Как установить windows 95 на vmware

Как установить windows 95 на vmware

Windows 95 can be installed in a virtual machine using a standard Windows 95 boot floppy and CD-ROM.

Note: Some Microsoft Windows 95 OEM disks included with new computers are customized for those computers and include device drivers and other utilities specific to the hardware system. Even if you can install this Windows 95 operating system on your actual computer, you may not be able to install it within a VMware ESX Server virtual machine. You may need to purchase a new copy of Windows to install within a virtual machine.

Note: Some Windows 95 distributions include instructions that do not include the steps to FDISK and FORMAT a C: drive. You must perform these commands on the VMware ESX Server virtual hard disk drives before running Windows 95 setup.

The instructions below are for the simplest case of one virtual IDE hard drive and one virtual IDE CD-ROM drive. If you have configured the virtual machine with more than one IDE hard drive, you should also perform these commands on these drives before installing Windows 95. If you have configured the virtual machine with more than one virtual hard drive or one virtual CD-ROM, you may need to use different device letters than those in the instructions below.

Before installing the operating system, be sure that you have already created a new virtual machine and configured it using the Virtual Machine Wizard.

Use the VMware ESX Server Configuration Editor to verify the virtual machine’s devices are set up as you expect before starting the installation. For example, if you would like the Windows 95 setup program to install networking services, be sure that a virtual Ethernet adapter is installed in the virtual machine’s configuration. VMware also recommends that you disable the screen saver on the host system before starting the installation process.

To install Windows 95 into a virtual machine:

1. On the VMware ESX Server host, insert the Windows 95 CD-ROM Setup Boot Disk in floppy drive A: and insert the Windows 95 CD in the the CD-ROM drive.
2. Power on the virtual machine.
3. After the virtual machine boots, if you are presented with a choice of CD-ROM drivers, select the first IDE driver option available (even if your computer has a SCSI CD-ROM drive).
4. Partition the virtual disk using the following command.

Answer the questions.

Note: If you create a primary partition that is smaller than the size of the hard disk, be sure the partition is marked active.

Note: An intermittent problem can occur during Windows 95 installations in a virtual machine. Shortly after the Windows 95 Setup program is started, Scandisk runs to completion, then when the Windows 95 Setup program should start its graphical user interface, the virtual machine returns to an MS-DOS prompt. VMware recommends you reboot the virtual machine and rerun Windows 95 Setup. You do not need to run FDISK or FORMAT against the drive again. If this problem occurs reproducibly, please report it to VMware technical support.

1. Continue with the Windows 95 installation, until you get to the Windows 95 Setup Wizard/Setup Options screen. Change the default setting from Typical to Custom and click Next to continue.
2. From the Network Configuration screen (which appears after the Analyzing Computer phase), click Add, select the Adapter component, select Advanced Micro Devices from the manufacturer window and select AMD PCNET Family Ethernet Adapter(PCI&ISA) from the network adapter window.
3. If you need TCP/IP networking, add it from the Network Configuration screen (Windows 95 Setup does not enable TCP/IP by default). If you don’t do this, the first phase of the Windows 95 installation does not copy some of the files it needs later, and the entire installation fails.

1. Right-click the My Computer icon and select Properties.
2. From the System Properties dialog box, click the Device Manager tab.
3. Double-click the Disk Drives device category.
4. Double-click the GENERIC IDE DISK TYPE01 device.
5. Click the Settings tab and enable the DMA check box.

VMware Tools

Be sure to install VMware Tools in your guest operating system.

Enabling Sound After Installing Windows 95

If sound was disabled at the time you installed Windows 95, you can enable sound for the virtual machine after the operating system has been installed.

Enabling Networking After Installing Windows 95

If networking was disabled at the time you installed Windows 95, you can enable it after the operating system has been installed. To set up networking for a virtual machine, follow the instructions below.

1. Shut down Windows 95 and power off the virtual machine.
2. Power on the virtual machine.
3. When Windows 95 reboots, it auto-detects an AMD PCNET Family Ethernet Adapter (PCI&ISA) and prompts for the Windows 95 CD-ROM to install drivers. The default Ethernet adapter settings should work fine and do not need to be changed.
4. Double-click the Network icon in the Control Panel to view or change network settings. For example, you may want to add the TCP/IP protocol since Windows 95 does not install it by default.

Known Issues

After Windows 95 has been installed, you may find that networking is not working in the guest operating system. There are several things you should check.

• Either remove your virtual machine�s virtual USB adapter using the Configuration Editor (Settings > Configuration Editor) or � if your release of Windows 95 includes USB support � be sure the USB drivers are installed.
• Check the Windows 95 Device Manager to see if COM5 and COM6 devices are listed. If they are, disable or remove them.
• Be sure that NetBEUI was installed when you set up networking.
• Be sure that Windows 95 Plug and Play properly detected the virtual Ethernet adapter. If it did not, you may need to use the Device Manager to remove the adapter, then reinstall it using the Add New Hardware control panel.

On a Linux host with an XFree86 3.x X server, it is best not to run a screen saver in the guest operating system. Guest screen savers that demand a lot of processing power can cause the X server on the host to freeze.

After Windows 95 has been installed, you may notice Unknown devices exist in the Windows Device Manager. These devices do not actually exist and are not consuming IRQ or other resources. You may remove them using the Windows device manager if you like.

Как установить Windows 95 на виртуальной машине

Шаг третий: Запустите установщик Windows 95

This tutorial will allow you to install Windows 95 in a VMware Virtual Machine and its drivers and networks that are not installed by default.
If we do this tutorial on Windows 95, it is to allow you to install it in a virtual machine and be able to install old games developed for Windows 95 or for nostalgic ;-).

