic packaging and pointless plastic junk ought to have HEFTY taxes on them. Cut the oil use, and empty the landfills.

@melwoc: Have you seen the KernelEx project? It aims to provide support for newer XP/2000 only programs on ME/98.

Well the cost of add-on software is manageable while we have OpenOffice.org, it’s free and does everything that MS Office does, except for macros which are a bit different, and the best thing is that it opens and saves MS Word, MS Excel, MS PowerPoint files.

So you don’t need to go MS Office unless you areheavily dependent on MS macros.

Eventually I will go entirely Linux with OpenOffice.

Anyway, let’s give this thread back to its owner’s subject - 'scuse us, chaps.