VOGONS


First post, by winuser_pl

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Hi, just installed vanilla copy of Windows 95 4.0.950B on my computer with following spec:
* Pentium 166 MMX,
* 64 MB EDO ram
* 8GB hdd
* S3 4MB video PCI

The problem I had since the beginning was low memory. First I started with 32MB of SDR ram stick (with 64MB stick it wont POST, tried at least 20 different sticks). In the system monitor I saw slowly memory decreasing over the time, up to the moment when 10, then 20MB was swapped to HDD.

Then I switched from SDR to EDO (32 -> 64 MB) and it was better at first, but then using Internet Explorer to access local web share for files download (I got NAS with SMB and http share) it was slower and slower. Again system monitor was reporting 20MB being swapped and 0.5 MB of unused physical memory.
I'm using Internet Explorer 5.01. No real web browsing, only text list of links for files on NAS.

20 years ago I had 486 with 36 MB of ram and I remember it worked quite fast. The only difference was missing IE (I had no network at all) and it was Windows 95 A.
I'm thinking about moving the OS (or reinstalling) to different motherboard with 2 slots for SDRAM and use 128 MB of ram (super socket 7).
But, wasn't such amount crazy in '95? That's insane I think. My first XP computer had 128MB of ram.

PC1: Highscreen => FIC PA-2005, 64 MB EDO RAM, Pentium MMX 200, S3 Virge + Voodoo 2 8 MB
PC2: AOpen => GA-586SG, 512 MB SDRAM, AMD K6-2 400 MHz, Geforce 2 MX 400

Reply 1 of 36, by doshea

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Yeah, 64MB should be plenty of RAM for Windows 95! Or at least it was when it came out, I'm not sure how much IE adds to the requirements but it shouldn't be that much more.

Have you tried closing IE to see if it frees memory? I suppose it might not help because I assume this is one of those versions where Internet Explorer is somehow tied in to Windows Explorer, so possibly you'd have to kill Windows Explorer too. You should be able to do that - Ctrl-Alt-Del, select Explorer and then End Task, then you might need to pick End Task again to actually kill it. It'll probably restart automatically, although unfortunately without your system tray icons there. If I recall correctly, if it doesn't restart, then you can hit Ctrl-Esc and get a Windows 3.x-style Task Manager which has a Run menu option you can use to restart Explorer.

Reply 2 of 36, by winuser_pl

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Yes, closing IE is not causing any substancial drop in memory usage. I think I will go with another motherboard (ASUS CUSL2-C) with Pentium III and SDR memory.
Will throw 128 or 256 megs or whatever it needs 😁

PC1: Highscreen => FIC PA-2005, 64 MB EDO RAM, Pentium MMX 200, S3 Virge + Voodoo 2 8 MB
PC2: AOpen => GA-586SG, 512 MB SDRAM, AMD K6-2 400 MHz, Geforce 2 MX 400

Reply 3 of 36, by doshea

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

I assume you're solving it with more RAM because the leak is relatively slow? How long does it take to start swapping with 64MB? I'm just curious in case I hit it myself.

If you could narrow down what causes the leak - maybe installing an older version of IE helps - then it might be easier to figure out if there was a patch to fix the leak, although the process of narrowing it down could be quite annoying! When I checked quickly, I found some patches for memory leaks in the Windows 95 kernel and TCP/IP stack, but they were all things which should have already been fixed in 4.0.950B.

Reply 4 of 36, by winuser_pl

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

It is up to 5 max 10 minutes and it is swapping like crazy

PC1: Highscreen => FIC PA-2005, 64 MB EDO RAM, Pentium MMX 200, S3 Virge + Voodoo 2 8 MB
PC2: AOpen => GA-586SG, 512 MB SDRAM, AMD K6-2 400 MHz, Geforce 2 MX 400

Reply 5 of 36, by doshea

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Ouch! I tried installing Windows 95 4.0.950B and IE 5.01 in a Bochs VM, used IE a little, and didn't see any leak. When I was setting up networking, it prompted to overwrite various system files, so I suppose it's possible in Windows 95 that even though 95B already had fixes for memory leaks, older system files could accidentally be installed over the top. From what you installed, though, that is unlikely!