Legals Informations:
Firstly, we wish to clarify that since Windows 95 is a shareware software protected by copyright, we unfortunately can not offer you the download.
We will still be able to download the bootable floppy disk (on which you can boot a computer) which is based on the beginning of this tutorial.

Tested with :
— VMware Workstation 9 (Paid version)
— VMware Player 6.0.3 (Free version)

1. Preparation of CD and floppy disk

Before you begin, here’s what looks like the Windows 95 CD. It contains the «.CAB» Setup and the contents disks as files.
Note : The «AOL30FR.EXE» file is also present.

If you’ve ever tried to install Windows 95 from a CD-ROM in VMware, you had to realize that errors were displayed during installation.
These errors are :
— Please insert the disk Windows 95 CD-ROM «and then click OK»
— The file ‘xxxxxx.xxx’ on Windows 95 CD-ROM was not found.

To solve these problems, we will have to extract the contents of «Precopy2.cab» file and the disks 6, 9, 10, 14, 18 and 19 represented by files «win95_06.cab», «win95_09.cab» and so on.
So unzip the following files : «precopy2.cab», «win95_06.cab», «win95_09.cab», «win95_10.cab», «WIN95_14.CAB», «Win95_18.cab» and «WIN95_19.CAB».

Then open the CD image and create a Windows 95 «FDD» folder in the root file. In this file, add the folders we just created by unzipping the CAB files in the FDD case.
Then save the changes.

Now to the boot disk. To do this, go to the website «bootdisk.com» and download the disk «Windows 95 Original».
Or download the floppy in flp format : win95.flp

By default, the content of the disk is like this.

If you’ve ever tried to install Windows 95 from a CD-ROM in VMware, you had to realize that the CD disappeared during installation which will prevent us to get the files found on the CD-ROM.
We will create a batch file on the boot disk to automate the copy folders containing these files on the hard disk.

Here are the contents of this file :

Then save this file: sources.bat (Careful to put .bat behind the name of the file, otherwise it will not be recognized as a program during the installation of Windows 95).

Once created the file, add the bootable floppy disk.

2. Creating and configuring the VMware virtual machine

If you use VMware Workstation, you can create your virtual machine manually.
To create and configure the virtual machine, select «Custom (advanced)».

If you use VMware Player, you can’t create a virtual machine with hardware compatibility 5.x.
To overcome this problem, we created a blank virtual machine :
— with 5.x compatibility hardware
— and configured to install Windows 95

This virtual machine has no data. It contains only the minimum requirements.
To download this basic virtual machine configuration, click this link : vmware_vm_5.x_compatibility.zip.
Note : Remember to configure the virtual machine to use the floppy and the Windows 95 CD (as explained further below).

Then, select «Workstation 5.x» as hardware compatibility as indicated in the official documentation.
The machine will thus have older hardware and is therefore more compatible with the older version of Windows.

Note : You must select » Workstation 5.x » as hardware compatibility. Otherwise, you will have problems later (including the blue screen that occurred during the installation of the sound driver «Sound Blaster PCI 128»).

Select «I will install the operating system later» to ensure that the installation is done by mode automatically.

Select «Microsoft Windows 95».

Enter a name for your virtual machine and select the folder where you want to store.

Leave a processor.

Avoid putting too much RAM. 64 MB is the recommended size and ample.

Click «Customize Hardware» to configure the diskette drive and CD / DVD drive of the virtual machine.

Click «New CD / DVD . » and select the CD image file (iso format) that contains the «Precopy2» folders «WIN95_06» . that we put in the «FDD» folder of the picture.
Note : Make sure the box «Connect at power on» is checked.

The Windows 95 CD is not bootable, we will also add the bootable floppy disk that will allow us :
— Create a partition on the virtual hard drive
— Format the partition with a name if you wish
— Copy the folders / files that we will need during installation
— Launching the installation of Windows 95

VMware and Windows 95

This is the second in a multipart series on virtualisation software. In an earlier post, I used VirtualBox to create a Windows 95 virtual machine. In this post, I’ll do the same thing, but use VMware instead of VirtualBox.

The first challenge for me was to figure out exactly what constituted VMware virtualisation software. I had assumed VMware was the virtualisation software. Turns out, a number of products are covered under the VMware umbrella.

Here’s a screenshot of the home page for VirtualBox. It’s pretty obvious what virtualisation software I need to acquire.

Here’s the home page for VMware. Hmm…

…and the downloads page from the side menu…

I’m none the wiser. Anyway, after further research, I figured out that what I needed was Workstation Player (WP).

I’m working with WP version 12.5.7. Installation was straightforward. I cranked up WP and was presented with the following screen.

Interesting… I need to upgrade to WP Pro to do snapshots. A bit of digging around and I realise I’m not able to clone a machine in WP. I need WP Pro to do that. Cloning and snapshots are included with VirtualBox. I found snapshots particularly invaluable. If I was happy with the state of a VM, I’d snapshot it and continue experimenting. If I stuffed up, I could roll back to the snapshot and try again. It saved a lot of time and effort in not having to build the VM again from the ground up. Cloning I found not as useful as a backup for later versions of Windows (Windows Vista and above) as it changes the Universally Unique Identifier (UUID) on which licence activation is built. As soon as you’ve activated a VM, it’s really important to take a copy of it and store it away for safe-keeping. If you don’t do this, and you corrupt your VM, it’s going to be problematic to use the same licence to recreate the VM. Unless you’re planning on licensing several VMs, cloning is of limited use. Refer here for more information.

