For PDF printer, try also CutePDF. It supports W98 even in the latest versions, and it's actually just a wrapper for Ghostscript. I have been using it for ages with no problems whatsoever. I haven't used it on W98 though, but should work.
http://www.cutepdf.com/Products/CutePDF/writer.asp

I always install 7-zip 9 (last version supported on 98). I can't tell the difference practically between it and later versions; has exactly the same functionality and works perfectly.

I usually install the following in Win 98 SE partitions:

Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.20
Mozilla Thunderbird 2.0.0.24
DivX 2.6
Ahead Software AG Nero Express 6.3.1.25 (bundled)
Apple QuickTime 6.5.2
RealNetworks RealPlayer 10.5
Aladdin Systems StuffIt Standard 8.0.0.148
Adobe Acrobat eBook Reader Version 2.2 Build 203.2 October 25, 2001
Adobe Acrobat Reader 6.0.6 1/8/07
IrfanView 32 Bit for WinNT, Win9x and Win2000 Version 3.17 (This probably isn't the latest version for Win 98)
Sun Microsystems Java 2 Standard Edition Version 1.5.0 (build 1.5.0_22-b03)
InterVideo WinDVD Version 4.0 DXVA (sometimes earlier versions depending on graphics card installed)
CyberLink PowerDVD Version 4.0 (sometimes earlier versions depending on graphics card installed)

As far as an office suite goes, I use Sun Microsystems StarOffice 6.0 (not the latest for Win 98).

For FTP, you might consider the following:

CoffeeCup Free FTP 3
Ipswitch WS_FTP Version 5.08 (no idea what the latest Win 98 version is)
LeechFTP Version 1.3

FalconFly has a good collection of Microsoft DirectX Redistributable versions:

http://www.falconfly.de/directx.htm

Edit:
Since your list is fairly expansive, I would add the following (commercial) voice recognition software that I have for Win 98:

IBM ViaVoice for Windows Release 9 Personal Edition
IBM ViaVoice OEM Version 9.1 Professional
Br0derbund Software, Inc./Lernout & Hauspie Dragon NaturallySpeaking 5 Standard
Br0derbund Software, Inc./Lernout & Hauspie Dragon NaturallySpeaking 5 Preferred USB

Yeah, I'm running Firefox 2.0.0.20 myself on my Windows 98 built, runs fine for small websites. Big modern ones lock the whole system up trying to render all that stuff. But at least it's better than IE 6.

And I use an old compatible version of Adobe Reader for PDF files.

What no kernelex abd Firefox 3.6?

This thread contained a link to https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=59559 , which suggests that Sumatra 2.2.1 supported Win98.

Not too much else of interest in there application-wise, though, except for OpenOffice 3.2.1.

I've updated the first post, adding some programs/versions.

Last supported version of 7zip is 9.22. Later versions don't include Windows 98 as supported system (but may work).

I haven't included codecs like divx, because I think every codec is (almost) covered using VLC. That includes DVDs, although I don't know if 0.8.6i could play them (and I won't find out, because my laptop has no DVD). I used to install Quicktime and Real Player but I didn't really have any use for them (excluding some older Windows games).

As a picture viewer, I always preferred XnView, but the good news is that current versions of Irfanview supports Windows 98 (or so their website says).

I didn't posted a FTP client because Filezilla may be heavy; thanks to akula65 I remembered LeechFTP that gave me good speeds (but was and is difficult to find).

About office suites: I didn't include any office suite because my goal was having a light system. OpenOffice 2.4.2 is the latest version supported, and any LibreOffice requires Windows 2000 or later.

I've seen posts about Sumatra users compiling the sources for Windows 98, but I haven't (yet) seen any official version that supports it.

Thanks.