Reply 6 of 36, by winuser_pl

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Maybe I should give a try with Windows 95C ?

PC1: Highscreen => FIC PA-2005, 64 MB EDO RAM, Pentium MMX 200, S3 Virge + Voodoo 2 8 MB
PC2: AOpen => GA-586SG, 512 MB SDRAM, AMD K6-2 400 MHz, Geforce 2 MX 400

Reply 7 of 36, by doshea

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

I'm not sure if 95C would help!

I was wondering what is different between your install and mine. I'm using a different video card, and possibly different network card. I wonder if memory leaks in drivers are possible and/or common?

I also forgot to mention that Process Explorer might be useful - perhaps you could figure out whether there is a particular process whose memory usage is increasing.

Reply 9 of 36, by Jo22

User metadata
Rank l33t++
Rank
l33t++

"Memory management in Windows 98 and Windows Millennium Edition (WinME) is dramatically improved over what existed in Windows 95. It is so much improved that, for nearly everyone, nearly all the time, the best recommendations on how best to optimize memory usage in Win98 is: Let Windows handle it. "

Source:
https://web.archive.org/web/20040410084807/ht … 4/a/memmgmt.php

"Time, it seems, doesn't flow. For some it's fast, for some it's slow.
In what to one race is no time at all, another race can rise and fall..." - The Minstrel

//My video channel//

Reply 10 of 36, by doshea

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member
auron wrote on 2023-05-25, 21:38:

um, this very much seems like the old win95 issue of vcache growing out of control on high RAM machines...

http://www.putergeek.com/vcache/

Thanks for the info! I wasn't aware of this back in the day but my PC at the time probably didn't have a "large" amount of RAM. I checked and I initially only had 8MB in the machine I put Windows 95 on!

It looks like this is Memory Manager -> Disk cache size in System Monitor? It certainly grows and causes free memory to drop, and swapping to start, once I start copying around or downloading a lot of files. I wasn't doing much disk I/O in my previous test.

I was wondering if it could be a disk cache issue, but I had imagined that Windows wasn't advanced enough back then to have a dynamic disk cache size.

Reply 11 of 36, by winuser_pl

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Yeah exactly, I was doing a lot of I/O operations including transferring files over LAN, extracting archives on HDD and so on when dis trashing started occur and swapping a lot. But these files were not big, up to 70MB I think.
I'd say disk cache that's ok but this never should cause swapping the memory of regular programs work set. Programs should have been prioritized over disk cache.

PC1: Highscreen => FIC PA-2005, 64 MB EDO RAM, Pentium MMX 200, S3 Virge + Voodoo 2 8 MB
PC2: AOpen => GA-586SG, 512 MB SDRAM, AMD K6-2 400 MHz, Geforce 2 MX 400

Reply 13 of 36, by auron

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie
doshea wrote on 2023-05-26, 03:18:

Thanks for the info! I wasn't aware of this back in the day but my PC at the time probably didn't have a "large" amount of RAM. I checked and I initially only had 8MB in the machine I put Windows 95 on!

according to this source, it's an issue with >48mb. this still would fall into the win95 era because PCs were frequently sold with win95b/c and 64mb in 1997. i'm guessing some OEMs probably put the tweak in system.ini, otherwise the fix was fairly well publicized in magazines of the time.

Reply 14 of 36, by leonardo

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Just so you know, installing Internet Explorer and the shell update cause a whole host of these memory leak issues on Windows 95.

At least I seem to recall Nathan Lineback had documented some issues down to various DLLs that were broken in those updates. You can see his website for more info (although, there is a lot of angry ranting there, so be prepared for that).

