Installing Windows 95 From 29 Floppy Disks - An Attempt

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Today I'm going to be installing Windows 95 on the famous $5 Windows 98 PC. But to add a little bit of a challenge, I'm going to be installing from 29 floppy diskettes instead of a CD. Will any problems arise? Let's find out!
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#MichaelMJD #Windows95 #FloppyDisks

[@lukebouma9292]

One of my first jobs was installing Windows 98 on school computers. Every computer lab and every class room computer needed to be updated by disk. I would start with the first computer on disk one. When it would finish with disk 1 I would start disk 2 and move on to the next PC to get it started with disk one... By the end of the day I would be walking between 6 different class rooms moving discs around as I installed Windows 98 on 100 computers one disc at a time.

[@brianmadonna2873]

I"m calling bs you would of had a CDROM version of 98.

[@jacobmccloskey171]

@@brianmadonna2873 "school computers". Dumbass, you obviously never seen a computer in school; they are 5 years behind everything else. '98-5= '93. People still had floppys in 98 bro.

[@lukebouma9292]

@@brianmadonna2873 it was a small school that had old computers donated. CD-roms did not come included with this old Windows 95 computers at that time. Was more common than you would think back in the mid 1990s.

[@jimb8201]

I like broccoli and eat it everyday because of the nutrients.

[@talkinglukashenko4303]

@@jimb8201 and?

[@tvg2848]

This video is PLEASE INSERT DISK 2 TO READ THE REST OF THIS COMMENT.

[@relik_star2255]

TVG28 le sue o

[@ruler_of_everything]

*turns pc off *removes DISK01: Installation *inputs DISK02: Installation part 2 *turns pc on

[@ShinK_319]

⚠️DISK READ ERROR Could not find and/or parse COMMENT.TXT Please verify if the disk has no errors. [Retry] [Skip] [Abort]

[@fran5678can]

Minecraft 3D (1991) in a nutshell

[@FunkyFurret]

*inserts disk 2*

[@raydeen2k]

In the year 2525, Michael is still installing Windows 95. edit: In the early days, MS had no real copy protection on their products. In most cases, you could totally make up a product key and it would work. For OS and Office software and some other things, you were required to allow the machine to write to the disk during install. This then marked the disc with your name and serial key so that it was loosely tied to you. You could still give out the software to anyone, but it would be personalized specifically to you. I took an old copy of Word for either DOS or Win 3.11 that my father in law wasn't using anymore and during the install, it came up with his name and info. I wasn't a fan of it, so I went back to whatever it was that I was using at the time (probably WordPerfect).

[@furryface1057]

i'd still be using Win XP Pro

[@mattelder1971]

111-11111111 was a really common one that worked on a LOT of old MS software.

[@lnxpro]

@@mattelder1971 yup. and if 111-1111111 failed you could always use the 112-1111111 product key. lol

[@LonelyMarowak]

@@mattelder1971I know I’m three years late here, but sometimes, you could also use another software’s product key. For example, at one point, I had both Monster Truck Madness and Gex. The Gex CD I had didn’t seem to work anymore, but before I got rid of it, I randomly decided to see if I could install Monster Truck Madness with Gex’s product key. It worked totally fine.

[@bipangshuchowdhury8152]

LOL

[@tomh3599]

I remember doing this. A nightmare. Back then, believe it or not, it wasn't how long it took. It was the fear that it would freeze at 98% on day two and you ended up with a brick! No internet, not forums, no google help. And Microsoft wasn't exactly helpful.

[@enriquejara699]

*FEEL THE TRUE WINDOWS 95 INSTALLATION*

[@NMDavid]

y e s

[@auto1lija]

Yes

[@user-pr9lw9de8j]

yes.

[@crackzonemobile2264]

Yes

[@5cover]

yes!

[@RedPandaGames75]

install office 97 proffessional plus from floppy disks there are around 45 of them

[@MichaelMJD]

If I can get my hands on a copy of that, I will. That would be worth recording haha

[@tschetatsch]

There is copy of floppy discs of office 97 in internet. Just get 45 floppies to save in ‘em

[@brandonupchurch7628]

You'll have to spend hours low level reformatting the disks since almost all of the office 97 disks are DMF, it'd probably take almost a full day alone just to reformat that many floppies, then you have to write the images after that and have the inevitable set back of one of your 20+ year old floppies being bad when you go to use it.

[@tschetatsch]

Bad idea

[@jamesshanks2614]

Over 18 years ago I installed win95 from floppies, That's floppy started finishing the installation then stopped from one missing file. I threw the floppies out.

[@plasticuproject]

I remember trying to install 95 like this on a 386 with my dad and failing. We had no idea what we were doing.

