Windows 98 Crashes ...why?

steve takacs · Post by **steve takacs** » 19 Jun 2004 8:27 pm

I am trying to understand why my computer crashes when I attempt to search for items on EBAY. I type in the item and enter and WHAMMO, CRASH! I've used both Netscape and Internet Explorer as browsers with the same effect. I'm told I performed an "illegal operation" and then thesecryptic (to me anyway) numbers pop up: EXPLORER caused an invalid page fault in
module <unknown> at 0000:11d0c720.
Registers:
EAX=70449c30 CS=015f EIP=11d0c720 EFLGS=00010246
EBX=03002d90 SS=0167 ESP=0102dad0 EBP=0102de40
ECX=00000000 DS=0167 ESI=0102de40 FS=4e7f
EDX=0102dafc ES=0167 EDI=70449bd0 GS=0000
Bytes at CS:EIP:
What can I do to fix this problem? Thanks, steve [This message was edited by steve takacs on 19 June 2004 at 09:28 PM.][This message was edited by steve takacs on 19 June 2004 at 09:48 PM.]

Donna Dodd · Post by **Donna Dodd** » 20 Jun 2004 5:22 am

Upgrade to Windows 2000.
I had so many problems with 98 that I actually lost weight from stress. I honestly thought EVERYONE had to reboot 3 or 4 times a day!
donna

Bill Crook · Post by **Bill Crook** » 20 Jun 2004 6:29 am

Steve......

Your "Win98" O/S has a coruppted XXX.dll file in it. That is whats causeing your problem. This happens sometimes if the computer is turned off before shutting down first. A power glitch,even a rouge pop-up,spyware can do this damage.

How-ever !!!

You can re-load "Win98" right over the top of the presently installed version. That way, you will not loose all your killer-alp programs.

(you may want to save you e-maill address out to a text or word.doc file tho, as I am sure the re-load will give you a new and fresh address book)

------------------
http://home.comcast.net/~crookwf/

http://f1.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/crookwf/my_photos

steve takacs · Post by **steve takacs** » 21 Jun 2004 4:35 pm

Thanks Donna & Bill. Donna, since I'm only in the US seven weeks a year, I'll still try to limp along with Windows 98 rather than upgrade. Bill, do I have to save all my documents on a storage device or are only the email addresses affected? The "recovery CDs" for this older HP Pavilion computer say "you will lose any software you've installed and other files you've created since you set up your computer" when you reformat. Does that mean all emails and documents must be saved??? GROAN if it does. If so is the easiest way to do this my using a flash disk? Thank for your help. Steve

Bill Bosler · Post by **Bill Bosler** » 22 Jun 2004 6:45 am

Steve:

See if you can locate a win/98 system disk from Microsoft. You can reinstall the system from this disk without any loss of data on your hard drive with the exception of maybe email addresses. The HP disk will completely restore the hard drive to the way it was when the computer came out of the box and you don't want that.
I don't know why the manufacturers insist on doing it that way, but that's the way they supply the so-called recovery disks.

Ron Randall · Post by **Ron Randall** » 22 Jun 2004 5:41 pm

because MS makes it. They will let you find out why.

John Lacey · Post by **John Lacey** » 23 Jun 2004 5:52 am

In the long run, Steve, Donna's right. I had my computer guy install Windows 2000 on his advice and I've had very few crashes or illegal operations compared to Win98SE. Much more stable platform and no transition time as display and operation is similar.

Bobby Lee · Post by **Bobby Lee** » 23 Jun 2004 10:10 am

Have you tried searching for WHAMMO.dll?

Seriously, it's hard to imagine what code Netscape and IE share, that would give the exact same error. Maybe winsock.dll, or an equivalent provided by your Chinese ISP.

------------------
<img align=right src="http://b0b.com/Hotb0b.gif" width="96 height="96">Bobby Lee - email: quasar@b0b.com - gigs - CDs, Open Hearts
Sierra Session 12 (E9), Williams 400X (Emaj9, D6), Sierra Olympic 12 (C6add9),
Sierra Laptop 8 (E6add9), Fender Stringmaster (E13, A6),
Roland Handsonic, Line 6 Variax

Bill Crook · Post by **Bill Crook** » 23 Jun 2004 12:18 pm

Steve.....

Sorry about being so long in answering.

If you use the "HP Recovery Disk", You WILL Loose everything,period. That recovery disk basically does a clean sweep of the hard drive and puts back ONLY all the files that came with the computer. Any document or other files you might have aquired,should be saved out to another disk for reloading later. I wont go into the MS bit as that is somewhat a sticky area.

Bottom line is:
If you get a Windows 98SE O/S disk and reload it over the top of the existing Windows 98SE O/S, it will work fine. like I said tho, be sure to save your address book.

------------------
http://home.comcast.net/~crookwf/

http://f1.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/crookwf/my_photos

Earnest Bovine · Post by **Earnest Bovine** » 23 Jun 2004 2:10 pm

I used my friend's "HP Recovery Disk" on his HP Pavilion computer. It warned us that he would lose all his data files so we backed up everything first.

But after re-installing Win98 all his data files were still there.

Still, I would back up everything first!