This is one of the reasons one should always install Windows 95 without Internet Explorer. The modification for skipping anything Internet Explorer-related during installation is as simple as editing a couple of .inf-files before running setup. This way one gets the benefits of OSR2 (better hardware support, AGP, etc.) but none of the downsides (slow buggy shell, memory leaks, etc.).

Unless of course you have an application that depends on having Internet Explorer installed. In that case it's probably better to just install Windows 98 SE.

[Install Win95 like you were born in 1985!] on systems like this or this.

Reply 15 of 36, by Jo22

User metadata
Rank l33t++
Rank
l33t++
auron wrote on 2023-05-26, 10:46:
doshea wrote on 2023-05-26, 03:18:

Thanks for the info! I wasn't aware of this back in the day but my PC at the time probably didn't have a "large" amount of RAM. I checked and I initially only had 8MB in the machine I put Windows 95 on!

according to this source, it's an issue with >48mb. this still would fall into the win95 era because PCs were frequently sold with win95b/c and 64mb in 1997. i'm guessing some OEMs probably put the tweak in system.ini, otherwise the fix was fairly well publicized in magazines of the time.

That's why I've used Windows 95 on 386/486 era hardware only.
My gut feelings always told me that Windows 95 emerged from Windows 3.1x and that it is very dated. PCI, AGP, ACPI, USB etc. - those are all alien technologies to Windows 95.

At its core, I believe, Windows 95 still expects to see a 386 system with an MFM or ESDI-era HDD Controller, VGA graphics and ISA bus.
The rest is pretty much shoehorned around Windows 95.

If we're being fancy, a quick 486 with VLB graphics and SCSI drives will do.
Memory should be in the range of 16, 24 or 32 MB. Past ca. 32MB, the heavy disk swapping will stop.

Also, Windows 95 was best suited for running Windows 3.1 era applications.
Be it 16-Bit or 32-Bit types (Win32s or NT 3.x).
That's where Windows 95 did shine. IMHO.

For serious work, Windows 9x wasn't ready up until Windows 98SE.
It's essentially the final, stable version of Windows 95.

Of course, nostalgia isn't about logical thinking. Some grew up with Windows 95 and want to re-live the old days. That's okay. 🙂

"Time, it seems, doesn't flow. For some it's fast, for some it's slow.
In what to one race is no time at all, another race can rise and fall..." - The Minstrel

//My video channel//

Reply 16 of 36, by the3dfxdude

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member
Jo22 wrote on 2023-05-26, 20:10:

That's why I've used Windows 95 on 386/486 era hardware only.
My gut feelings always told me that Windows 95 emerged from Windows 3.1x and that it is very dated. PCI, AGP, ACPI, USB etc. - those are all alien technologies to Windows 95.

For the initial release version yes. But later Microsoft supported these items for manufacturers as Win95 had a long life. Disagree about PCI.

At its core, I believe, Windows 95 still expects to see a 386 system with an MFM or ESDI-era HDD Controller, VGA graphics and IS […]
Show full quote

At its core, I believe, Windows 95 still expects to see a 386 system with an MFM or ESDI-era HDD Controller, VGA graphics and ISA bus.
The rest is pretty much shoehorned around Windows 95.

If we're being fancy, a quick 486 with VLB graphics and SCSI drives will do.
Memory should be in the range of 16, 24 or 32 MB. Past ca. 32MB, the heavy disk swapping will stop.

No, Win95 really was designed for the Pentium 60-90 with IDE and SVGA accelerators which you didn't see as much in Win3.1. It had to support some of the older stuff, yes, but the best experience is when people upgraded the CPU, which you would see these larger RAM amounts (16-32) in these pentium systems. Frankly, if you had a 386 or low end 486 of the day, you probably were better off waiting and kept running Win3.1.

Also, Windows 95 was best suited for running Windows 3.1 era applications. Be it 16-Bit or 32-Bit types (Win32s or NT 3.x). That […]
Show full quote

Also, Windows 95 was best suited for running Windows 3.1 era applications.
Be it 16-Bit or 32-Bit types (Win32s or NT 3.x).
That's where Windows 95 did shine. IMHO.