Creating the VM to house Windows 95 was straightforward. A notable difference is that WP wants to create an 8GB container for Windows 95, while VirtualBox creates a 2GB container by default. I changed this to 2GB. I also opted for a single file rather than splitting the virtual disk into multiple files, which is the default for WP.

Firing up the VM and I’m presented with quite a lot of information. Unlike VirtualBox, which had no Guest Additions for Windows 95, WP does have VMware tools for Windows 95. Nice! No point downloading and installing VMware Tools at this stage though as the C: drive has yet to be prepared.

I soon realised that I have access to an optical device, but no floppy device. Fortunately, this was pretty easy to add.

As with VirtualBox, WP handles both optical and floppy devices well. Interesting that WP also assigned the letter R: to the optical drive. The floppy was A: and the target drive for the system was C: as expected.

Ctrl-Alt is used to switch back from the guest system to the host system. I found this easier than using the Right-Ctrl key that VirtualBox uses to switch from guest to host. I think the reason it’s easier is that you have a choice of Ctrl-Alt on either side of the spacebar, whereas for VirtualBox, you’re restricted to the Right-Ctrl key.

I find some useful notes in this VMware article for a much earlier version of WP, but essentially adopt the same steps that I followed for VirtualBox. Of note in the article is the discussion DMA transfers for virtual disks. Initial setup proceeded smoothly and the experience was identical to that of VirtualBox. Interestingly, WP didn’t experience the same Windows protection error that I saw with VirtualBox. Nice!

Initial Impressions

After finalising setup and booting into Windows, the first thing that I noticed was the lack of sound. I also noticed that Windows 95 only runs in 640 x 480 resolution and 16 colours. The display matched what I saw with VirtualBox.

It was easy to setup VMware Tools for Windows 95. However, after restarting the guest system, I did find the mouse cursor overly sensitive within it. I eventually realised that, as long as I stayed within the guest windows and didn’t touch the edges, I could avoid the erratic mouse behaviour.

WP scores points over VirtualBox for having guest services available for Windows 95. For instance, with guest services, drag and drop is enabled between the host and guest systems making it very easy to transfer patches and add-ons to Windows 95 when there isn’t any network connectivity. In VirtualBox, which doesn’t have guest services for Windows 95, the only way to transfer files to the guest system is via the floppy and optical drives.

The view of Device Manager below provides additional clues to what we’re observing. Note that the display is standard VGA and there are some unknown devices. At this stage, also note that the VM network adapter has been identified as an AMD PCNET Family Ethernet Adapter (PCI&ISA). No sign of any audio device.

Display

Unlike the VirtualBox experience, once I located this article, it was dead easy to set up an enhanced display. A much better experience here than with VirtualBox.

Sound

This article, which I didn’t locate in VMware forums, describes a method for enabling sound in the Windows 95 VM. The required drivers can be found via this YouTube video.

Network

I followed what I did for VirtualBox, but even after a reboot, I still had no network visibility. Forum discussions I came across weren’t particularly useful. After some tinkering though, I managed to figure it out. The clue was that the VM was not getting a valid network address from the host’s DHCP server.

I checked the network settings for the Windows 95 VM and noticed a reference to a VirtualBox Ethernet Adapter (as VirtualBox was installed on the same host PC). I unchecked this and rebooted and magically, the private network became visible.

Internet Explorer (IE)

Drag and drop through guest services made it easy to install IE 5.5, the latest version of IE Windows 95 supports.

Summary

Words that describe my experience in key areas in getting VMware WP to create a Windows 95 VM:

1. Installation – Trivial.
2. Sound – Tricky.
3. Display – A little tricky.
4. Network – A little tricky.

Review

Once you get your head around the VMware website and forums, WP is a great product. On the upside, WP has:

1. VMware Tools to provide guest services; and
2. A straightforward display setup compared to VirtualBox.

On the downside, WP has:

1. A difficult to work out website;
2. Contradictory, incomplete and inaccurate information in VMware forums;
3. Twitchy mouse control within the Windows 95 VM;
4. A tricky sound setup; and
5. No cloning and snapshot functionality in the free version.

On the up side, VirtualBox has:

1. An easy to follow website; and
2. Accurate and consolidated information in VirtualBox forums.
3. Straightforward sound setup; and
4. The ability to clone and take snapshots.

On the downside, VirtualBox has:

1. No guest additions; and
2. A tricky display setup;

In my humble opinion, VirtualBox just pips the free version of WP mainly due to the lack of cloning and snapshots, and the difficulty of finding relevant information for the latter. However, WP Pro, the paid version, would be ahead of VirtualBox mainly because of the lack of guest services for Windows 95 in VirtualBox.

Edit: Check out these postings as well for other relevant topics.

Как установить windows 95 на vmware

In this article, we will examine how to set up and run Microsoft Windows 95 on a new virtual machine using VMware Workstation 16 Pro virtualization software on a Windows 10 64 Bit PC.

How to Install Windows 95 on Windows 10 using VMware 16 Pro

Microsoft released Windows 95, the first 32 Bit operating system with an improved user interface after the Windows 3.1 DOS system, for its users on August 24, 1995.

One of the main innovations of Windows 95 is that it has a user interface instead of DOS. It also includes protocols such as TCP/IP that help establish network connections, as well as support for 32-bit applications.

With this system, the Plug and Play feature was developed for users to integrate peripheral devices into computers more easily. The Start menu and taskbar were introduced to users for the first time with this version and are still the features of Windows 10 that are widely used today.

With the advent of the Internet in the 1990s, Windows 95 was the first operating system to use large networks. Also, the Internet Explorer web browser was the most popular era.