I didn't have any luck with CPCDiskXP on clean Win98. Which is bad since my main desktop doesn't have a "real" floppy and my retro pcs don't go higher that Win98.
If you need an alternative, instead of creating something specifically to be able to run CPCDiskXP, I'm using CPDWrite (DOS)

keenmaster486 wrote:

I always install 7-zip 9 (last version supported on 98). I can't tell the difference practically between it and later versions; has exactly the same functionality and works perfectly.

There is a bug in earlier versions in the sense that if you try and open a pic (jpeg, jpg, gif, etc.) inside a zip file, then 7-zip deletes the temporary file before it opens the file, resulting in an error that it cannot find the file. Later versions fixed this problem.

As i know.

Last updates for Windows 98 were:
IE6 with SP1 (Might be a requeriment to some programs)
VMP7.1 (FE) and 9 (SE)
.Net Framework 1.0/1.1 SP1 and 2.0 (no service packs) (Might be a requeriment to some programs)
VC++ 2005 redist (Might be a requeriment to some programs)
Windows Installer 2.0 (maybe be included with other programs like OpenOffice)
GDI+ redist (Might be a requeriment to some programs)
Microsoft Layer for Unicode (unicows.dll) (Might be a requeriment to some programs): http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/confi … on.aspx?id=4237

As office suite:
OpenOffice 2.4.x or any MS Office version up to Office XP (Office 2002)

About software, many of them were already mentioned here though

Zup wrote:

About office suites: I didn't include any office suite because my goal was having a light system.

You want a "light system" with Gimp, Abiword, Gnumeric, and an EPROM burner, but an office suite is going too far..?

OpenOffice 2.4.2 is the latest version supported, and any LibreOffice requires Windows 2000 or later.

I've seen posts about Sumatra users compiling the sources for Windows 98, but I haven't (yet) seen any official version that supports it.

Well, I guess that post I linked to must be wrong then. 😒

Yes, you're right. I guess GIMP is the heaviest tool I want to install (but maybe I won't install it at all).

Abiword and Gnumeric are "light" opposed to a full featured suite. Obviously, I could install Works 4.0 that would be way lighter but Abiword is a balance between lightweight and features (=opening modern documents). The EPROM burner is a must tool (I've got only two computers with onboard parallel port, and the other is going to be scrapped), but it does not use too much memory/hard disk space (and there are no alternatives).

As wikipedia states, OpenOffice 2.4.3 is the last version supported on Windows 98/ME, in threads on forums they say it is 2.4.2. Note that maybe 3.x would work, and no doubt there are higher versions running over kernelex. But that are unsupported, and my goal was to list software that was meant to run on Windows 98. Other example would be 7zip. Checking the readme, 9.22 says that can run on Windows 98 but 9.34 does not. I guess that 9.34 could run on Windows 98 but again it's not meant to do it (BTW, wikipedia says that the last StarOffice version that supports Windows 98 is StarOffice 😎.

About Sumatra... looking into its forum it seems that it was never supported on Windows 98. Can it run? Some versions are said to run, but again: nothing official. So I guess I'd need another lightweight PDF reader (FoxIt used to be a good alternative, but latest versions are crappy).

I'd refrain from installing dx 9 on win98. It can cause all sorts of issues. 8.1 is as far as I go since I found it breaks compatibility with some older games / software, and it's almost impossible to roll back from, usually requiring a complete OS reinstall.

kanecvr wrote:

I'd refrain from installing dx 9 on win98. It can cause all sorts of issues. 8.1 is as far as I go since I found it breaks compatibility with some older games / software, and it's almost impossible to roll back from, usually requiring a complete OS reinstall.

Can you be more specific please? any examples?

I've looking into my (few) game boxes, and I've found that Fahrenheit and Beyond Good and Evil both supports Windows 98 and require DirectX 9.0. It may not be true, because both are re-releases and maybe the games are using older versions of DirectX (but are shipped with DirectX 9.0).

Doppler wrote:

kanecvr wrote:

I'd refrain from installing dx 9 on win98. It can cause all sorts of issues. 8.1 is as far as I go since I found it breaks compatibility with some older games / software, and it's almost impossible to roll back from, usually requiring a complete OS reinstall.