[@coydog7902]

How did you fail? What step were you at?

[@plasticuproject]

@@coydog7902 This was probably 25 years ago and I was just a boy. I don't think the computer had enough resources, either disk space or RAM, to support the OS. We were probably getting errors but didn't even know it. But it's hard to remembered it was so long ago.

[@andrejkiss]

I had a similar experience with my dad, installing CorelDraw 2.0 from floppies from 11PM to 3AM. In the end it didn't work, because a lot of files couldn't be read, and each had to be OK-ed to skip, that's why it took so long. We also had no idea what we were doing but it was great.

[@rockslide2258]

Those 386 machine were r-e-a-l-l-y slow and the diskettes frequently had read errors. The record slow computers were the ancient IBM PCs. Boot up time was 4 to 5 minutes, including the mandatory memory verification. Don't know what the CPU speed was. Sixteen megabytes (NOT gigs) of RAM was a large computer in the days of highly compact DOS. Those "toy" computers were quite a novelty in the days when big iron (or big blue) (IBM mainframes) reigned supreme. To people with fore sight, those "toy" computers were the early sign of a coming crack in the armor of big iron.

[@zenkim6709]

@plasticuproject > I remember trying to install [Windows] 95 like this on a 386 with my dad and failing. Trust me ... U didn't miss much. Technically, a 386DX (33MHz clock) -based PC would've met the minimum system requirements in order 2 run Win95 -- but only if "run" covers "run like an asthmatic pig". I once had the (dubious) privilege of seeing what an actual Win95 installation looks like on a 386 PC (because some self-styled "junkyard PC" enthusiast insisted on showing his recently-scavenged 386DX junker laptop, massive & heavy w/ a ginormous power brick & a painfully motion-blurry [passive matrix] monochrome LCD display) & the results were, well ... certain expressions come 2 mind: "underwhelming" ... "same-day service" ... "like watching paint dry" ... "tragically ridiculous" ... "so bad it's good" (as in "awful to the point where it becomes hilarious" -- like the infamous Ed Wood movie "Plan 9 from Outer Space") ... "mind-boggling" (as in "who the devil would actually want 2 *install* this on a 386 -- let alone USE it?!?") 2 give U an idea of just how much of an (unintentional?) joke this was, the aforementioned PC enthusiast demonstrated that the Plug-N-Play feature of Win95 was functional by popping in a PCMCIA device (I forget exactly what type) into 1 of the laptop's open exapnsion bays ... & I swear 2 U I could see the horizontal progress bar tick *pixel by pixel* from left 2 right on the once-infamous "Windows has detected new hardware and is automatically installing driver software for your device" popup window. The only rational reasons I can think of as 2 why anyone would want 2 use a 386-based Win95 PC like that R: (a) U just wanted 2 find out 4 yourself if the Minimum System Requirements would result in a (barely) functional Win95 install, or (b) U wanted a humorously horrific example of the difference between "minimal but useable" vs. "minimal 2 the point of insanity" -- i.e.: "you'd have to be out of your damn mind to even contemplate using this".

[@antaeus000]

65,536 bytes in bad sectors? I think your hard drive might be failing and need replacing 😞

[@sburton015]

On my old Toshiba Satellite 330 CDS laptop, I remember running the scandisk in MSDOS and it said that it has 0 bytes in bad sectors and it still has its original 4.1 GB hard drive with a manufacture date of October of 1998.

[@pentiummmx2294]

That hdd is about to die, i had many hdds die from bad sectors, it is inevitable, nothing lasts forever.

[@professionally.n00bi46]

that's about 65.5 kb! So little!

[@bdhale34]

@@professionally.n00bi46 it's exactly 64 kilobytes

[@ChloekabanOfficial]

@@bdhale34 It's 64 kilobytes if you follow the 1,024 rule. Professional LY. n00Bi was following the 1,000 rule.

[@halbouma6720]

I was thinking when I saw this video headline that no floppy disk install attempt would be complete without having damaged disks. Thanks for keeping true to historical accuracy. lol...

[@willmurphy3012]

I've done that....will never forget how ridiculous it was. I can tell you all the floppys were beige...I didn't have a working CD, so I had no choice but to install by floppy. Now, imagine a 4 hour download of internet explorer over modem and have someone call an hour before completing it and having to download the entire thing all over again.

[@dougherbert7899]

Will Murphy I did this successfully back in the day, all my disks were beige

[@hjackson.92]

Someone attempting to make a call while I was downloading something via a modem was exactly how my first PC got fried about 16 years ago.

