swordsman30457

I know windows 98 doesn't support flash drives and you can download drivers for them. Is there some kind of program that can make the flash drives work like they do in win XP. What i am talking about is being able to stop the device so you can remove it. I know there is an eject option whe you right click on the removable device but that doesn't seem to work. Any help would be helpful.

Bartender

The only option I'm aware of in Win98 is the right-click>"Eject" option. Why are you thinking it doesn't work with your thumb drive? Does your thumb drive have a light on it, and does the light go out after you click "Eject"?

swordsman30457

that's the thing, when i right click and eject, the light on any of my flash drives doesn't go out. I just don't want to lose my data.

OldGrayGary

Hi all


Try the website of your USB flash-drive's manufacturer. Some have system tray utilities for Windows 98 (along with "drivers" for the key itself) that can provide the "Safely Remove Hardware" type of plug-in/removal that Windows XP has built-in.

Here's the catch: usually these only work for Windows 98 2nd Edition.

Here's the next catch: many flash-drive vendors no longer support Windows 98 (any version), and have stopped providing any Win9x help whatsoever.

Here's one more catch: regardless of the flash-drive utility you might use, you will still need to have a good driver for the USB 1.1 or USB 2.0 controller on your motherboard (or on your add-in PCI card).

To see what hoops you may need to jump through: this thread over on Expert's Exchange describes a wild chase for Win98se drivers for a Kingston USB flash-drive --- it wasn't easy, but they succeeded in the end --- http://www.experts-exchange.com/Hard..._21997675.html --- note: scroll and scroll and scroll downward on that page & you'll see the replies in readable condition: you don't have to subscribe or become a member there to read the solution [it just looks that way at first].

Best of luck!
. . . Gary

Bartender

Yeah, I didn't think of that, Win98 is going to be tougher than Win98SE. Win98 had virtually no USB support. SE had some USB support and you're more likely to find drivers at the thumb drive website for that OS.

andyenglish

That's right. 98 really doesn't have much more support than 95. It wasn't until SE that things started catching up with the 'new' technology; i.e. USB. If you're intent on staying with Win98, do yourself a favor and upgrade to SE. It really is a great OS, and you'll need it more and more into the future.
Besides, everytime you install a new plug-in, 98 needs a process running to display the system tray icon. Better to use Microsoft's built in USB support than the external add-ons.
What system are you running 98 on? If it's even just a 166Mhz, it'll run 98SE quite well, depending on your RAM.
Good Luck!
-Andy

Bartender

I don't know if it's proper to lurk on the Windows forums trying to entice people over to Linux, but before I bought Win98SE I'd sure think about trying any modern Linux distro - they all recognize thumb drives just fine

sandman55

I know its a pain but if the light doesn't go out I would shut down the computer and then remove it.

andyenglish

Everyone says this is dangerous, but I just wait for the light to go out and just yank the drive. (I'm kind of a computer barbarian like that.)
Just make sure your thumbdrive is backed up from time to time, as with everything else.
-Andy

Justalilhelp

I've never used the safe eject on any computer. I just pull the drive out and never have had data loss.

andyenglish

I've had some corrupted data once, but as long as the computer is not accessing the drive, it should be safe to just yank it out.
-Andy