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General discussion

How can I download a drive for a Win95 computer

Mar 15, 2004 4:13PM PST

I am working for a non-profit organization who teaches Literacy and ESOL to very poor individuals. We use old donated computers which use WIN95 and cannot be upgraded b/c they are not so big and only take WIN95. In addition, they were used by people who did not know much and when donated, we did not get anything, not even the WIN95 CD, no drives, nothing. I had to reformat all b/c they had corrupted files, and most programs were unusable. I got a WIN95 CD-ROM from a friend and managed to reformat & instal clean WIN95 but in the process I missed many files I had to skip b/c the installation Manager would ask for Floppy 9 or up to 12 and I didn't have any, therefore I had to skip the files. In one of these --which used to have sound and 256 color graphics-- became soundles and only 16 colors, but most programs do not work as they require these interfaces/programs. Most programs are with sounds and animations that teach students how to write and pronounce letters. I did a lot of things but nothing worked. A friend told me that probably I would have to dowload these drives from the Internet, which means I have to exactly know the name and info about the drive, and then download them in my own computer, as we don't have Internet in our place, or is not installed. This computer is a Pentium One, and that's about all info I have, an old box, not even a tower, which had installed Win95 and a lot of programs related with vocabulary-aided with animation and sound. Any idea as to what can I do to get the rite info? WIN95 is installed but if I go to the system manager, I find a lot of yellow ? (question marks) and do not know what to do. Neither do I profit if I start in Safe mode, as I do not know what to do when I am there. I have no books, no references, not even from Papa Microsoft who no longer support anything. Your help is greatly appreciated.
Thanks a lot.
Inkisitive
inkisitive@hotmail.com

Discussion is locked

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Re:How can I download a drive for a Win95 computer
Mar 15, 2004 5:44PM PST

1. You should be able to install a working Windows 95 from only the CD. The 'diskettes' the setup asks for are, in fact, contained on the CD. It seems to me your friend gave you a corrupt and unusable CD. Try to find another one on ebay.

2. For some devices (like graphic cards, if you want to use other features then what Windows 95 offers, some motherboards, network cards and the like) you'll need drivers from the makers, if they aren't on the CD. It is doubtful if you still can get these from Internet, and you should certainly have to know all details from the hardware, which you'll find impossible most of the time, I'm afraid.

3. If these were originally Windows 95 computers, it might be possible to use Windows 98 on them. You would need to buy CD's with licenses, of course. Ebay might be of help here also.

Hope this helps.

Kees

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Re:How can I download a drive for a Win95 computer
Mar 16, 2004 12:05AM PST