[@blahajenthusiast101]

@@hjackson.92 Uh those were the days, modem was painfully slow:(

[@aared]

Did you forget to put up a "don't call me" sign? :(

[@captmcneil]

I'm sure someone told you this already, but just in case: some laptops or computers from that time (thinking of Toshiba Satellite 200CDT/CDS) came with the option of Win95 / Win3.11 and on first launch you had to choose which one you want. It then allowed you to create the setup disks. For this, they usually provided you with the floppy disk stickers for both options, but you obviously had to buy the diskettes yourself. I might still have a set of unused 95 stickers lying around somewhere. If you already knew this, I have a video suggestion: could you recover the setup files for both OSes on one of these computers? What's on the disk before they make you choose?

[@tomh3599]

As for the disks being genuine or not, I think I remember getting computers with the system installed and you had to create the disks yourself as a 'backup'. I don't remember getting labels to stick on them but that might have happened. So you could end up with original labels on a load of odd disks.

[@peteriskrumings8771]

5:29 I remember you couldn't just copy diskettes with setup files to other diskettes because Microsoft used advanced DMF formatting with 1.68MB instead of 1.44MB and you needed special DOS utility to be able to format or read from that capacity... 8:45 it was not that uncommon that the setup freezes in the middle you could just have restarted your PC, setup was programmed in a way that it knows which part of driver detection/installation caused the PC to freeze and it will bypass that part and continue installation like nothing happened. It may happen even 2 or 3 times but eventually you will get windows installed.

[@dallardyce]

I'm pretty sure when setting up my dad's first PC (from PC World, here in the UK) we had to create installation media as part of the setup on first boot. The computer came with the labels but you had to supply your own disks. Imagine buying a brand new computer and then having to spend all that time writing 30-odd floppy disks!

[@Dazlidorne]

Found in an old forum... GregM August 19, 2005 at 11:16 am My wife got a Digital notebook at one time that came with Windows 95 pre-installed, but didn’t include distribution media. What it included was a set of 30 floppy disk labels, and a utility to create the distribution media on 30 floppies that you provided. We actually created them, just in case. (It was a work computer, so we didn’t have to buy the floppies.) So these actually did exist.

[@MichaelMJD]

Thanks for looking into this! So maybe these disks were official after all

[@Dazlidorne]

@@MichaelMJD That would explain how professional the labels looked and the floppies being branded.

[@pwood6446]

@@MichaelMJD Yep. But only will reinstall on that machine, no doubt.

[@esseferio]

Now, that was a real good incentive for a CDROM purchase! :)

[@firebucket8203]

now install windows 98 from 30 floppy discs

[@msinfo32]

98 would be like 40 but by then floppy disks were bigger so like 10

[@Blood-PawWerewolf]

JakeFox actually 39 floppies

[@msinfo32]

@@Blood-PawWerewolf I didn't do some research just thought about it

[@Flandz420]

But there’s actually a super rare windows 98 floppy disk version (There was also an SE version as well) that you could ONLY order from Microsoft.

[@supakusuta]

Its floppy disk, not disc, a *disk* is a magnetic *disk* like a Hard Drive or a floppy, a *disc* is a optical *disc* like a Compact Disc (CD) or a Digital Versatile Disc (DVD).

[@JosephX]

Hey Michael, I think the reason windows 95 can't install those files is because the disks are starting to go bad, (... they are 20-some years old) and have cyclic redundancy error (a.k.a bad clusters). So, the part of the disk that has the directory structure is still good, but the part that has the data for the files is not, which is why you can see what is on the disk but not read it. I believe the command to help fix this is "scandisk /autofix /surface A:" but its been a while since I done stuff like this. Another good way to figure out if this is the problem is, listen to the drive sounds when reading the floppy disk, the drive will make a different reading sound when it tries to read a bad cluster. Also, when it locked up at 80-some %, I believe it was the hardware scan, that happens a lot when installing win95 on a vm or on a computer newer than 1996. Plus, my dad had a "make your own" windows 98 start up disk that had a disk label and brand label just like your 29 win95 disks. A lot of OEM computers from the mid 90's came with programs to make backup installation disks. My toshiba portege 610ct came with a program that made installation disks for all the toshiba OEM software and parts of win95. Perhaps, your 29 win95 disks are something like that. ??? Hope this helps :)

[@MichaelMJD]

Thanks for posting this! If those disks ever end up on the channel again I will keep this in mind for sure. Could definitely be due to age.

[@JosephX]

@@MichaelMJD your welcome

[@DrachenYT]

I admire the attempt, good sir. Dealing with that many disks is not for the faint of heart. Shame it didn't pan out.

[@NascarMario]

The piracy message and the computer freezing is like one of those anti-piracy creepy videos

[@jniska]

For those of us that has experienced this epic time of events; videos like this are crazily addictive 😅😅😅

[@marcp.]

