I recently pulled out an old Compaq desktop, a relic running Windows 98 Second Edition. It’s a piece of history, passed down through the years, and while I don’t recall it ever being connected to the internet directly, it does have a Firefox browser from way back in 2007, so who knows? My first goal was to get online using the built-in 56k Compaq modem. However, despite the modem appearing in system settings, connection attempts using dial-up programs like HyperTerminal and Phone Dialer failed consistently.
Suspecting a faulty modem, I decided to do a bit of hardware swapping. I had an old Dell Dimension 8200 with Windows XP lying around. I salvaged its internal modem and network interface card (NIC) and installed them in the Compaq. After a bit of initial resistance – it didn’t boot on the first try, but power cycling resolved that – the system started up, seemingly fine.
However, the “Add New Hardware” wizard, which I expected to pop up, never appeared. Running the wizard manually also yielded no results; neither the NIC nor the replacement modem was recognized anywhere in the system.
This led me to believe that driver issues were the culprit. The catch? This vintage machine only supports USB 1.1. My research indicated that third-party drivers could potentially enable USB 2.0 functionality on Windows 98 SE, including support for USB flash drives. Since I’m using PS/2 for my keyboard and mouse, flash drive compatibility is my primary concern for data transfer.
I downloaded a couple of driver packages, copied them to a floppy disk (yes, floppy disks are still in my life!), and took them to the Compaq.
To test the first driver, I plugged in a flash drive. As expected, the “Add New Hardware Wizard” launched, prompting for drivers. I pointed it to the floppy and manually executed the .exe for the first driver package. It installed, and the system rebooted as required. Disappointingly, upon plugging the flash drive back in, the wizard didn’t start automatically this time, and the flash drive remained unrecognized in “My Computer”.
While I have nothing against floppy disks in principle, USB flash drives would be significantly more convenient for transferring data and especially drivers. This is particularly important because getting the modem to work is proving difficult too. I’m hoping an external US Robotics 56k modem, which I’m expecting from eBay, might be more reliable than the internal ones and work more smoothly. But after my experience so far, I’m not overly optimistic.
I also extracted the files from the second driver package, which turned out to be a collection of “.sys” files. At this point, unsure of the next step, I paused.
I’m trying to follow online guides for enabling USB 2.0 on Windows 98. What else can I do to get my Windows 98 SE PC to recognize and use USB flash drives? Is it purely a driver issue, or are there other system configurations or changes required?
My main motivation for needing USB 2.0 support is to easily transfer modem drivers (and potentially other drivers) to the Windows 98 machine using a flash drive. Trial and error with drivers seems inevitable, and the limited capacity of floppy disks makes that approach highly impractical. For now, though, floppy disks are the only reliable data transfer method I have for this old system.
Alt text: A user’s Windows 98 SE desktop environment, highlighting the challenges of modern peripheral connectivity on legacy systems.
Alt text: The “Add New Hardware Wizard” dialog box in Windows 98, illustrating the operating system’s attempt to detect and install drivers for new USB devices.