For serious work, Windows 9x wasn't ready up until Windows 98SE.
It's essentially the final, stable version of Windows 95.

Of course, nostalgia isn't about logical thinking. Some grew up with Windows 95 and want to re-live the old days. That's okay. 🙂

Win95 was intended to be backwards compatible as it was an upgrade to the Windows technology, so indeed ran Win3.1 stuff, and quite well since Win95's kernel was a substantial improvement. It really was Win4.0, albeit, loaded on top of DOS. Win98/98SE/ME were really just polished up versions just to justify their position in the market that they were staying up to date. Anyway going back to Win95, there were newer APIs introduced with it, and of course no software would use it day one (unless you were already using win32s, an early version that was really targeting win95 anyway). But once software was written for Win95, it was definitely a step forward and really the APIs were used through to the end of Win9x in late 2000, when it started to be phased out. Software was still being released that could run on Win95 even up to 2000!

As far as VCACHE, that really does bring back memories. But yeah, the fact they even had settings for this they knew it needed tuning to make some of these older systems run snappier. It was just a guess for what was needed at the time. Arguably, it was a minor mistake, but it's hard to say it mattered in the retail lifetime of Win95, and it got tuned anyway. This stuff still affects OS kernels to this day at a different scale, people arguing over what gives faster performance or not. I think it is awesome you could even tune stuff like this anymore, as most OS don't even expose stuff as easy as editing an .ini anymore 🙁

As far as running Win95 today on today's overpowered machines? I mean I dunno. WinME and WinVista probably would be mucho better!

Reply 17 of 36, by auron

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

yeah, have to concur with win95 really feeling at home on those expensive pentiums of its day, i don't see the argument for running it on most 486s and certainly not 386 machines. all the software that came out for it clearly targeted pentiums from the beginning, so if you didn't need that new software, why torture those older machines with win95 in the first place? even a p60 is somewhat borderline and may have been better off running wfw3.11 if a snappy GUI experience was preferred over the newest games.

in terms of RAM, the common 8mb at the time was a bit iffy for win95, but it was also well publicized at the time that upgrading to 16mb was in order. that amount was fine for the average user in 1995-6, the bump to 32mb was only needed if desiring to run certain DOS games under 95 or for later games. PCI is enumerated in device manager and i'm not aware of any issues with it really, but AGP and USB - those definitely feel bolted on in later OSR revisions, but that was two years after the original release. even then, AFAIK AGP cards will still function as regular PCI cards even in 95 retail.

overall, i think vista might be a good comparison, which also just felt pointless at the time if you didn't have a core2 machine with 4 gigs of RAM...

Reply 18 of 36, by Jo22

User metadata
Rank l33t++
Rank
l33t++

Guys, I can understand your nostalgic feelings for Windows 95.
But realistically speaking, it was one big mess and unfinished.
The relationship between Windows 3.1x, Win32s and other legacy technologies is much bigger than you may think.

The whole VXD model originated from the *.386 drivers in 3.x. That's why it was "a pile of bad drivers" at some point, its skeleton is an interconnection of poorly written VXDs.

Windows 95 is (was) Windows 3.1x on sugar, with the old core components (GDI, USER, KERNEL) being massively hacked to match Windows NT 3.x in terms of features (NT4 was released after Win95).
Windows 95 was never meant to last, it was intended as a quick&dirty intermediate solution.
The whole 16<>32-Bit thunking going on behind the curtain says a lot.
That goes so far that some Windows 3.1x applications can run fine on Windows 95 RTM, but face compatibility issues with late Windows 95 (say 95C) or 98.

And that's why I said PCI was like an alien technology to Windows 95.
Unlike Windows 3.1x, which lets the third-party drivers fiddle with physical hardware freely, Windows 95 prefers to use drivers for this.

It actively sees things like USB host controllers and PCI bridges and tries to initialize them, which is hit and miss. In parts because of 95's immaturity.
(In best cases, no harm is done and a yellow mark is shown in device manager.)