20:44 is the moment I enjoy so much 2019 and being able to install Windows 10 in 20 minutes from a usb stick.

[@matthewrobinson1699]

20:06 EXPLORER?! That IS crucial for Windows!

[@leok6138]

My first computer back in 1996 or 1997 came with an album full of Win95 floppy stickers, exactly like the ones on this video. Interestingly the computer came with a CD-Rom version of Win95. FYI, it was a Toshiba Infinia bought at Comp USA

[@furryface1057]

could be humidity and age messing with the diskettes

[@Kresh42]

"Hey Smokers, Duraga1 here" oh wait. Wrong channel.

[@gustavrsh]

Not enough SSDs

[@Johnhet09]

This guy sounds like a better version of Microsoft Sam.

[@NathanHunt]

Microsoft was well known for once windows was installed when it did the cleaning up section it corrupted the disks. So you need to enable the write protect tab on the floppy disk

[@Dr-Random]

Maybe he didn’t know that.

[@taz7264]

"you have selected microsoft sam as the computer's default voiiiiice" thats wthat i heard upon hearing your voice

[@rockslide2258]

"sam" was the free voice. You had to pay to get a sexy Suzie.

[@airfixer9461]

Great video! If I remember well the disks are 'legit'. In those days when you bought a new pc the Windows installation files were on your new OEM PC HD. When booted the first thing you had to do was choose the language (in Belgium in those days Dutch, French, German or English), the pc would boot up in the chosen language (the others wouldn't be available anymore afterwards). The next thing to do was to 'backup' your Win95 OS disks. You had to get the 29 empty diskettes ready and a special software tool on the pc wrote the entire OS to the provided disks. Therefore, in the systems documentation there were the 29 floppy diskette labels provided that you could stick up on every disk after it was written 'I think the screen mentioned the correct nr of the disk). Possibly the copying went wrong somewhere on your disks and files didn't write correctly or sectors on the disk were damaged and info was lost so the system couldn't correctly read the files from disk. Aaaaaah...those happy floppy days... :-)

[@hardies1]

@MichaelMJD What you have there is actually an OEM disk set. The Windows 95 manual that was included with some new computers also included a set of floppy disk labels. There would have also been a utility included on the computer that allowed you to create your own set of Windows 95 installation disks. I actually have an unused set of those labels in one of my Windows 95 manuals.

[@asingh53]

I must say its pretty cool to see some of this old tech. My first home pc was a windows 95 so I feel like that was the first OS I was ever saw and it holds a special place for me. My grandfather had a windows 3.1 system and to see how different it was compared to 95 was amazing. Great video, I really enjoyed it!

[@MichaelMJD]

Glad you enjoyed it! Thanks for watching

[@rockslide2258]

Win 3.1 with graphics was a huge leap over plain DOS. That really launched Microsoft. One of my employers was using win 3.11 for networking (worked but needed rebooting at unpredictable intervals). Save your work often.

[@dominikschutz6300]

Your disks are old, they may have disk rot. Demagnetized or surface rot (you could whipe that off with a cotton swap and windex) :)

[@rockslide2258]

Breathe on them and wipe them on your sleeve.

[@brandontechnerd]

disc rot is only a thing with optical media like laserdisc, cd, dvd and blu-ray, unless the diskette has mold

[@dominikschutz6300]

@@brandontechnerd Mold it is. Mostly involved in rotting things :) Very common in floppy disks (magnetic surface looks looks dull and moldy). I open them up and remove it with windex and cotton swabs, works very often :)

[@DxDeksor]

I might have the answer why there are genuine stickers on fujifilm disks. Few years ago I bought two sealed Windows 95 licenses ... that contained only the licence and these stickers. No floppy disks. I don't know why microsoft did that (maybe you had your computer with 95 pre-installed and you were supposed to generate the windows 95 setup disks by yourself ?)

[@15fakeaccount]

That would might explain these "Copyright Warning"s too.

[@paulobrust]

yes. pre-installed w95. you had to write them to the floppies and label them.

[@CaelThunderwing]

those large "Counterfit disks" those ones that spat the errors, likely are corrupt. (the files its pulling from the .cab file)

[@zwz.zdenek]

You don't say. But his genuine ones were bad too.

[@DamienPup]

@@zwz.zdenek also corrupt

[@KaitoTriforce]

I have never seen original setup disks which are writable. (That hole in the bottom corner) These are definitely not made by Microsoft. ;-)

[@siltdoctor3478]

It amazes me someone would do this

[@yeet9189]

nom

[@linglin92]

also it's hard to find not used disks today(contains first installed data on most web found image).

