Virtualizing an old windows 98 machine, plan to run it on a windows 7 machine

[brandonkick]

My father's business computer fits the usual bill for a fifteen year old (or more) system. It has software that is no longer made, or supported and he doesn't have the install disks. Well he does but they are corrupt.

So long story short, I know this 98SE machine is a ticking time bomb. It's extremely old hardware and I know it'll be dying soon. It just can't continue to kick forever. So I want to help that system live on, because he knows and likes that software and well he is as resistant to change as most others are in this situation.

I have two ideas about this.

1) Image the hard drive and use the image in a virutal machine. I'm not entirely sure about the best way to do this. Some research has shown that using winimage would be the best way to make my image. Then set up a VM using VMware player and clone the image onto the VM's virtual hard disk.

The questions I have about that are, how much of a PITA will it be to get everything playing nice?

He has two old dot matrix printers, that I've had to put in parallel ports (PCI cards). It was a real pain to get working, but under windows 7 it does print. How much of a fiasco will it be to get the windows 98 virtual machine printing to his old dot matrix printers? The printers did have windows 98 drivers, and they did work on his physical windows 98 machine.

Would it be hard to ditch those and upgrade him to a laser printer. I'd like that much better, they are much faster. I know the laser printers today are more then likely NOT compatible with windows 98. Will it matter?

2) Just clone the hard drive and let him chug along doing what he is doing. I'll deploy the cloned drive to a new hard drive just to make sure the image was good and everything working. Keep the image on my workstation, the old drivel locked up and put a brand new one in his old machine.

Will I get messed up because of the drive geometry on the old drive (cylinders, sector size and so on) being different from the new one?

I would like to get this old machine virtualized. But from what I've read it could be areal pain. Especially because this is a windows 98 machine.

Any pointers from anyone who's successfully done this?

 

[SAG]

I've done this.
I don't know if VMW Player handles Windows 98 though, I did it on my ESX host.

The VMW Converter does not work with Win98. You'll need to get a good solid image of the baremetal system. I used Acronis B&R.
Then create a blank VM, make sure to switch to IDE disks and don't get too fancy with the HW configuration, boot the recovery CD, and restore like you would if you were doing it baremetal.
Pray to your diety of choice and power it on.
Get a Win98 ISO handy because you will likely need it once the system boots.

Good luck.

 

[SAG]

He has two old dot matrix printers, that I've had to put in parallel ports (PCI cards). It was a real pain to get working, but under windows 7 it does print. How much of a fiasco will it be to get the windows 98 virtual machine printing to his old dot matrix printers? The printers did have windows 98 drivers, and they did work on his physical windows 98 machine.

I'll address this one too. You can still use the dot matrix printers if he needs/wants them. I'm one of the first to say "tell your customer to upgrade their junk", but this is your pops, and we all do strange stuff for family.

Assuming you get Windows 98 working with VMWare Player - and I see now that it does work with you. Then install the PPort cards in the computer hosting the VM. Of, install the printers on two different computers on the network. The point is, install the printers *somewhere*. Then just SMB share them with simple names (DOTM1 and DOTM2 for example). Now capture the printer port on the Windows 98 VM.
NET USE LPT1: \\SERVER\DOTM1 /persistent:yes
NET USE LPT2: \\SERVER\DOTM2 /persistent:yes

And there you have it.

Of maybe you'll get lucky and can use pass-thru for the printers if they are connected to the host.

 

[nlinecomputers]

What is the software he HAS to have? Might be ways to convert the data to something that a Modern Win7/8 system can run.

 

[brandonkick]

@SAG,

Thanks for the replies. If I'm understanding this I need to capture the old windows 98 drive with Acronis B&R, then configure a new VM and boot the recovery disk (Acronis B&R recovery disk I'm assuming) in the virtual machine.

I'll also assume this means inserting the backup disk into the host machines physical dvd drive, and the VM im creating will be able to access the host machines physical dvd drive.

Then I'll deploy the image of the old windows 98 machine, which will be stored on the host machines hard disk drive. This again assumes the VM will be able to access the hosts physical hard drive.

After that I should be able to power up the VM and pray to God/Allah/Oprah/Baby Jesus that this thing works. I did read in my research that I'd probably need a 98 setup CD because of hardware differences. I have one available so I'm not worried about that.

As far as the dot matrix printers go:

Currently he is using a windows 7 machine, which I installed Quickbooks on and he hates it. It's too complicated for him. The software he used to use was VERY simple. He used a really old version of InvoMax. He doesn't like the newer versions because they require a subscription model and again he wants to use the old one that he knows.

He has two OkiData printers that connect via parallel. I had to put in an add on parallel PCI card to install them on his windows 7 machine, and after two hours of fiddling around with settings I did get them to print properly with quickbooks. I had to set the adapter to legacy mode and a few other things to get it to work right.

Anyways, so yes the dot matrix printers are installed and working correctly on the windows 7 machine. Hopefully it will work out that I can use the dot matrix printers without too much fuss, as they will be directly connected to the physical host machine.

In an ideal world, I'd like to get him switched over to a laser printer. But being that they weren't supported in windows 98 (or most of the new ones anyways) I think that would be a bit of a pain.


@nline

It's called invomax and he is not wanting to switch. It's very simple and easy for him to use. I've tried and tried to explain to him that without the install disks, this situation can only get worse. But alas he wants me to see what I can do!


I even think his on board IDE controller died and I had to find him an ISA IDE controller card and an (new) AT power supply! Talk about an old machine!

 

[SAG]

Thanks for the replies. If I'm understanding this I need to capture the old windows 98 drive with Acronis B&R, then configure a new VM and boot the recovery disk (Acronis B&R recovery disk I'm assuming) in the virtual machine.