In addition, Direct X and Direct 3D were introduced for MS-DOS to run some programs and elements and to be able to run more demanding games.

Although Windows 95 is an old system, some users want to install it and try it out. In addition, some old hardware machines or devices can be updated with old operating systems and firmware.

If you have an old computer, it may make more sense to install Windows 95 on a physical PC, but if you do not have an old PC, you can install this system with a virtual machine on your computer with up-to-date hardware and system.

How to Create a New Virtual Machine for Windows 95

In order to run one of the Windows or Linux distributions on the virtual machine, you must use software such as VMware Workstation Pro. Using one of the Player and Workstation Pro software developed by VMware, you can run old Windows systems on your physical/host computer.

To install Windows 95 with VMware , you must first create and prepare a virtual computer suitable for this system.

First of all, install VMware Pro on your Windows 10 system and follow the steps below in order.

Step 1

After installing VMware 16 Pro, run it and click Create a New Virtual Machine on the home page of the program, then select Custom (Advanced) in the opened VM wizard and click the Next button.

Step 2

Since the virtualization software you installed on your system refers to the latest version, Workstation 16.x is selected in the virtual machine hardware compatibility window.

We’re choosing VM compatibility for 16.x here, but we’ll change the value here later because we’ll explain the importance of VM compatibility.

Step 3

To prepare the virtual system first, then to install it, select the I will the operating system later option and click Next.

Step 4

In the Guest operating system selection step, first, select the platform of the system (Microsoft Windows) and select the system you will install in the version section, and click Next.

Step 5

You can change the name of the virtual computer you have prepared in the Name section. Also, since storing the VM on an external HDD is important for performance, click the Browse button to change the installation location and continue.

Step 6

Specify 1 processor and core number in the Windows 95 virtual machine and click Next.

Step 7

For Win95, you need to set the RAM size maximum 512MB. If you configure more RAM size your virtual PC will not boot up and will reboot constantly.

Step 8

To connect your virtual machine to the network, select the NAT network type and click Next.

Step 9

Select Paravirtualized SCSI as the I/O disk controller and click Next.

Step 10

At this step, you must select the IDE for the virtual disk type, because the SATA disk structure is a problem during the installation of the drivers. You will understand the difference between disk structures better in the driver installation part.

Step 11

To install a clean operating system, you need to use a new disk, so select Create a New Virtual Disk and click Next.

Step 12

Use the recommended amount specified by VMware Pro for the size of the virtual disk, and also check the Store virtual disk as a single file option to store this disk as a single file on your host and click Next.

Step 13

In the Specify Disk File window, you can change the name of the virtual disk you created or change the location you want to store. If you leave the location of the virtual disk in the default location, the virtual disk will be stored where you will install the VM.

Step 14

In the summary window, click the Customize Hardware button to add the Windows 95 ISO file to the virtual machine or to increase the graphics memory.

Step 15

In the hardware settings window, click on the Processors device and enable the features in the Virtualization Engine area.

• Virtualize Intel VT-x/EPT or AMD-V/RVI
• Virtualize CPU Performance Counters
• Virtualize IOMMU (IO Memory Managemet Unit)

Step 16

Click on the Display device and check the Accelerate 3D Graphics option under 3D Graphics and configure the VRAM memory as 256 MB in the Graphics Memory section.

Step 17

First, click this link to download the ISO file to your computer, and then click the CD/DVD device to add the Windows 95 ISO image to the VM, then enable the Use ISO Image File option and click the Browse button.

Step 18

Select the Windows 95 ISO file for the VMware you downloaded to your computer and click the Open button.

Step 19

After preparing the Windows 95 machine, close the hardware window.

Step 20

When the VM is ready, when it opens automatically on the homepage of the program, run it and proceed to the installation steps.

How to Install Windows 95

After preparing your virtual computer and running it, when your system’s boot screen opens, you must first edit the virtual disk you created using the fdisk command.

Before the Windows 95 operating system is installed, you need to format the disk and create an active partition. If you have genuine installation media you will need a Floppy drive. After adding the Floppy device to the virtual machine, you need to open it with the img file and first prepare the disk and then copy the system files.

Step 1

The first screen you will encounter after booting your system is as follows. Since fdisk is integrated in the content of the ISO file you add to the VM, you do not need a floppy device.

Step 2

To edit the virtual disk, execute the fdisk command at the A:\> command line.

Step 3

If your system has a disk size of more than 512MB, press Y and then Enter to enable large disk usage.

Step 4

Press Enter on the Create DOS Partition or Logical DOS Drive option on the Microsoft Windows 95 FDISK options screen.

Step 5

Press Enter on the Create Primary DOS Partition option to create a Primary partition on the disk.

Step 6

Press Y then Enter to confirm the maximum disk size usage for the Primary Partition you created.

Step 7

You need to restart your computer for the changes to take effect, to do this click the down arrow next to the Suspend button and click on the Restart Guest option.

Step 8

After restarting your virtual system, you may get the missing operating system error because you did not boot from the CD-ROM .

Press the ESC button while restarting your system to open the Boot Menu on VMware. Press Enter on the CD-ROM Drive on the Boot Menu screen and continue.

Step 9

You need to format the disk where you created the primary partition, execute the command format C: on the command line, and then press the Y key to confirm that all files on the C drive will be deleted. Press Enter to configure the volume label character number as default.

Step 10

After formatting the C drive, you need to create a new folder to copy Windows 95 system files. To create a folder named WIN95 on C, first switch to C drive with the C: command and execute the mkdir WIN95 command.

