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Microsoft

Driver Repositories for Windows 95 Users? 39

Posted by Cliff from the you-might-not-be-able-to-find-these-in-2-years dept.
musselm asks: "I've begun working with a PC-refurbishing operation which provides Win95 machines to folks in need. The most time-consuming part is tracking down drivers for disparate modems and other devices. Does anyone have a solution to this problem? I have a dream of a few CDs with every possible driver for every possible device, but of course that's silly. Thanks for the help."
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Driver Repositories for Windows 95 Users? More

Driver Repositories for Windows 95 Users?

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  • windrivers (Score:2, Informative)

    by galaxy300 ( 111408 )
    I've found http://www.windrivers.com to be a valuable resource for drivers that are still available. It's a subscription service, I believe it runs about $30 a year.

    • Re:windrivers (Score:2, Interesting)

      by rilian4 ( 591569 )
      driverguide.com [driverguide.com]

      • driverguide requires registration, but it's only a way to get your personal details. I did it once and what did I get for a username and password?

        Username:drivers Password:all

        And happy driver hunting. I know how frustrating that can be. Sometimes the problem is when the manufacturer does not support the product any longer. I had a Voodoo Rush 3d card with TV Out that I had to replace because all the drivers I could get had the same problem. When playing DVD/VCD/Divx the picture was corrupted (some overlay problems). Not a nice thing to have when I was building a box to watch movies on the TV.

  • Why? (Score:1)

    by Theom ( 567303 )
    Every windows advocate will tell you that windows has excelent hardware support...
    • They should be using Linux, which has excelLent driver support, much better than windows. Good point, you're comment is so true and not an ignorant statement by a zealot who wants the rest the extremeist linux lovers here to champion him on.
      • It's good that you aren't pretending to be able to read minds and to know exactly what I wanted to say. Thank you for not beeing arogant.
        • So you post a message, that isn't really what you want to say. It's but a hint, a clue if you will, of what you really wanted to say, and expect others to guess at what that is. When they guess you were implying they should not be using windows, and using linux (WE ARE ON SLASHDOT, I MEAN COME ON, HOME OF LINUX ZEALOTS), you get angry for me jumping to false conclusions. So here's my argument, up front, with no hints or clues to my real argument: linux hardware support is generally not so hot. Windows, granted 95 isn't the greatest at hardware detection, isn't *that* bad. WindowsXP has outstanding harware detection.

  • You may want to try... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by thecampbeln ( 457432 ) on Saturday November 16, 2002 @12:41AM (#4683630) Homepage
    ...a friendly local computer dealer. One of the white-box shops (ie- they build their own). We have one where I'm at that has drivers for all of the stuff he's sold over the years simply for his own support. So if an old customer comes in and needs their system reformatted, he can re-install the components he sold them over the years.

    Especially since you're a 'good cause' it shouldn't be too hard to talk one of the local shops into it! Offer a 'special thank to' on your site or fliers... you may even get more then drivers out of them =)

    Good luck!

  • http://www.driverguide.com/

    Thousands and thousands of drivers.... and the site is easily found using Google. I swear, you'd think people "smart" enough to read slashdot would be smart enough to use a search engine. I guess I overestimate the intelligence of most people.

  • Drivers CD (Score:2, Interesting)

    by hound3000 ( 238628 )
    In my business I typically go out to people's houses and fix their computers on site. In rare instances, I have to reformat their drives and reinstall Windows. Finally, after all these years, people generally know to keep their Windows CD handy, but all the other stuff such as modem, and video drivers are no where to be found. When they have Windows 98 or later my life is much easier, but even with W98, it almost never has the drivers for two things the video and the modem.

    I now have a CD full of drivers for all of the most common devices I come across. This was built with the help of driverguide.com [driverguide.com] on the modem drivers section, and from various other manufactuer websites for the video. A collection of all drivers ever made is impossible, but one that has the drivers of most devices you run into is not. Just be sure to come up with a organizational system to put the drivers in any time you have to hunt one down for a new exotic device, and in a few short months driver hunting will be more a diversion than the norm.

    Once you are done collecting your drivers, you can then invest time in organizing 2-3 CDs full of Windows Updates and bug fixes so that you are not sending virus prone machines out to be wrecked by some script kiddie.
  • Maybe using newer versions of windows would be the best option, if hardware support is what you need. From my own experience I have an old creative-based soundcard that nothing (even 2000) would recognize, but xp picked it up right off the bat. Granted, you'd have to tweak a bit to get XP running quickly on older hardware but it won't be as bad as trying to get OSX to run at all on my performa.
  • The most time-consuming part is tracking down drivers for disparate modems and other devices.

    "Disparate" modems, eh? ;-) Anyways... Try this link for modem init strings and drivers [56k.com]. Good luck.
  • I've begun working with a PC-refurbishing operation which provides Win95 machines to folks in need. Does anyone have a solution to this problem?

    I know it's hard, but just stop being a jackass and giving people win95 machines. If people can quit smoking, you can surely quit this atrocious act.

  • Packard Bell Modem (Score:4, Informative)

    by Quill_28 ( 553921 ) on Saturday November 16, 2002 @02:00AM (#4683994) Journal
    Good gads, whatever you do stay away from the combo modem sound card that Packard Bell had in their computers. What a nightmare!