[@acmenipponair]

My father did this. Because you had a problem, when you wanted to install Windows 95 from a CD drive: When your CD drive was TOO NEW. And too new meant anything younger than 1996 and faster than 2x. Then your only option was... using the diskettes. And no, it wasn't forbidden to make personal copies of the diskettes and even give them your friends. The illegal part would be (as today) typing in a licence code that don't belong to you. Although: Everyone did it, as until Windows 8 there was no mandatory internet activation (even Windows 7 can be still activated by telephone, which means, you call a number, type in your license code on the screen and if the code is genuine, you get a answer code back to fulfill activation. The line is still open because of many MS Developer-versions of Windows 7 and because Windows 7 is not always run from a property with internet connection (like high security facilities)

[@acmenipponair]

ANd, btw, you even could MAKE a disc copy of your Windows 95 in windows 95 itself. The backup function had a function to make a windows disk install :D

[@TheGamingComputerBomb]

the problem is that overtime the floppy disks have decayed and the portions that have decayed just happened to at-least partially contain the missing files

[@SThomas1972]

The was two version of diskettes one the standard 1.44Mb and then there was the a 1.7Mb DMF (distribution media format) this reduces the number of discs to about 24 discs if my memory serves me correct. In the days I supported win95 in the uk on behalf of Microsoft. As for the labels back in the nineties there label had Microsoft was in grey. Also copy the contents to a single folder then run setup from there.

[@deadendwaterfall]

Windows 95 strangely seems to look good on that Dell monitor.......

[@jon8189]

When I saw this I knew that I had to watch this, especially when your tutorial helped me install homebrew on Wii without SD card

[@SakuraShirakawa]

Those kinds of sets usually came from third party shops that had licensed permissions from Microsoft to make backup copies of the installation media for use in their repair shops. The same way that shops in the early 2000s would use the same few OEM discs over and over again.

[@dstarfire42]

I know that an ISP I worked for back then had many sets of these, and (supposedly) a license to redistribute copies. Also, blank diskette labels you could use in your printer were fairly common in those days. Remember the "CD Stomper"? same sort of thing.

[@gjaxson01]

Some computers came without the disk with the OS preinstalled. The computer came with the labels, and you would run a utility that would create the disks for you. Then after you create your backup install of Windows 95 it would self delete the utility. This was mainly done for machines that did not ship with a Cd-Rom drive.

[@masonthedunce3711]

_a e s t h e t i c_

[@cyberwolfe]

0:36 - OH SNAP! This is going to be an adventure! Now you just know that all of those disks are going to be ERROR free right? lol

[@chieflego43]

install windows 10 and gta5 in floppys you need about 750 per GB so thats like around 75000 floppys

[@diog5384]

This comment hurts my brain Lmao!

[@adid.5585]

I haven't interracted with your channel before, but your interrest in oldschool IT really caught my eye. Your videos give me some nice 90s homey vibes and they're so soothing.

[@Dr-Random]

20:01” This feels like a real simulated nightmare!”

[@thewayiigo9886]

Did this on a early computer I had back in late 2000. A 486 DX4 100mhz 24mb ram I think it was like 50 disks in total for full install. Back then people still did not have CD-roms. I remember back in 2002 I was learning in a PC repair shop a lady came in with a computer she had bought new back in around 1987ish it had 2mb ram 30 pin dimms soldered to the board as the board did not have slots. She was happily still using it with windows 3.0 and was playing solitaire on it. I think it had a 40mb HDD. It just goes to show we all did not have access to the latest tech and made do with what we had.

[@TechflashYT]

perhaps the disks are so old that the floppy tape is starting to break down lol

[@MakotoIchinose]

At least Windows 10 installation files doesn't fill an entire Blu-ray disc (which is same as 6 DVDs), and Linux distros doesn't split the installation files into 5 CDs anymore

[@Locutus]

Windows has required larger storage mediums, because of its increasing complexity, and because storage mediums have allowed it to increase. Rather than having to compress all the files as much as possible, and then uncompress them during installation, which slowed the process down, Windows now comes fairly uncompressed, which speeds up installation time significantly.

[@bogroman13]

Progress: 82% Good luck! 🤗

[@marcobonera838]

old habits die hard I guess... still in win10 this torture exists lol

[@nigelcooper1191]

29 floppy disks is still too easy!! For your next challenge I think you should do a video where you try to install Windows 98 First Edition from floppy disks. Windows 98 First Edition was the last version of Windows sold on floppy disks and requires 38 (DMF formatted) floppy disks to install! I would love to see a video on that in the future! (There is no Windows 98 Second Edition on floppies just First Edition)

[@lunakoala5053]

I actually "had" to do it on my first (broken) laptop. I didn't have any special floppies, so I just copied the Win95b install disc to floppies piecemeal and ran the actual setup once everything was copied to the HDD. Oh and btw: I totally had legit looking stickers like those on all my pirated floppies. That was the main reason we got a printer, lol. The trick was to buy the cheap no-name staples floppies that came without branding on the metal piece, this way they looked even more legit.