Step 11

To view the contents of the CD-ROM device, switch to the corresponding drive with the R: command and view and check the contents of the drive with the dir command.

In order to copy the Windows 95 installation files to the folder named WIN95 that you created on the C drive, execute the following command on the command line.

Step 12

After copying the system files, execute the setup command in the C:\WIN95 folder to start the Windows 95 installation, then press Enter to continue.

Step 13

When the Microsoft ScanDisk tool is opened, wait while checking your system’s file integrity, disk size check, and directory structure.

Step 14

When the Windows 95 Setup screen opens, the wizard notifies you that the setup will be completed in 30 to 60 minutes. Click the Continue button in the welcome window to start the installation.

Step 15

Click the Page Down button to read the Windows 95 license agreement, then click the Yes button to accept it.

Step 16

Click Next to have the setup wizard collect information about your computer and copy system files.

Step 17

In the Choose Directory window, select the default C:\WINDOWS location where you will install your virtual system and click Next.

Step 18

In the Setup Options window, select the Typical as setup type by default and continue. If you want to make changes to your system, you can continue with the Custom option.

Step 19

In the Certificate of Authenticity window, type your Windows 95 product key and click Next.

Step 20

In the User Information window, type in your user account name and company information for your system and click Next.

Step 21

Click Next to have the setup wizard analyze the hardware components of your virtual system.

Step 22

Wait while the hardware of your virtual computer is being scanned.

Step 23

In the Windows Components window, select Install the most common components to install the most commonly used services and continue.

Step 24

If you want to create a Startup Disk, select Yes, but since it is not required in the virtual machine, select the No option and click Next.

Step 25

Click Next to start copying Windows system files and continue.

Step 26

Wait while the Windows 95 system files are being copied and installed.

Step 27

When the installation wizard detects the floppy disk drive on your system, disconnect it and click the OK button.

Step 28

Wait while Windows 95 is setting up plug-and-play devices. Also, at this stage, when Windows prompts you to type a computer name and workgroup name, click OK.

Step 29

When the Network window opens, type a computer name for your virtual system and also type Workgroup for the workgroup and click the Close button.

Step 30

Configure your date and time settings depending on the country you live in and click the Close button.

Step 31

When the Add Printer Wizard opens, click the Cancel button to configure this step later or to close the wizard if you do not have a printer.

Step 32

After the setup wizard completes the Win95 installation, click OK to restart your virtual system.

Step 33

Wait while the Microsoft Windows 95 operating system is starting.

Step 34

Type in your user account name you created and click OK.

Step 35

In the Set Windows Password window, set a new password to make your system password accessible and click OK. If you do not want to create any password here, just leave the fields in the New Password section blank and click OK.

Step 36

After your virtual system restarts, right-click on My Computer and click Properties from the opened options and check the version of your system.

How to Install VMware Tools

After installing the Windows 95 system, you must also install the VMware Tools software. With this software, you can install the driver of the video card and use your virtual PC in full-screen mode. Also, you can use your host’s devices such as a USB, Webcam , and mouse on the virtual PC.

Step 1

To install VMware Tools on Win95, click VM / Install VMware Tools from the Workstation Pro tool menu.

Step 2

Wait while VMware Tools is preparing for installation on the VM.

Step 3

When the setup wizard opens, click Next to start installing the virtual machine tools.

Step 4

If you will use your virtual machine with other products of VMware Pro, select Complete as the installation type and click Next.

Step 5

When the virtual machine tools are ready to be installed, click the Install button.

Step 6

Click the Yes button when you get Warning 25010 (Microsoft HTML Help Engine) warning during the VM Tools installation phase.

Step 7

Continue by clicking the OK button in the HTML Help 1.31 Update window.

Step 8

This time, when you get Warning 25009, click OK.

Step 9

If the SVGA driver cannot be installed in VM Tools installation, you will need to do this manually later.

Step 10

Click Finish to close the VM Tools wizard.

Step 11

Click the No button in the warning window asking you to restart your system.

Step 12

A text document will open automatically to install the SVGA driver manually. Copy the video driver location in step 5 in this document.

Step 13

Right-click on the desktop and open the Display Properties window and click the Advanced Properties button.

Step 14

Click the Change button on the Adapter tab in the advanced display properties window, and then click the Have Disk button on the Standard PCI Graphics Adapter (SVGA).

When the Install from Disk window opens, paste the location you copied in the previous step to the From section and click the Browse button. Select the VMX_SVGA.inf file in the opened location and click OK.

Step 15

In the Select Device window, select the VMware SVGA II device and click OK.

Step 16

Click the Apply button to confirm the settings of the VMware SVGA II device.

Step 17

Click the Yes button if you want to set a monitor, otherwise click the No button.

Step 18

Configure the screen resolution to 1024 x 768 and click OK to confirm the resolution. If the resolution of the VM is not working correctly, you can return to the original settings after waiting 15 seconds.

Step 19

If the resolution of the virtual machine is working correctly, click Yes to use the resolution you set.

Step 20

Click View / Fit Guest Now to fit the Windows 95 resolution to full screen.

Step 21

After clicking Fit Guest Now, you can see the VM has adapted to full screen.

Step 22

You can also drag and drop a file from your host computer’s desktop location or any other location to the virtual machine to see that the file has been copied successfully.

How to Install TCP/IP Protocol for Internet and Network Connection

After configuring Windows 95 completely, you need to set up the TCP/IP protocol to access the Internet through your VM.

Step 1

Right-click on the Network Neighborhood on the desktop and click Properties.