That's why PS/2 emulation for USB mice and keyboards (via BIOS) go away once Windows 95 detects them. Or tries to do so.
To be fair, Windows 98SE faces the same phenomenon here, but it has at least the necessary drivers included (most of the time).

Edit: Unlike ISA and VLB, PCI is based on Plug&Play and uses active resource management.
Which is either done by PnP-BIOS or the OS ('PnP aware OS: Yes/No' in CMOS Setup).
Old systems like Windows 3.1x don't see PCI and don't fiddle with anything.
They rely on pre-configured settings handled by the hardware (physical jumpers or Setup Utility).
- ISA PnP exists, but is a special case (in between). It can be controlled by utilities or BIOS.

The many Windows 95 releases, RTM/A/B/C, were not simple updates to keep Windows 95 up-to-date.
In reality, Win 95 just wasn't finished at all on its release in the year 1995.
It essentially was an unfinished beta (!) version sold due to time constraints.
That's how bad it was. 😟

However, on existing PCs that were still running Windows 3.1x, the bugs didn't show up so often.
The underlying 3.1 foundation was still in there and drivers for Windows 3.1x could still be used.
Users which did the upgrade installation from 3.1x to 95 were thus being saved from the new, poorly written/immature Windows 95 drivers of the time.

Windows 98, by contrast, tries to break free from that legacy. The WDM drivers were being invented to find a healthy balance between Windows 95's messy, but flexible VXDs and NT's robust, yet static drivers.

The whole memory management in Windows 98SE is more elegant.
It's like a re-implemtation of VCACHE in some ways.
The virtual machine monitor, VMM, in Windows 98SE is more feature complete, too.

It's mainly the portly responding GUI (Explorer) introduced in Windows 95 with Active Desktop that makes Windows 98SE appear slower.
Tools like 98Lite can help here, though.

Edited. Edited.

Edit: I guess we could also say that Windows 95 was like an infection or parasite,
from the point of view of the old Windows 3.x foundation.
It grew around the existing functions and took over certain processes..
Like a slime fungus who replaces its host from the inside.
It also did mimicry by using thunking in order to appear to 3.x components as if it was one of them. Like in the insect world. 😉
All in all, Windows 95 has/had a lot of zombie-esque attributes I must say. That's both cool and uncanny.

"Time, it seems, doesn't flow. For some it's fast, for some it's slow.
In what to one race is no time at all, another race can rise and fall..." - The Minstrel

//My video channel//

Reply 19 of 36, by the3dfxdude

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member
Jo22 wrote on 2023-05-27, 00:49:

Guys, I can understand your nostalgic feelings for Windows 95.

I pretty much responded to the point that Win95 was intended for 386/486 the same as Win3.1 saying it was based on the same code. I don't agree with that, and I wouldn't recommend anyone to use it that way. In fact most reviewers at the time seem to suggest that it was better for the mainstream pentium level machines of the day. Maybe your statement could make sense to someone that briefly tried Win95 on release with a 386/486, and then turned around and went back to Win3.1 because it ran all their apps anyway. So I'd simply say that Win95 was not a simple hacked up version of Win3.1. I used it from 95 to about 2000, when I briefly got my copies of 98SE and ME, then switched to linux a few months later. It was fine for computers of the time and ran all the same apps as the later 98/ME did as I said, so what is the disadvantage really? Not much.

Every major OS release has problems, yes. But I do think based on everything that happened Win95 was not a "beta" disaster and was well received by millions at retail at release, and led to 98/ME a few years later anyway. Does that make me nostalgic for it? No. I haven't ran it since about the time I switched to Linux more than 20 years ago. The only Windows release I didn't really like was WinXP, and that was because of software activation. But as I switched to Linux that didn't affect me, and I don't know too much how Microsoft treats their customers with OS installs after that point so... I guess Windows has mostly been ok over its entire course of history? We'll see when Windows 12 finally hits.