Can you be more specific please? any examples?

Ok, here's why I would not recommend DX9 on win98:
- firstly most win98 boxes won't be running DX9 games, so having dx9 installed is of no practical use. The only DX9 win98 compatible cards I know are the FX series , the 6xxx, some r300 based radeon 9xxx series cards (late radeon 9000, the 9500, 9600, 9700, 9800) and the x800 series.

Second, very few win98 compatible titles support DX9, as Zup pointed out:

Zup wrote:

I've looking into my (few) game boxes, and I've found that Fahrenheit and Beyond Good and Evil both supports Windows 98 and require DirectX 9.0. It may not be true, because both are re-releases and maybe the games are using older versions of DirectX (but are shipped with DirectX 9.0).

Third, DX9c sometimes requires files not present in win98, causing some anomalies (take this with a grain of salt, I've yet to experience such problems).

Problems that I have experienced:
- issues with 3dfx cards - predominantly voodoo 2, banshee and voodoo 3 cards, where they would perform poorly or games would outright refuse to run on them (Homeworld 1, voodoo 3000, Dx9 installed)
- some games either perform poorly (unreal, freelancer), become unstable (unreal, dungeon keeper II, unreal tournament), show graphical corruption (NFS Porsche) or outright refuse to run.
- issues with older nvidia drivers (with no dx9 driver support). I've seen this in forceware 2x, 3x and early 4x drivers. The system becomes unstable and might bsod (nvidia driver DLL or VXD based).

kanecvr wrote:

Third, DX9c sometimes requires files not present in win98, causing some anomalies (take this with a grain of salt, I've yet to experience such problems).

If that was the case, there would surely be a bazillion reports of that problem by now, and another bazillion repetitions of the same old fix that everyone would know.

- issues with 3dfx cards - predominantly voodoo 2, banshee and voodoo 3 cards, where they would perform poorly or games would outright refuse to run on them (Homeworld 1, voodoo 3000, Dx9 installed)

But there were never any drivers for those Voodoo cards that supported DX9.

- issues with older nvidia drivers (with no dx9 driver support). I've seen this in forceware 2x, 3x and early 4x drivers. The system becomes unstable and might bsod (nvidia driver DLL or VXD based).

If they have no DX9 driver support, how would the presence of DX9 be an issue? I'd also say that VXD drivers were never very stable.

I'll relate my experience with my Pentium II rebuild.

After installing Windows 98, I immediately did upgrades, including DirectX 7. THEN I tried to install Final Fantasy VII (uses DirectX 5). Well, the FMVs refused to run, period. Nothing I did solved the problem, short of a wipe and reload of Windows 98. Doing THAT, I installed FF7 first, with its bundled DirectX 5. Game works like a charm. Then I upgraded DirectX to 7 and FF7 still works perfectly fine.

So it seems that games that don't use DX7 will try to use DX5 files that it calls for. If those files aren't there, it won't run.

I'd only upgrade DirectX to the required versions for games, now. Let the game itself install what it needs to play. Because honestly, are you really seeing any gains or improvements by upgrading your copy of DirectX if the game doesn't even use the updated version? Shit, I had to TELL Final Fantasy 14 on my modern PC to use DX11 and I'm running Windows 10 with DX12 installed and a fully-DX12 compatible card (GTX 980Ti), but it still only uses DX11...because I told it to. Otherwise, it would run in DX10 or DX9 mode (not sure which).

FFXIhealer wrote:

Well, the FMVs refused to run, period. Nothing I did solved the problem, short of a wipe and reload of Windows 98.

I remember having a similar problem. It was just a matter of having the right codec. Installing the latest version of Media Player 6 did the trick for some reason. Not sure why the particular sequence of steps you followed resulted in something different – it is surely a quirk of the installer rather than some obscure missing DirectX feature.