Step 2

When the Network window opens, click the Add button and open the Component Type window. In this window, check Protocol and click the Add button again.

In the Select Network Protocol window, select Microsoft, then TCP/IP, and click OK.

Step 3

You can see the conflicting files in the File name: in the Version Conflict window. Click Yes to confirm overwriting these files.

Step 4

When you open MS-DOS Prompt and ping the Google search engine by executing the ping 8.8.8.8 command, you can see that your Internet connection is OK.

We got a bad command error in the previous ping because the TCP/IP protocol was not installed.

Step 5

When you open The Internet, the Connection Wizard will open. You need to set up your Internet connection with this wizard, so click Next directly.

Step 6

To configure your current connection from the Internet connection setup options, check Current and click Next.

Step 7

When Microsoft Internet Explorer opens automatically, you can see that your connection is working fine when you visit the Google website.

How to Install Chipset Driver

After installing current operating systems with VMware, VM Tools usually automatically installs all drivers that are not installed in the system.

But when you install old and outdated systems, you need to search and find the system’s drivers and install them manually. You can get more usability and efficiency by installing drivers that are not installed in the Windows 95 virtual computer.

Step 1

First, open the properties of your Win95 system and click the Device Manager tab, then check the drivers that cannot be installed by VM Tools.

• PCI Bridge
• PCI Multimedia Audio Device
• PCI System Peripheral

Step 2

You need to reduce the hardware compatibility of the VM on the VMware Workstation software in order to install drivers for older systems. In the virtual machine configuration phase, we set the hardware compatibility as 16.x and emphasized its importance in the next steps.

When you try to install the drivers when the hardware compatibility is 16.x you will get many errors by the system or the drivers will not be installed. Also, the system can give Windows Protection Error .

Now, turn off your Win95 machine and click on VM / Manage / Change Hardware Compatibility from the menu.

Step 3

When the hardware compatibility change wizard opens, click Next to continue.

Step 4

In the Hardware Compatibility section, select Workstation 5.x and click Next.

NOTE: If you had selected the disk type of your virtual system as SATA, your disk would fail when you downgrade the hardware version. Because it is stated in the Limitations section that SATA devices will not be supported.

Step 5

After configuring the hardware version, check the Alter this virtual machine option and click Next.

Step 6

In the Review Changes window, you can see the settings to be removed from the virtual machine.

• PciBridge0
• PciBridge4
• PciBridge5
• PciBridge6
• PciBridge7
• Hpet0
• VMCI
• Vpmc.enable

Step 7

After changing the hardware version, start Win95 PC.

Step 8

In this step, you will see that new hardware is found automatically while your virtual system is booting up. If you get a version conflict warning as shown in the image below, click the Yes button to confirm the process.

Step 9

Windows 95 audio device was also found automatically by the system, but since the driver was not installed, click the Cancel button in this window.

Step 10

When you open the Device Manager again, you will see that the driver for the PCI Bridge device could not be installed this time.

Step 11

After downloading the driver software of the Windows 95 virtual machine from the list at the bottom of the article, open the Chipset Driver folder and run the Setup file as shown below.

Step 12

When the Intel Chipset Software Installation Utility V2.80.008 wizard opens, click Next.

Step 13

Click Yes to accept the license agreement for the Chipset driver software.

Step 14

After checking the Intel Chipset list supported by the software utility, click Next and complete the installation.

Step 15

After the Windows 95 Chipset driver installation, restart your virtual system.

Step 16

You can see that it automatically finds the PCI to ISA Bridge (ISA Mode) device this time while your system is powering up.

Step 17

Also, click Finish to update the PCI Bus Master IDE Controller driver.

Step 18

When you check the Device Manager again, you can see that the Primary and Secondary IDE controllers in the Hard Disk Controllers section have been updated successfully.

• Intel 82371AB/EB/MB PCI Bus Master IDE Controller
• Primary IDE Controller (dual fifo)
• Secondary IDE Controller (dual fifo)

Step 19

Now, to install or enable the Standard Floppy Disk Controller driver, turn off your virtual computer and then click Power On to Firmware to enter the BIOS settings of your VM.

Step 20

In the PhoenixBIOS Setup Utility screen of the virtual machine, configure A: in Legacy Diskette as 2.88 MB in the Main section and press F10, and save the settings.

Step 21

After turning on your system, open the Device Manager again and check that the yellow exclamation mark is removed from the Standard Floppy Disk Controller.

How to Install Audio Driver

To install the Audio driver on the Windows 95 VM, download the Sound Blaster PCI128 driver software from the table at the bottom of the article and copy it to the VM.

Step 1

After copying the audio driver to your virtual computer, double click on Sound Blaster PCI128 and click Yes to accept the software’s license agreement.

Step 2

Click Next to install the Creative Sound Blaster audio driver.

Step 3

After the Creative Sound Blaster PCI128 hardware is found, wait while the drivers are installed.

Step 4

After restarting your system, open the Device Manager and this time select Properties / Drive / Update Drive / Gameport Joystick (8-24-1996) and click Finish to solve the driver problem of the Creative Gameport Joystick.

How to Add a USB Controller to VM, and How to Install the USB Driver

To be able to use USB devices on the Windows 95 VM, you need to add, install and configure a USB Controller from the hardware wizard.

You can find the Windows 95 VM USB Driver in the table at the bottom of the article.

Step 1

To add a USB device to the virtual machine, first, turn off your VM and open the Virtual Machine Settings window and click Finish after selecting USB Controller.

Step 2

After running your virtual system, open the Device Manager and check if the drivers for the PCI Universal Serial Bus device are not installed automatically.