Acronis B&R is what I used the last time I had to do this. You can use anything you want I suppose.
But to answer your question, yes

I'll also assume this means inserting the backup disk into the host machines physical dvd drive, and the VM im creating will be able to access the host machines physical dvd drive.

Or make an ISO of it and boot that.
But yes.
Create the virtual hardware, but chose to install the OS later.

Then I'll deploy the image of the old windows 98 machine, which will be stored on the host machines hard disk drive. This again assumes the VM will be able to access the hosts physical hard drive.

This is where it gets tricky.
I forgot to mention the funky stuff you'll need to do here, but there are several options. The best option is just to put the image of the win98 machine in a shared folder. Acronis can browse SMB on the network.
Other options include:
Converting the image into an ISO.
Creating a virtual disk in another VM, putting the image on that disk, then attaching that to the new vm.
Putting the image on a local ftp server.
Either way, it usually works best if you virtual nic is set to Bridged mode and not NAT-to-Host mode.

After that I should be able to power up the VM and pray to God/Allah/Oprah/Baby Jesus that this thing works. I did read in my research that I'd probably need a 98 setup CD because of hardware differences. I have one available so I'm not worried about that.

Yup, that about sums up exactly what I did. And now my client has what he needs to run is old CAD/CAM software!

 

[brandonkick]

This is where it gets tricky.
I forgot to mention the funky stuff you'll need to do here, but there are several options. The best option is just to put the image of the win98 machine in a shared folder. Acronis can browse SMB on the network.

Either way, it usually works best if you virtual nic is set to Bridged mode and not NAT-to-Host mode.

So I can create a shared folder elsewhere on another computer, like my fiancees computer that is running windows 7. Store the image in that shared folder, power up the Acronis disk in the new virtual machine and deploy that image across my network to the new virtual hard drive.

Seems pretty straight forward.

Thanks for the virtual nic tip!

Thanks for the help.

 

[nlinecomputers]

InvoMax still exists. He just doesn't want to pay for the upgrade. Over $1000. Some things are the cost of doing business.

 

[brandonkick]

InvoMax still exists. He just doesn't want to pay for the upgrade. Over $1000. Some things are the cost of doing business.

Exactly. And I imagine that even if the software were more affordable and it didn't require a subscription model, it would still be more complex then he wants it to be.

He uses this as a basic invoice and receipt software, something to show the customer an itemized bill. And this software keeps track of his sales tax, so he doesn't have to figure it out by hand.

This ancient version of invomax does these tasks in a way that he finds very simple and fast to use. He doesn't want a newer way of doing, and he doesn't want a different way of doing. He wants that way.... I'm sure many of you have dealt with this situation only a million times in the past!

 

[nlinecomputers]

Exactly. And I imagine that even if the software were more affordable and it didn't require a subscription model, it would still be more complex then he wants it to be.

He uses this as a basic invoice and receipt software, something to show the customer an itemized bill. And this software keeps track of his sales tax, so he doesn't have to figure it out by hand.

This ancient version of invomax does these tasks in a way that he finds very simple and fast to use. He doesn't want a newer way of doing, and he doesn't want a different way of doing. He wants that way.... I'm sure many of you have dealt with this situation only a million times in the past!

So how the hell does he function without all the part lookup features that it provides? Can really run an effective auto shop without the various part tracking tools that Autozone or NAPA provide.

 

[SAG]

So I can create a shared folder elsewhere on another computer, like my fiancees computer that is running windows 7. Store the image in that shared folder, power up the Acronis disk in the new virtual machine and deploy that image across my network to the new virtual hard drive.

Seems pretty straight forward.

Thanks for the virtual nic tip!

Thanks for the help.

Yes, you can.
But for the sake of "not knowing how reliable the network is" it'd be best to share it from the host computer.

 

[brandonkick]

So how the hell does he function without all the part lookup features that it provides? Can really run an effective auto shop without the various part tracking tools that Autozone or NAPA provide.

He doesn't have a massive stock of parts. Never did. He usually calls the local NAPA in town and gets pricing for whatever he needs, they have most of it in stock and if not can have it in a day or two. No need for that kind of tracking.

Yes, you can.
But for the sake of "not knowing how reliable the network is" it'd be best to share it from the host computer.

So to "share" it from the host computer, is that as simple as just having it on the host machines hard drive? Or do I have to set up some sort of "shared" folder on the host physical machine and since the virtual machine is technically a different machine it will act as if they were two different physical machines on a network?

 

[Rosco]

i didnt read every reply so if someone mentioned this sorry.

http://danweber.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/imaging-real-windows-98-box-into-vm.html

Havent tryied it but worth a shot hope this helps

 

[SAG]

He doesn't have a massive stock of parts. Never did. He usually calls the local NAPA in town and gets pricing for whatever he needs, they have most of it in stock and if not can have it in a day or two. No need for that kind of tracking.



So to "share" it from the host computer, is that as simple as just having it on the host machines hard drive? Or do I have to set up some sort of "shared" folder on the host physical machine and since the virtual machine is technically a different machine it will act as if they were two different physical machines on a network?

Wow, I missed this a few days ago.
Yes, just a simple windows share. Nothing special and NOT a vm-to-host shared folder. You'll be accessing the share just like you would if it were on another computer.
The reason I say to do it from the host is for simplicity.

 

[brandonkick]

Finally got the old machine from him, scrubbed the old grungy case down and removed the 1.2GB Western Digital Caviar from it!

Hooked it up to my laptop at work via an IDE to USB converter cable, but the disk shows up as not initialized. I'm wondering if it's because of how this drive was formatted and partitioned....


Either way, I'll wait till I get home tonight and hook it up directly to my workstations on board IDE slot. I'll then try Acronis B&R to clone the disk. Hopefully that works! From there I can try to work out virtualizing this bad boy!