[@brandonspies]

There is a practical reason for doing this. In about 1998 I had a 486 and I had upgraded my computer before Windows 95 came out with a new sound card that came with a proprietary CD-ROM where the IDE (Data Ribbon) Cable was attached to the sound card. So one day I was tinkering with a setting and wiped the whole computer out, locked up machine no boot. Back then I was in high school so I didn't keep or TEST backups like I do today. Floppy install MS-DOS, then Windows3.1. Went to install my sound card drivers so I can use my CD-ROM and install 95. Nope corrupted floppy disk and a dead CD-ROM. Windows 95 was revolutionary in the way it found and installed drivers compared to 3.1 introducing plug and play devices. Bought another copy of Windows 95, installed it, and boom back in business. Windows handled the drivers itself. It was definitely more that 29 disk by the time you add DOS and 3.1. Then once the drive was online I still had to install Windows 98! Those were the days... ahh the memories!!! Almost as tedious as installing Windows on a Mac with Bootcamp! ;-)

[@MTLbigJ]

This video is 3 years old but I recently purchased a Toshiba Libretto 70CT and it only had a floppy drive. It gave the option to create windows 95 backup disks. A total of 29 for Windows and 7 for drivers and programs. When I reformatted using these disks they were tailored for my Libretto only. I think the reason you ran into these issues and why your disks are on Fujifilm are because they were backup system disks like mine, and when it stopped reading them I am sure its because of a driver issue for hardware the $5 windows 98 PC doesn't have. For those of you who don't know. 95 on floppy is hell on earth. The process of writing my disks, installing and figuring out all the errors has been a total of 6 hours. Not even exaggerating!!!!

[@rostyc]

You could just try installing Windows without any components at all, and then copy any failed files, if needed from another diskette or CD-ROM. Also Windows is looking for files directly in A: directory, not in .cab file, so maybe extracting these .cab files would help. Like, so Michael MJD would see!!!

[@henson2k]

It's amazing how simple Windows 95 was

[@leok6138]

i vividly remember my computer coming with pre-printed stickers for the floppy disks for the user to stick on.

[@otistically]

This thing should worth hundreds, fifty videos and not a single time it died. Respect.

[@elit3darkness]

I could listen to Michael read from a Phonebook all day. Another fun video!

[@mihiguy]

It was common at that time (for floppy installers) to count the installations on the floppy and after a few usages show a warning. (Similar to what happens today when you online activate several times). Write protect the floppy disks to avoid it. About the disk errors: Both disk drives and floppy disks are aging (even when not used) so when today you find 29 floppy disks, the chance that at least one of them is unreadable is quite high. It also happens that a floppy which is unreadable on one drive is still readable on another drive (in another computer). Try to copy the contents (all the files) from MS-DOS prompt to a directory on the hard drive (so you will notice which disks fail, get a good error message, and try copying them on a different machine to a different floppy) and only if they all work, start the setup from hard disk (so you don't have to do the disk swapping during install). Yes, that procedure works with most Microsoft products that came on diskettes. The fact that the directory is readable (= you see the files) does not tell anything about whether the files are actually readable. In case you are interested in preserving your floppies (that don't include any hardware copy protection, but normal Microsoft install floppies don't): Use a tool that can create a disk image file from them and safely store those images on more modern media. For the DMF disks you might still need an old computer with a real floppy controller on the mainboard to format new disks as most USB floppy drives are not able to format floppies in DMF format (and also some virtualization software is not able to emulate them properly). Last but not least, about the FUJI floppies: Some CD editions of Windows 95 came with a tool to create installation floppies (and I believe they also had pictue files you could print on a set of blank stickers), but legally you may not re-sell those floppies without selling the CD as well. Still you would need some high quality printer (which might be not so common in 1995).

[@rockslide2258]

Well written. I've used these life saving methods over the years. Even today on modern hardware, always maintain at least two copies of all critical, non-replaceable data in physically separated areas. Faulty software or computer crashes can destroy data on a physically perfect storage device. Experience talking here.

[@keithwhisman]

I kind of remember back in the day installing DOS 6.22 and copying the floppies over to a directory called cabs on my hard drive and installing windows 95 from there. It might have been a different version but I’m sure it was windows 95.

