2 software requests.

Hi I'm using my backup computer right now, as my good one went kaput, and I need a program that will force my driverless videocard to display a higher colour depth (it will only do 16 colours right now).

It's driverless because the only OS I have that will work with my network card is Windows 2000, and the video card's driver only supports Windows 95 (it's a very old card - only 1 MB of RAM).

I know for a fact that it can display at least 256 colours (I tested it with Windows 95).

Please help. I can't stand this crappy colour any more.

Also, can you recommend a good browser for this computer? It's a Pentium 1 with 64 MB of RAM. Half the sites that I access with any IE powered browser crash, and the non-IE powered browser that I'm using now (OffByOne) barely has any features.

This is my only backup computer, and I don't have any better parts for it. It'll be a few days before I can fix my good one.

Again, please help.

Can't help with the video card drivers, but when I had to do some work on older computers, K-Meleon worked quite nicely as a lightweight browser.

Since the machine is so old and light. This is a good time for a lightweight Linux distro. You will not have to worry about much besides the install. With modern Linux installs, it is just about as easy as installing Windows.

You will have everything you need and ready to go out of the box kind of. No hunting for drivers or installing a modern browser. Plus a nice perk of no need for virus scanners and such. So you will get a bump there.

Do you know how to burn a ISO to disc? Or know what an ISO is? If not chime back in and I would be glad to help you.
http://www.xubuntu.org/

A nice little read.
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-lwl1/

I thought 2k could make use of 95 drivers, what video card is it?

Opera or an old version of Netscape could be alternatives for a browser.

It's generally not good for web browsing, maybe firefox and flashblock, Pentium 1 + flash = die.

The video card is a Trident Super VGA, and I have tried every possible driver I could find. None of them will work with 2000.

I do know how to burn ISO's, but this computer doesn't have a CD burner on it, and I'd prefer not to remove the one in my good computer.

That K-Meleon browser works nicely. Many thanks.

I have a Trident SVGA card (only 512KB though, you must have the deluxe version ) And to the best of my recollection, you need to just use a VESA driver for it, rather than a manufacturer specific one. I think many cards of that era were the same way..

TurboChickenMan said:

The video card is a Trident Super VGA, and I have tried every possible driver I could find. None of them will work with 2000.

I do know how to burn ISO's, but this computer doesn't have a CD burner on it, and I'd prefer not to remove the one in my good computer.

That K-Meleon browser works nicely. Many thanks.

Click to expand...

Linux tends to have decent support for older hardware (we call them light) and he was advocating you to install a version of linux that was optimized to use few system resources (such as Feather, Damn Small Linux, etc). To do this you make an install CD buy burning the ISO (that can be downloaded from the internet for free) and installing it on your computer.
The appeal of this is that the linux distro is current (while your windows is not really supported anymore) and uses less memory and CPU to run then the windows version.
This will allow your computer to run faster when you're using it.

If the card was newer. I would of never made the hint of Linux. I tried the thing of looking for older drivers, on an older machine. I felt worn out doing it. The VESA drivers in some Linux are actually good enough to run web surf fun. The JAVA and Flash will run, tho slow. Since you are not pushing a virus scanner and firewall suite. You have enough, to just use the machine.

For old tried and true machines. Linux is a good pick. Plus some of the games that run in it are kinda fun for the "what you are using"/

If the machine had a new vid card. I would of never chimed in. If the OP is in the US. I will burn whatever disc is needed and send it (I will ask for no cost), gratis. I think in this case. Linux is, more then just promote Linux. It is a good call.

I would use Linux if I could, but I clearly mentioned earlier that this machine doesn't have a burner on it.

Enablingwolf said:

If the OP is in the US. I will burn whatever disc is needed and send it (I will ask for no cost), gratis.

Click to expand...

I live in Canada, and even if I did live in the US, my good machine would probably be fixed by the time the disk arrived.

ratbuddy said:

I have a Trident SVGA card (only 512KB though, you must have the deluxe version ) And to the best of my recollection, you need to just use a VESA driver for it, rather than a manufacturer specific one. I think many cards of that era were the same way..

Click to expand...

I don't know anything about VESA drivers. Can I use them with my Windows 2000 installation?

TurboChickenMan said:

I would use Linux if I could, but I clearly mentioned earlier that this machine doesn't have a burner on it.



I live in Canada, and even if I did live in the US, my good machine would probably be fixed by the time the disk arrived.



I don't know anything about VESA drivers. Can I use them with my Windows 2000 installation?

Click to expand...

I'll do 2 things: I'll see if I can find you a VESA driver, and I'll check to see if I still have the box for my Trident SVGA card. I probably do, I save *everything* much to my girlfriend's dismay.

"Do you really need this 2400 baud modem??"

"Honey, that's an external Boca 2400 modem with MNP5 and v.42bis. It'll connect over the dirtiest phone line you can imagine. It'd probably work over a couple of tin cans with a piece of string in between."

"You haven't used dialup in years."

"I better keep it just in case."

etc etc

edit: oh yeah, what model is the card?

I hoard things too, it's fun.

Actually he could have problems with the video card in Linux too.

I have a 433MHz celeron system 256MB ram, and added a TNT2 video card.

I was running an old Xandros install on it fine. Updated and it broke.


tried installing Xubuntu, (fresh DL) and it broke. Onboard worked fine but I could not get the system to recognize the TNT2...

turns out one of the last few kernel updates dropped legacy support (for nVidia, dont know about other brands).

Just my personal experience for yah

ratbuddy said:

edit: oh yeah, what model is the card?

Click to expand...

I'm not quite sure. I think I knew a year ago, but not now. Probably a TVGA8900 or TVGA9000.

I'll check the boot screen later to see what it says.