Heartland

I've been presented with an interesting computer problem:

I have been asked to retrieve some files from a laptop which has Windows 95 installed.

• There's about 75MB-worth of files so putting everything on floppy disks isn't feasible.
• I can't install broadband software (because it's W95) and the dial-up connection falls over too frequently to upload the stuff.
• There's no ethernet port on the laptop so I can't transfer the files that way.
• I can't find W95 drivers for any of the USB pen-drives I have.

Ideas anyone?

dont think 95 supports usb anyway. it barely supports plug n play

have you got access to an ethernet pcmcia card?

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=et ... cmcia+card

otherwise can you rip out the drive and plug it into another pc as a spare drive and access the filesystem that way? (i dont actually know if laptop drives work like that though...)

You could try connecting the W95 machine to another machine via the serial ports/cable.

I know this can be done, but most of the knowledge has leaked from my mind...

Or see if you can find an old copy of laplink (i think) which would do the job via the serial port.

Quiff Boy wrote:have you got access to an ethernet pcmcia card?

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=et ... cmcia+card

There might be one in the office...

Nasty one...
USB is only supported on Win 98 SE and above if you can be bothered doing an upgrade. Or try to find an old serial and external CDR?

markfiend wrote:I've been presented with an interesting computer problem:

I have been asked to retrieve some files from a laptop which has Windows 95 installed.

• There's about 75MB-worth of files so putting everything on floppy disks isn't feasible.
• I can't install broadband software (because it's W95) and the dial-up connection falls over too frequently to upload the stuff.
• There's no ethernet port on the laptop so I can't transfer the files that way.
• I can't find W95 drivers for any of the USB pen-drives I have.

Ideas anyone?

If it's got USB ports at all, boot some Linux or *BSD live CD, mount the hard drive, and copy it onto the USB drive.
Of course that implies some basic knowledge about Linux or whatever live system you'd be using. Another idea might be to pull out the disk and get an adapter to put it in a desktop PC. The serial port thing (Laplink-style) most likely works but is _slow_ although it might be bearable for just 75mb. And you'd probably need a nullmodem cable.

Bah. Can't find a pcmcia card. I'll try serial port-to-serial port.

markfiend wrote:Bah. Can't find a pcmcia card. I'll try serial port-to-serial port.

I forgot to mention, it might be painfully slow...

Can't you just hide it in a cupboard and claim "no knowledge" if anyone asks about it??

It has a USB port... and the owner remembers using some USB hardware with it in the past

I could try the boot disk idea, thanks nowayjose, but my linux knowledge is... slim-to-nil. Still, it might be worth a go.

I considered an upgrade but the windows CD seems to want to reformat the hard drive, which would (naturally) knacker the data I'm after.

I don't really want to take the computer to bits as the owner wants it back for a newer OS install.

snowey wrote:Can't you just hide it in a cupboard and claim "no knowledge" if anyone asks about it??

Best idea yet I think

Tell its owner to get a Mac and look smug.

I would take the harddrive out of the laptop, set it to slave, pop it into an widely-available HD enclosure, hook it up to another machine, pull the files across, format the drive, then install the new OS.
Mind you, I don't know how difficult it is to get the HD out of a laptop but I'm curious: if Win95 is installed then I'm guessing that the thing is pretty old - will it even run a new OS without a major overhaul?

EDIT: does it have a CD burner? You could get the 75MBs on a couple of flat shinies.

EvilBastard wrote:will it even run a new OS without a major overhaul?

Oh heck I hadn't even thought of that

EvilBastard wrote:EDIT: does it have a CD burner? You could get the 75MBs on a couple of flat shinies.

I wish. Do you think I'd have been asking if it did? And actually it's only ~0.1 of a CD... But anyway.

I've got an old Iomega zip drive somewhere; it's a bit knackered but if I can get that running it might work... (thanks R&R for that suggestion)

markfiend wrote:

Quiff Boy wrote:have you got access to an ethernet pcmcia card?

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=et ... cmcia+card

There might be one in the office...

If it has a pcmcia slot how about a pcmcia flash disk I have one that I use on old laptops for file trasfer and a lot of new laptops (my Dell Latitude has anyway) have a pcmcia slot too.

markfiend wrote:

EvilBastard wrote:will it even run a new OS without a major overhaul?