[@brandonupchurch7628]

The version that's 29 disks is probably the updated OSR2/95B version, DMF disks are only 1.68MB which isn't that much larger than 1.44MB, the version with only 13 DMF disks is the original RTM version from August of 95. That 29 disk version is probably a backup copy someone made so that didn't damage their originals or it was copies that a bootlegger sold to someone, I don't think it's because they're non genuine that they don't work, I think it's just that after several years especially depending on storage conditions floppy disks can go bad.

[@thogameskanaal]

My guess is that these floppy disks are custom made by Microsoft to be installed by the companies that bought them. That would explain the Fujifilm labels because they're probably just made by a Microsoft employee, and not mass-produced. That would also explain why you can't change your name form "March of Dimes".

[@jezzermeii]

The slogan for the Microsoft HomeMouse @ 13:16 would have been way cooler (and cheesier) if it read 'The Ideal Mouse for Everyone in Your House' xD

[@gazzydoesntknow]

Can’t read disk 17… Gawd the story of my early IT journey. I knew then that I would suffer greatly for this hobby/career I love so much 😂

[@barowt]

On my first computer, when I was wanting to upgrade to Windows 98, legally with my own key, I recall doing this from a set of floppies from a garage sale, from what I remember, one disk didn't work.. 😭😭 but I ended up fixing it because I found all of the files on my dad's Win98 cd, and made a new disk. The good days.

[@datasoftinc]

Very good vid. Please make more like this in the future!

[@MichaelMJD]

Thank you!

[@james-5560]

Please make a full multi hour long video of the entire thing with no edits!

[@rockslide2258]

Fond of punishment, are you?

[@gregsedwards]

Regarding the diskettes displaying the previous owner's information, this was quite common back in the day. The first time a Microsoft product was installed, it would write the information to a file on the disk that could not be then altered or deleted. It was so well known, that when you bought a legit copy of a Microsoft product, you'd just make a copy of the disks and then install from those instead in order to preserve your originals as cleanly as possible.

[@obfuscated3090]

Back in the day I used Winimage to image and write OS installation floppies. Imaging is the first thing I do with any old floppy disc that matters.

[@tokyochannel2020]

I remember having to do this on about 20x PC's back in the day lol.

[@3949zxcvbnm]

User: install disk 3 Windows: You have a cd-rom drive, but you forgot to check the box to install the driver Installer: I going to wait for you both to figure it out

[@banesrb]

2077: Instaling Windows 10 from 29 dvds.

[@KagetsukiRei]

OK, let me explain the disks: These disks are basically "genuine" but they were produced by an OEM, distributor, or a repair shop. How it worked was you'd by a "license pack" and it would have a paper license, a thin version of the manual, and stickers to make disks. If you were a shop you'd basically install Windows 95 on the client's machine with your own media and give them the pack with the option to make the disks themselves (there was a tool) or you'd go to the trouble of actually creating the disks for them (for an additional fee). If I'm not mistaken corporate license packs did not include the stickers as the assumption was they'd be imaging or using media they already had. Generally users wouldn't want to install the OS themselves, and the assumption most of them had was that if they needed to re-install they'd just bring it back to the shop. The license packs were cheaper (if I recall correctly they were just a little more than half price actually) so for about the same price as buying the box you'd get installation service and a license, but you'd be missing the media/would have to make it yourself if you wanted it.

[@ElectronicsHikingandJesusTalk]

It looks like you may need to extract the cab files on the diskettes to the root of the diskettes. This will fix your file copy issues for the counterfeit diskettes.

[@ahmadsohail4940]

this video should have been named installing windows 95 during a thunder storm from 29 floopies

[@Tsaukpaetra]

Next use LapLink5 to transfer the installation using parallel port!

[@KagetsukiRei]

I've done that more than once. I had the genuine LapLink service cable (the blue one) and a third party really long (I'm thinking it was 10M) serial/parallel combo cable that worked for both LapLink and daisy-chain networking that was amazing (and I'd use to play Command and Conquer and Descent multiplayer with a serial IPX/SPX connection). The thing is I now can't remember how I actually did the install. I think maybe I had a LapLink service disk that booted to a DOS shell, and I'd partition/fdisk the drive, copy the files over, and launch the installer right from that DOS shell? Or was the LapLink client something you'd launch from DOS?

[@timramich]

I just love how back then all the store shelves were packed with nothing but Intel and MS stuff, and now we have so many more options from OSes, CPUs, to peripherals, and people are still up in arms about monopolies.

[@nascarandjeff123]

I subbed to your channels just because of your voice. So soothing.

