China DOS Union

Who can tell me which files of win98 need to be readable and writable, and which files are read-only and not writable? Because I want to make a bootable CD to boot win98 without any optimization of 98 files, and keep all functions. Put the files that need to be readable and writable into the memory-mapped disk, and the files that don't need to be written are still on the CD!

Please ask your specific question.

The project is enormous, and I support it.

If using Master MLD's method, I think your computer needs to have 512MB of memory and that would be okay.

The full-function CD boot of WIN 98 should be feasible, because since WINDOWS PE can achieve such an effect, I think all Windows series can. If WIN98 can perform file swapping in a small memory environment, the main barrier to memory for this function, I think it should be solved.

The only thing is that Microsoft is afraid of the operating system being pirated.

In fact, there are also many Linux desktop versions

You should look up a large amount of information about WINDOWS core files and their usage. Necessarily, programming may be needed to modify it!

Don't tell me that the upstairs means putting 98 into a disk mapped by memory. That would require a lot of memory. I mean putting the swap file into memory, and other read-only files are on the CD. Otherwise, really like you said, a 512M stick might not be enough!

The idea is very good, and I also want to do it like this. My vision is to view the boot startup menu.

It's not that complicated. Actually, the main things that need reading and writing operations are the registry files, and then some folders that need to be written. Some files in the.system folder also need to be swapped. But the system made this way only works on your own machine. Isn't my 98 system completely on the CD - ROM?

The main defect of running a large system from a CD is that it is too slow. Isn't WinPE already able to run from a CD? But it is too slow (I mean slow to boot). This is fundamentally unsolvable.

Using a RAM disk can better solve the problem of running speed after booting. It is hoped that in the future, the memory of most machines can reach more than 1GB.

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Therefore, I think the difficulty is still the universality of hardware drivers. I downloaded a WinPE CD, which uses a display of 648*480 and cannot be adjusted to 1024*768 or other resolutions. It can automatically identify some network cards but cannot identify other network cards. It cannot automatically configure the modem. It also has no Chinese input method.

The files system.dat and user.dat must definitely be read and written during startup. These two things can't be only on the CD, they must be placed on a virtual disk. Also the swap file.