Majorgeeks.com has posted a link to an unofficial independent release of a Service Pack for Windows 98SE. While it does introduce some fixes and additional support, it is important to note that this is not official software.
Unofficial Win98 SE Service Pack
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Er, how are we supposed to trust this unofficial 98SE service pack? It doesn’t come from Microsoft, so who’s to say it won’t have some trojan horse/virus/worm in it? I think I’ll keep updating 98SE via Windows Update thank you (there was just a fix recently for IE6 SP1, so they haven’t quite abandoned updating it yet…).
http://exuberant.ms11.net/98sesp.html this is the offical site, it’s been around for ages(though i think this may be a new version, last i saw it was 1.2) and works great (some of my friends use 98se….)
Er, how are we supposed to trust this unofficial 98SE service pack?
You can’t really trust any software, be it from a major proprietary vendor, or from an open source one. It all boils down to using which you mistrust the least I guess, while still being able to do the things that you have to do.
If you don’t trust this software run a spy checker (ie SpyBot) and a full virus scan before you install the software. Run them again after. Imagine that would tell you if it installs any garbage?
If you are only deploying for yourself forget about it.. you probably already have all that crap anyway. But for deploying to a large quantity of machines makes this look like a huge time saver. I think it’s worth the few minutes to verify it’s clean just to save on having to do windows updates on the 400+ machine’s I support that are still on 98SE.
2 cents
I take it then you never downloaded something online and installed it since it might be infected? Wow. Tell me, how do you deal with all those Flash sites?
/sarcasm off
Package is more than welcome tool for anyone still messing around with frequent Win98SE installations.
It’s excellent “single-shot” updater and it works well.Exuberant software ( Win98 updater maker ) clearly stated it is “unofficial” , recomends system backup before updating OS and has clear disclaimer.
Ten Mb file has all OS related patches ( it does not updates IE browser)and comes to us as a great tool for all people still hesitant to abandon Win98 OS in its end of the
life cycle (read : official Microsoft support ).
But can you really trust the spy checker and the antivirus software either?
You can trust Open Source because you have access to the source code and if you really need to you or someone else can review it and then compile it from source.
“You can trust Open Source because you have access to the source code and if you really need to you or someone else can review it and then compile it from source.”
Yes yes lovely, ever tried reading through the gecko rendering engine? Reading other peoples’ code takes a lot of time and effort.
I’m all about open source, but the many eyes argument isn’t fool proof. A better argument would be the pride argument (the risk of people finding out is not worth the damage to ones repution). Another excellent point to make would be that propietary companies are about money, and if their is money in including a trojan they will do it.
As for virus scanning, it only works on known viruses. A patch like this would have a very different virus in it if it was done right. Since Windows 98 is commonly run in offices if I were going to do this for mischevious purposes I would include an easy backdoor for myself to perpetuate later viruses. But first, it must be marketed so that those businesses trust it and install it.
“This is only for WINDOWS 98 SECOND EDITION ENGLISH”
Has anybody tried to use it wiht a different localised version of windows98???
is there really a chance to break something or just to have some english dialoges or something like that…?
You can trust Open Source because you have access to the source code and if you really need to you or someone else can review it and then compile it from source.
Do you trust your precompiled compiler not to be trojaned?
Some people really are clueless, despite the fact that this issue was discussed here not two weeks ago.
it doesn’t seem to be reliable way for netraverse win4lin-sessions (using a german win98se as base). the vm will crash after “virtual” reboot … yeah – i love to have a backup of my /home/stuff/windows 🙂
is there really a chance to break something or just to have some english dialoges or something like that…?
IIRC, Windows 9x had different binaries for diferent languages (language packs for IE aside), whereas Windows NT and up used a single binary for all languages.
Using this service pack with anything but the English version wouldn’t be a very bright idea.
Do you trust your precompiled compiler not to be trojaned?
I’d have to second that. Open source can’t be trusted much more than closed source software when it comes right down to it. Sure the source could be verified, but verifying the binaries used to build the source is a really, really big job that few people anywhere are really capable of doing.
http://www.albion.com/security/intro-18.html
IIRC, Windows 9x had different binaries for diferent languages (language packs for IE aside), whereas Windows NT and up used a single binary for all languages.
I meant to say NT 5.0 (AKA Windows 2000) here.