    I used to goto windrivers.com(when they were free) maybe they would be willing to help you out since this seems to be charitable work but who knows.

    • Wow.
      I had a girlfriend ( boy could she screw) who had one of those Packard Bells. It freaking sucked.
    • I've got 2 of those POS cards laying around (one 14.4, one 28.8.) FreeBSD has support for them, but trying to find windows drivers was a nightmare. Those 2 packhell machines can be yours for the cost of shipping, I want them out of my living room. :)
    • Ah yes, the full-length Packard Bell monstercard. I've personally seen 4 or 5 different versions of this and they're all different hardware-wise.

      The one I have basically an Aztech Sound Galaxy Washington 16 with a Rockwell-chipset 14.4 modem grafted on top of it. Linux, with some isapnptools magic, always recognized it fine as a standard serial port and sound with the usual SB driver (iirc). I think once when I was bored I even managed to enable the IDE port on there and with a hacked-up IDE module (this was in 2.0.x) I got a third hard drive connected through it. Win95 worked fine with standard modem and a driver from Aztech somewhere. FaxWorks Voice was a beast though, crashed so many times I just ended up ripping it out.

      Of course that modem fried years ago (Florida lightning), and my current machines are ISA- and modem-free.

  • My advice... (Score:3, Informative)

    by dasunt ( 249686 ) on Saturday November 16, 2002 @02:42AM (#4684135)

    www.driverguide.com [driverguide.com] is always a good place to look. Get used to yanking the card, looking for the ID on any chips, and then searching for that chip's drivers. Also check out www.google.com [google.com] and groups.google.com [google.com] for other excellent places to search.

    When you download the drivers, have a network share (or directory) with this file structure: /drivers/type[video,sound,modem,network]/manufactu rer/model/OS. Then, if you keep seeing the same type of card (not uncommon when you realize the machines you are refurbishing tend to come from a specific local manufacturer[s] who use the same hardware in each of their machines) you don't have to redownload it. And you can always burn /drivers/ onto a few CD's if your driver collection gets large enough to be useful.

    • Re:My advice... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by zcat_NZ ( 267672 )
      driversguide? what a freaking PITA.. every time I'm looking for drivers for anything I get pages of hits for the fscking driversguide forums from other people looking for the same drivers who never bothered to do a simple search first. I've never figured out how to actually get -drivers- from driversguide other than giving them money, and I'd like to see some proof that they'll actually have the drivers I'm after before I go doing that!

      Usually what I do is figure out who made the device (If there's no manufacturers name you can look up the FCC ID at www.fcc.gov) and go to the manufacturers homepage. Most of them have drivers downloadable for just about everything they ever made.

      And what really pisses me off most; if it weren't for places like driversguide.com and windrivers.com, the MANUFACTURERS site with the FREE drivers would probably be a whole heap easier to find via google!!

      • I just checked driversguide again and apparently it's actually free to join and they really really promise that they'll try not to sell your address to spammers.

        OTOH their advertising partners 'flycast' will be tracking your every keyclick. No thanks, I'll just stick with getting drivers directly from the manufacturers sites thanks!

        I just felt I'd better mention this correction and save anyone else the bother of flaming me.. :)
        • They'll probably rip out this password now but what the hell... login is temp, password is 512. That's what they give you when you say you've "forgotten the password." The real password is another same-for-everybody equally stupid one, but I can't remember it at the moment.
  • most machines that ran 95 can run 98 why not upgrade to 98?

  • I was gong to make a repository.... (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    ExcelAnd I have the code to run one. It was gonig to be public, with a list of links to where the drivers were available from, or optionally have it on my web sevrer. However, I didn't like the first option because over time, the companies that supply drivers for their products either remove the drivr or go offline completely. The second one introduced licencing issues on redistribution. *shrug*

    How many times have you found an odd network card, or even your mobo BIOS, and never been able to find the manufacturer. There are sites that *list* the manufacturer, but dont have the driver. If only drivers could all be freely redistributed, then I'd probably go ahead with my site.... anyone got any suggestions/

  • refurbishing... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by joto ( 134244 ) on Saturday November 16, 2002 @12:53PM (#4685755)
    I'm not really sure if it's worth the trouble to get all those old peripherals to work. Most people who buy refurbished products don't want to deal with troublesome peripherals anyway.

    You should probably just throw them out, and put in more modern (but dirt cheap) stuff. Then you can stack those weird devices up in piles, waiting untill you have at least a dozen of a given type. At that time, you may invest time in finding a driver. By working this way, you can also use time to your advantage. Instead of you using your time to find those old drivers, write a letter to the manufacturer, and ask them to dig up the old drivers.

  • Driversguide.com [driversguide.com] is a great place to find drivers for old systems. I work in a used computer store [where I'm typing this right now] and we use driversguide, windrivers, and google.

    For login, use: drivers. and password: all.

  • If you ever come accross an IBM MWave card (combo sound card and modem) - they came with the early Aptivas - do the world a favour and burn it. That has to be one of the worst products ever made. Not only dosne't it work, but the official Tech Support answer for any MWaave question in WinFax Pro was "get a new modem" - after years of work trying ot get the MWave to be compatible, they just gave up on it.

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