I would almost suggest that a DOS-based archiving program would work, but I don't know for sure how you would go about preserving long filenames. If someone else could chime in and suggest a DOS archiver with LFN support, that would be awesome.

I've never actually tried it, but the command-line version of 7Zip supposedly works under DOS if you use HX DOS Extender.

PKZip added long file name support in version 2.50.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PKZIP

Presumably the Info-Zip DOS port will also do the trick.
http://www.info-zip.org/Zip.html

But I understand what Mr. Keropi means when he seeks a more elegant solution. I just can't think of what such a solution would be.

IMO, the more elegant solution would be a more elegant batch file. With conditionals, variables, and the CHOICE command, you can do all sorts of cool shit.

thanks for all your replies, it seems I must do it with a batch + LFN tsr + PKZIP , if it isn't gonna be pretty then at least it can be a format that can be opened easily 😀

most files required for bare-minimalist win9x to function are in 8.3 format,
you can tell by listing the file-list from win9x .CAB files, all of them're 8.3 compliant.

^ sure, but one also needs to archive "Program Files" , it's contents and/or even folders on Desktop , these use long file names...

Of course I don't know what your ultimate goal is but a minimal BartPE Windows xp you can boot might do the trick as well. That might be way over your machine's specs though 😉

^ my ultimate goal is to have a simple backup of my 98SE setup, so I can test a bunch of crap/drivers/hardware and not having to worry about conflicts or garbage in the system, test and then restore to a "clean" 98SE state... 😀
The machine is a p200mmx/128MB and 98SE ...
Did some tests and pkzip2.50 + doslfn works just fine, I can archive and restore LFN dirs/files in dos just fine, so I'll use that 😉

keropi wrote:

^ my ultimate goal is to have a simple backup of my 98SE setup, so I can test a bunch of crap/drivers/hardware and not having to worry about conflicts or garbage in the system, test and then restore to a "clean" 98SE state... 😀
The machine is a p200mmx/128MB and 98SE ...
Did some tests and pkzip2.50 + doslfn works just fine, I can archive and restore LFN dirs/files in dos just fine, so I'll use that 😉

PowerQuest DriveImage runs in DOS.... 😎

Yes it does. However, as one might guess from its name, it is a drive imaging program. And for some strange reason I get the feeling that's not quite what the OP is looking for. 😉

keropi, in the title of the thread, wrote:

Is there a DOS util that can backup/restore win9x installations? (no drive imaging)

keropi wrote:

I am not looking for a drive/partition image tool, just something that you pick directories to be saved and it creates a backup on the disk.