Step 3

After downloading the USB driver and copying it to the VM, double click on Xusbsupp in the driver folder and click Yes to confirm the installation of the USB driver in the window that opens.

Step 4

Click Yes to accept the license agreement for the Xusbsupp software.

Step 5

After the eXtended USB Supplement installation is completed, click OK and restart your virtual computer.

Step 6

When you check the driver for USB devices, you can see that the PCI Universal Serial Bus device has a yellow exclamation mark.

Select the PCI device and click the Remove button, then click OK. Then click Refresh so that your system can install the USB drivers correctly.

Step 7

After refreshing the list of available devices, your virtual system will find and install the USB Universal Host Controller device.

Step 8

When you check the USB Controller device, you can see that the drivers have been installed successfully this time.

1. Intel 82371AB/EB/MB PCI to USB Universal Host Controller
2. USB Root Hub

Step 9

Now, insert a Flash Memory formatted with a FAT32 file system into your host machine and when the New USB Device Detected window opens, check to Connect to a virtual machine and select Windows 95, then click OK.

Step 10

After inserting the flash drive into your virtual machine, when the Driver Wizard automatically opens, click Next to install the Generic USB Mass Storage Class Device driver.

Step 11

Click Finish after Windows has updated the USB mass storage device.

Step 12

Click Next to install another required Generic USB Hub driver.

Step 13

After Windows has updated the Generic USB Hub device, click Finish.

Step 14

When you open My Computer, you can now use your Flash Memory on the Windows 95 VM without any problem. When you check the drive of your USB memory in Device Manager, you can see KINGSTON DataTraveler 3.0 in the Disk Drives section.

NOTE: Use the USB 2.0 port of your host device to install flash memory in the VM. If you plug your flash drive into your host’s USB 3.0 ports, your virtual computer will fail.

This tutorial will allow you to install Windows 95 in a VMware Virtual Machine and its drivers and networks that are not installed by default.
If we do this tutorial on Windows 95, it is to allow you to install it in a virtual machine and be able to install old games developed for Windows 95 or for nostalgic ;-).

Legals Informations:
Firstly, we wish to clarify that since Windows 95 is a shareware software protected by copyright, we unfortunately can not offer you the download.
We will still be able to download the bootable floppy disk (on which you can boot a computer) which is based on the beginning of this tutorial.

Tested with :
— VMware Workstation 9 (Paid version)
— VMware Player 6.0.3 (Free version)

1. Preparation of CD and floppy disk

Before you begin, here’s what looks like the Windows 95 CD. It contains the «.CAB» Setup and the contents disks as files.
Note : The «AOL30FR.EXE» file is also present.

If you’ve ever tried to install Windows 95 from a CD-ROM in VMware, you had to realize that errors were displayed during installation.
These errors are :
— Please insert the disk Windows 95 CD-ROM «and then click OK»
— The file ‘xxxxxx.xxx’ on Windows 95 CD-ROM was not found.

To solve these problems, we will have to extract the contents of «Precopy2.cab» file and the disks 6, 9, 10, 14, 18 and 19 represented by files «win95_06.cab», «win95_09.cab» and so on.
So unzip the following files : «precopy2.cab», «win95_06.cab», «win95_09.cab», «win95_10.cab», «WIN95_14.CAB», «Win95_18.cab» and «WIN95_19.CAB».

Then open the CD image and create a Windows 95 «FDD» folder in the root file. In this file, add the folders we just created by unzipping the CAB files in the FDD case.
Then save the changes.

Now to the boot disk. To do this, go to the website «bootdisk.com» and download the disk «Windows 95 Original».
Or download the floppy in flp format : win95.flp

By default, the content of the disk is like this.

If you’ve ever tried to install Windows 95 from a CD-ROM in VMware, you had to realize that the CD disappeared during installation which will prevent us to get the files found on the CD-ROM.
We will create a batch file on the boot disk to automate the copy folders containing these files on the hard disk.

Here are the contents of this file :

Then save this file: sources.bat (Careful to put .bat behind the name of the file, otherwise it will not be recognized as a program during the installation of Windows 95).

Once created the file, add the bootable floppy disk.

2. Creating and configuring the VMware virtual machine

If you use VMware Workstation, you can create your virtual machine manually.
To create and configure the virtual machine, select «Custom (advanced)».

If you use VMware Player, you can’t create a virtual machine with hardware compatibility 5.x.
To overcome this problem, we created a blank virtual machine :
— with 5.x compatibility hardware
— and configured to install Windows 95

This virtual machine has no data. It contains only the minimum requirements.
To download this basic virtual machine configuration, click this link : vmware_vm_5.x_compatibility.zip.
Note : Remember to configure the virtual machine to use the floppy and the Windows 95 CD (as explained further below).

Then, select «Workstation 5.x» as hardware compatibility as indicated in the official documentation.
The machine will thus have older hardware and is therefore more compatible with the older version of Windows.

Note : You must select » Workstation 5.x » as hardware compatibility. Otherwise, you will have problems later (including the blue screen that occurred during the installation of the sound driver «Sound Blaster PCI 128»).

Select «I will install the operating system later» to ensure that the installation is done by mode automatically.

Select «Microsoft Windows 95».

Enter a name for your virtual machine and select the folder where you want to store.

Leave a processor.

Avoid putting too much RAM. 64 MB is the recommended size and ample.

Click «Customize Hardware» to configure the diskette drive and CD / DVD drive of the virtual machine.

Click «New CD / DVD . » and select the CD image file (iso format) that contains the «Precopy2» folders «WIN95_06» . that we put in the «FDD» folder of the picture.
Note : Make sure the box «Connect at power on» is checked.

