Windows ME and backwards compatibility

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Asher
I really don't know much about running old programs, I never do it.

What I'd do is leave your WinMe installed, get a program like Partition Magic, and install Windows XP on a different partition. Then if you have a problem in XP with something, you could boot into WinMe and use it still.

I'm not sure if XP will run your game though.

Partition Magic Pro 7.x and 8.x both have problems moving or resizing large (8 Gig+) partitions that are mostly full. This happens a lot with FAT32 (Win9x/ME and optionally XP) and almost all the time with NTFS (WinNT and optionally 2k and XP). Some games will not install if you run NTFS, but if you have a FAT32 partition to install in, virtually all Windows games can be run under Win XP Pro.

IF you use Partition Magic Pro (I do, despite it's problems) here's a few things to help you avoid most potential problems:

Make sure you have plenty of free space before you do any repartitioning, and ideally, have a UPS or make sure you're not likely to have a power outage. (If you have to reboot in the repartitioning phase, you're screwed silly) If you need to clean junk off your hard drive, do it before playing with Partition Magic.

If you have any files for which you have a deep emotional attachment, back them up, and not to somewhere else on the same HD.

When you add a new partition to your existing drive, be sure to leave at least 2-3 gigs free space in your existing C: partition. Preferably, leave 5 or more.

[Urban Ranger]

My suggestion for you is to rollback to W98SE. Use Win98Lite on the installation, and you have a pretty good OS.

[Seeker]

Get System Commander and switch to 'True DOS' mode.

Win ME does not have REAL plain jane DOS needed for such old games with funky memory access like Ultima 7, etc.

[Urban Ranger]

You could always dual boot into DOS if that's the case.