Oh heck I hadn't even thought of that

EvilBastard wrote:EDIT: does it have a CD burner? You could get the 75MBs on a couple of flat shinies.

I wish. Do you think I'd have been asking if it did? And actually it's only ~0.1 of a CD... But anyway.

I've got an old Iomega zip drive somewhere; it's a bit knackered but if I can get that running it might work... (thanks R&R for that suggestion)

I think the old IomegaWare software runs on 95, so could be a good plan...

Have used Bart PE to boot onto an OS with no USB support. As long as the OS on the PE disk supports USB, you can copy files off fat32 or NTFS partitions onto a USB stick or drive.

http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/

You may try a live system, for example knoppix which is a monster of hardware recognition. If there is enough RAM on the laptop (128MB required, as I remember) you can run a GUI like windows (In this case KDE). A right button click on the disk (It will be called hda, not c: or something alike) and getting the permission to read and write should enable you do anything you like. There are handy self-explaining dialoges that help you setting up a connection.
Maybe worth a try. You can download it from the link above..
Note: KDE opens programs etc. on ONE click!

The live Linux suggestion is definitely the best. Because the filesystem will be FAT (or FAT 32) you should have no trouble reading it.

Windows 95 OSR 2 came "with USB support" (as it laughingly claimed on the disk) so you might get some mileage if you're on that version, if you're stuck for other solutions.

You can even get DOS USB drivers (I think they're lurking somewhere on HPs Japanese site) which I have successfully used in the past, so there's another option if you're comfortable with the autoexec.bat and config.sys thing.

markfiend wrote:

• There's about 75MB-worth of files so putting everything on floppy disks isn't feasible.

Binaries? Word documents, etc, compress to a fraction of their original size when zip:ed/rar:ed.

James Blast wrote:Tell its owner to get a Mac and look smug.

Smug Mac Users : Honestly, the worst part about Mac OSX. Every Mac user can't help be evangelize about Mac OSX. "I'm a born again user!" they say, and it takes a bullet or a stapler to get them to shut up. Anything that happens on your PC or laptop that isn't Mac is purely because you're not using Macintosh. "You wouldn't have those problems if you paid $800 too much for your laptop!"

9while9 wrote:

James Blast wrote:Tell its owner to get a Mac and look smug.

Smug Mac Users : Honestly, the worst part about Mac OSX. Every Mac user can't help be evangelize about Mac OSX. "I'm a born again user!" they say, and it takes a bullet or a stapler to get them to shut up. Anything that happens on your PC or laptop that isn't Mac is purely because you're not using Macintosh. "You wouldn't have those problems if you paid $800 too much for your laptop!"

Second worst.

The worst is that they're probably right

WIn 95 does have USB support: there is a version of win 95 on cd
that says "with usb support" on it. I owned a copy. Once.

You could find an off board usb cd burner. These were available
freely about 5 years ago, and came with driver software that
supported windows 95. With this you could offload up to 700 MB per disk.

mugabe wrote:

markfiend wrote:

• There's about 75MB-worth of files so putting everything on floppy disks isn't feasible.

Binaries? Word documents, etc, compress to a fraction of their original size when zip:ed/rar:ed.

75 meg already zipped unfortunately. Sorry I should have said.

My USB Zip drive doesn't want to work.

I noticed a Windows 98 serial number stuck to the bottom of the laptop, so it should at least support that...

Right, I'm downloading knoppix. Fingers crossed.

markfiend wrote:

mugabe wrote:

markfiend wrote:

• There's about 75MB-worth of files so putting everything on floppy disks isn't feasible.

Binaries? Word documents, etc, compress to a fraction of their original size when zip:ed/rar:ed.

75 meg already zipped unfortunately. Sorry I should have said.

My USB Zip drive doesn't want to work.

I noticed a Windows 98 serial number stuck to the bottom of the laptop, so it should at least support that...

Right, I'm downloading knoppix. Fingers crossed.

Good luck!
You inspired me to take a closer look at my remaining problems with my Linux system, one of which I managed to fix..
I had the solution under my fingers, only wouldn´t see it because it was a menue I needed that was in a place where Windows wouldn´t have it. Most of the difficulties with switching to Linux are skipping old habbits.