>> You never drink Coke or Pepsi, don’t you?
worst analogy yet… software is much different that a soft drink, if you haven’t noticed…
>> You don’t trust a company who wrote the code but trust some guy somewhere in undisclosed Internet location who will be so kind to review these code and send you his seal of approval.
no, I don’t trust 1 (one) guy but thousands will do quite well for me. how about you?
WTF? That’s the worst analogy I’ve read in my life, bar none.
Except for the cola thing, I thought that it was very fitting personally.
This unofficial service pack is very good.
It works – simple as that!
If you use Win98 SE then it’s worth updating.
If you are unsure then use powerquest drive image to make a copy of your hard drive or partition before installing.
If you are unsure then use powerquest drive image to make a copy of your hard drive or partition before installing.
Or you could download the individual components from Windows update, md5 them, and do the same for the service packs constituents and compare the outputs.
Never trust a closed system that they will never provide a manual for.
SOrt of like building a public bridge without the contractor leaving the blueprints with the public or civil autority maintain it with.
Could you give an example of such a system?
Yeah you are right!
@Chris
What do you think Open Source Software is? Do you really think the community allows just any joe blow to donate their code without having anyone check it out first? The large OSS tools (including Linux) get thoroughly tested before it gets into the build. Even if something did get thru — have you ever looked at a change long for some of these large projects? Half the modules get modified or rewritten on a regular basis.
Sometimes you gotta use a little faith, and a little common sense. Who would you trust more — joe blows patch off the street or the same patch from someone like Redhat (in this case MicroSoft (although I don’t trust them too much either)). I hear of people all the time that had their computer messed up because they downloaded that piece of software from download.com (or some other site) that in the last 18 months had only been downloaded 4 times. Again, use a little common sense; read the reviews (I can’t beLIEve how popular Kazaa is although anything you read about Kazaa is negative — hey you guys you deserve it ).
In this case if you don’t trust the patch don’t download it — let someone else be the lab rat. Eventually some feed back will make it’s way on the internet about the patch. Then make an educated decision based on the information you find.
In my company we run a hybrid of servers running Win2k, Redhat 7.3/8, and Solaris 8. To this day we still run SP2 on our Windows Servers, and we hand pick the other patches we want. Why? Win2k SP3 & SP4 breaks alot of functionality in mixed server environments (*cough* our 2yr old NetApp *cough*). We know what patch breaks the functionality, and we stear very far from it.
The point is… Do a little research (or let someone else do it for you), do some testing of your own on a non-critical systems/network then apply to your everyday.
what about regular windows 98?
Do you really think the community allows just any joe blow to donate their code without having anyone check it out first?
Yeah, because you know, Microsoft hires people right off the street ;p
why don’t order official windows security update cd? that Microsoft is sending FREE OF COST. it includes updates for all OS i.e. from 98 to XP plus it is from MS which will put an end to the rubbish discossion going here. also it is also sort of one click installation (by sort of I mean) if you prefer to install WMP9 & DirectX9 etc.
for further information go to the following url : http://www.microsoft.com/security/protect/cd/order.asp
I installed the service pack from a Windows session on Win4Lin and had Windows die on reboot. Unlike the previous poster who reported this problem, I was using an English version of Windows 98SE.
Yeah, you can check the source code. That’s nice. But how much of the population is going to understand the code whatever is written in, and have the knowledge to check threw it? please..
Ken Thompson,
http://www.acm.org/classics/sep95/“>Reflections
Kudos to the author of the SP. Second time I booted my win98se partition since I installed it a year ago. Working great
First of all, the German guy needs to read. The update only works on SE ENGLISH EDITION, I installed the Service pack on a 3 VM’s, 1 Virtual PC Image of Windows 98 SE, worked great. 1 SuSE Linux 9.1 VMWare image of Windows 98 SE works great, 1 Merge VM Image of Windows 98 SE on SCO UnixWare 7.1.3, works great. It might be noteworthy to mention that Merge is just Win4Lin for UNIX, so I would imagine the problems that 1 user claims to have may be on faulty configuration.
… that it only supports 98lite 4.7 Chubby and Overweight. I use 98lite sleek (I think that is the name), which uses the Win95 Explorer as the shell. Having a fix without having to go through the Win update site sounds attractive.
works great. Of course I could be a hacker trying to seduce you into installing a mess of virus’ and trojans.