[@DJOzYBoY]

That was me in 1995 .. I was to late to get the cd version and there was only the disk version .. because I did not do it right and it killed disk 1 … had to return the box and wait a few days for the cd version to be available again

[@scharkalvin]

HD DMF wasn't that much denser. It squeezed 1680K bytes onto a diskette instead of 1440K bytes. The difference was 21 sectors per track instead of 18, and a 1024 or 2048 cluster size instead of 512. I think that meant using a sector size of 1024, with clusters of 1 or 2 sectors in the file system. The root directory also only had 16 entries instead of 224. Since most disks only had 1 cab file on them, the root directory didn't have many entries. While the disk didn't hold that much more in bytes, more of each disk could be devoted to data since less was used by the directory. I bet that the installer wrote a flag to the first disk in the set to indicate that it had been used to install the OS once, and maybe it also wrote a serial number from the bios so it knew which computer it had installed it on. That's why you got the warning, because you must have used that set of disks to install Windows 95 on some computer in the past.

[@zoeymccann124]

install windows 95 from punch cards

[@andreidjberja1678]

GG

[@jdelkins2]

I remember getting stickers for the diskettes in CD ROM versions of Windows 95 (OEM editions I believe) and the idea was you could create recovery diskettes and they provided the stickers but you had to provide the diskettes.

[@Vanessinha91Pucca]

My family had the 13 floppy version, the upgrade.I remember first installing DOS 6.22 then Windows 3.1 then Windows 95.Always skiped the 13th floppy as it was optional for printer

[@gaymermoment]

michael, i *want* to watch half an hour of you putting and taking out floppy disks

[@lambda2657]

We understand bro :) Its nice to see a new windows video from time to time :D

[@urguru89]

- So how long did it take you to install Windows 95? - It wasn’t so bad. I only had time to look for a job, get an offer, accept it, and MOVE TO A DIFFERENT STATE.

[@TheBrawl]

"Installing Windows 11 On 54,936 Floppy Diskettes"

[@Kitsudote]

Wait, the speedup was x4000, so that means one second is actually 4000 seconds (which is about a hour)... And that speedup has gone on for quite some time... Did I make a mistake or is this some Micheal Stevens amount of dedication?

[@andrew1898]

Loading screens? Sign me up!!!!

[@michaelcobb1024]

I love the way you call them floppy diskettes

[@Dr-Random]

2:13 lol all of my drawing books would be taller than that 😯 (I have 20)

[@ryanstoddard1803]

It’s a shame you did not record this with a camcorder back in the 90s. You may have had better luck installing win95 with floppies back in the day. It is fun for nostalgia sake to install with floppies, but for my sanity I have to use a gotek floppy emulator or I will snap and throw my retro pc through my window and I don’t have unlimited funds to keep buying new ones. There are too many fail points and variables that caused you to run into issues but great video never the less.

[@ShinyElGhosteo]

Congrats on the new job bro! Hope your new place treats you well! :)

[@MichaelMJD]

Thanks man! I appreciate it.

[@simonj48]

I'll be watching this video in a few days for new years. If you want to play along at home, you'll need 1 shot glass, and a bottle of rum. You know the game, every time he puts a floppy in, take a shot. See you on the flip side.

[@cbw56]

20:02 "explorer.exe... wat?!?"... i laughed out loud

[@solitonmedic]

Floppy reading noises and thunderstorms in the background make great ASMR though

[@creepycomputer]

I remember my family's first pc. It was 1 December 1995. My father has bought from his work a Dell Optiplex (i dont know the type number of that system anymore). 16 megabytes of Random Access Memory, Intel Pentium 1 processor (120 megahertz), harddisk drive 1 gigabytes (very much at the time), a Creative SoundBlaster 16 soundcard and the famous Windows 95 operation system. The computer was supported with a Microsoft ball mouse, mechanical keybord, two Altec Lansing speakers and a Sony Trinitron 15 inch CRT monitor! What a historical day was that in my life. Also we got Microsoft Office 95. It was contained on 24 floppy diskettes. My father and I has spent the whole evening to install Office. It was such a pain in the buttocks! Windows 95 was on a CD-ROM. Man, i never forget that day! The operation system was in (American or British) English, despite we are Netherlanders. Since 1-12-1995 my computer interest hase come!!!! I owned the PC for six years and seven month. In July 2002, my parents had got a Dell Dimension 4550 pc and i got the Dell Optiplex of 1999. So the 1995 Dell system I discribed in this comment went to a acquiantence of my father and sincethen the pc has been disappeared. But i still have the memories to our old electronic Dell friend! Even some of the old videogames I've played on the machine!

[@dougiec6750]

I just picked up that very same model Dell Dimension for $10 at a thrift store.

[@kiljupullo]

Win95 was actually very aesthetic and nice to my eye. I liked it.