The Windows 95 CD is not bootable, we will also add the bootable floppy disk that will allow us :
— Create a partition on the virtual hard drive
— Format the partition with a name if you wish
— Copy the folders / files that we will need during installation
— Launching the installation of Windows 95

Installing Windows 95 into a Virtual Machine

Windows 95 can be installed in a virtual machine using a standard Windows 95 boot floppy and CD-ROM.

Note: Some Microsoft Windows 95 OEM disks included with new computers are customized for those computers and include device drivers and other utilities specific to the hardware system. Even if you can install this Windows 95 operating system on your actual computer, you may not be able to install it within a VMware ESX Server virtual machine. You may need to purchase a new copy of Windows to install within a virtual machine.

Note: Some Windows 95 distributions include instructions that do not include the steps to FDISK and FORMAT a C: drive. You must perform these commands on the VMware ESX Server virtual hard disk drives before running Windows 95 setup.

The instructions below are for the simplest case of one virtual IDE hard drive and one virtual IDE CD-ROM drive. If you have configured the virtual machine with more than one IDE hard drive, you should also perform these commands on these drives before installing Windows 95. If you have configured the virtual machine with more than one virtual hard drive or one virtual CD-ROM, you may need to use different device letters than those in the instructions below.

Before installing the operating system, be sure that you have already created a new virtual machine and configured it using the Virtual Machine Wizard.

Use the VMware ESX Server Configuration Editor to verify the virtual machine’s devices are set up as you expect before starting the installation. For example, if you would like the Windows 95 setup program to install networking services, be sure that a virtual Ethernet adapter is installed in the virtual machine’s configuration. VMware also recommends that you disable the screen saver on the host system before starting the installation process.

To install Windows 95 into a virtual machine:

1. On the VMware ESX Server host, insert the Windows 95 CD-ROM Setup Boot Disk in floppy drive A: and insert the Windows 95 CD in the the CD-ROM drive.
2. Power on the virtual machine.
3. After the virtual machine boots, if you are presented with a choice of CD-ROM drivers, select the first IDE driver option available (even if your computer has a SCSI CD-ROM drive).
4. Partition the virtual disk using the following command.

Answer the questions.

Note: If you create a primary partition that is smaller than the size of the hard disk, be sure the partition is marked active.

Note: An intermittent problem can occur during Windows 95 installations in a virtual machine. Shortly after the Windows 95 Setup program is started, Scandisk runs to completion, then when the Windows 95 Setup program should start its graphical user interface, the virtual machine returns to an MS-DOS prompt. VMware recommends you reboot the virtual machine and rerun Windows 95 Setup. You do not need to run FDISK or FORMAT against the drive again. If this problem occurs reproducibly, please report it to VMware technical support.

1. Continue with the Windows 95 installation, until you get to the Windows 95 Setup Wizard/Setup Options screen. Change the default setting from Typical to Custom and click Next to continue.
2. From the Network Configuration screen (which appears after the Analyzing Computer phase), click Add, select the Adapter component, select Advanced Micro Devices from the manufacturer window and select AMD PCNET Family Ethernet Adapter(PCI&ISA) from the network adapter window.
3. If you need TCP/IP networking, add it from the Network Configuration screen (Windows 95 Setup does not enable TCP/IP by default). If you don’t do this, the first phase of the Windows 95 installation does not copy some of the files it needs later, and the entire installation fails.

1. Right-click the My Computer icon and select Properties.
2. From the System Properties dialog box, click the Device Manager tab.
3. Double-click the Disk Drives device category.
4. Double-click the GENERIC IDE DISK TYPE01 device.
5. Click the Settings tab and enable the DMA check box.

VMware Tools

Be sure to install VMware Tools in your guest operating system.

Enabling Sound After Installing Windows 95

If sound was disabled at the time you installed Windows 95, you can enable sound for the virtual machine after the operating system has been installed.

Enabling Networking After Installing Windows 95

If networking was disabled at the time you installed Windows 95, you can enable it after the operating system has been installed. To set up networking for a virtual machine, follow the instructions below.

1. Shut down Windows 95 and power off the virtual machine.
2. Power on the virtual machine.
3. When Windows 95 reboots, it auto-detects an AMD PCNET Family Ethernet Adapter (PCI&ISA) and prompts for the Windows 95 CD-ROM to install drivers. The default Ethernet adapter settings should work fine and do not need to be changed.
4. Double-click the Network icon in the Control Panel to view or change network settings. For example, you may want to add the TCP/IP protocol since Windows 95 does not install it by default.

Known Issues

After Windows 95 has been installed, you may find that networking is not working in the guest operating system. There are several things you should check.

• Either remove your virtual machine�s virtual USB adapter using the Configuration Editor (Settings > Configuration Editor) or � if your release of Windows 95 includes USB support � be sure the USB drivers are installed.
• Check the Windows 95 Device Manager to see if COM5 and COM6 devices are listed. If they are, disable or remove them.
• Be sure that NetBEUI was installed when you set up networking.
• Be sure that Windows 95 Plug and Play properly detected the virtual Ethernet adapter. If it did not, you may need to use the Device Manager to remove the adapter, then reinstall it using the Add New Hardware control panel.

On a Linux host with an XFree86 3.x X server, it is best not to run a screen saver in the guest operating system. Guest screen savers that demand a lot of processing power can cause the X server on the host to freeze.

After Windows 95 has been installed, you may notice Unknown devices exist in the Windows Device Manager. These devices do not actually exist and are not consuming IRQ or other resources. You may remove them using the Windows device manager if you like.