Windows 98 From A to Z

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Date/Time

Windows 98 keeps track of the system date and time for the computer. As shown in Figure D.1, you can easily view the date by hovering your mouse pointer over the time display, which appears on the right end of the taskbar.

Figure D.1

To set the month, day, year, and time zone, follow these steps:

1. Double-click the time display on the taskbar to open the Date/Time Properties dialog box, shown in Figure D.2.
2. To change the date--for example, to February 9, 1998--click 9 in the calendar display, select February from the Month drop-down list, and click the up- or down-arrow button next to the Year text box to change the year to 1998.
3. To change the time, click the up- or down-arrow button beneath the clock.
4. To change the time zone, first click the Time Zone tab to open the screen shown in Figure D.3.

Figure D.2

Figure D.3

5. If your time zone uses Daylight Saving Time, click the Automatically Adjust Clock for Daylight Saving Changes check box. (Note that when these daylight saving days arrive, you will be prompted with a dialog box informing you of the change to make sure that you are aware that a date change was performed.) Windows 98 will automatically update itself twice a year to reflect Daylight Saving Time changes. To change the time zone itself, click the down-arrow button near the top of the tab and select another time zone from the drop-down list, as shown in Figure D.4. When you are satisfied with your selection, click OK.

Figure D.4


NOTE: Notice the parenthetical items containing the initials GMT that appear in every Time Zone entry. As you might expect, GMT stands for Greenwich Mean Time, and the numeral following it (if any) indicates how many hours that time zone is ahead of or behind Greenwich Mean Time.

Desktop

The Windows 98 desktop is the primary screen from which all activities originate; it is the screen you see when you first enter Windows 98. This screen typically contains a series of icons--including My Computer, Network Neighborhood, and Recycle Bin--as well as a Channel bar that enables you
to easily reach Internet content. The desktop can also be enabled as the Windows 98 Active Desktop, a concept that was discussed earlier in this book.

Desktop Themes

Desktop Themes, which are built in to Windows 98, enable you to easily change your desktop background (also known as wallpaper), screen saver, sound events, mouse pointer graphics, system colors, desktop icon graphics, and system display fonts. Microsoft is releasing several additional variations to these Desktop Themes in its Windows 98 add-on product known as Microsoft Plus! 98, which should be available about 30 days following the initial Windows 98 release date of June 25 1998. To use these themes, follow these steps:

1. Click the Start button, choose Settings, Control Panel, as shown in Figure D.5.

Figure D.5

2. In the Control Panel window, shown in Figure D.6, double-click the Desktop Themes icon.
3. In the Desktop Themes screen, shown in Figure D.7, notice that all the check boxes in the Settings section are grayed out. This indicates that you cannot change any of the current themes' settings.
4. To switch to a different theme, click the down-arrow button to the right of the Theme text box, and select a new theme from the list of available themes (as shown in Figure D.8).

Figure D.6

Figure D.7

5. As shown in Figure D.9, a preview of the selected theme (in this case, Inside Your Computer) is provided. Notice that the check boxes in the Settings section are no longer grayed out. Uncheck any of the settings to see how the preview changes.

Figure D.8

Figure D.9

6. After you are satisfied with the theme you have chosen and any modifications you have made, click the OK button.

Dial-Up Networking

The Dial-Up Networking feature of Windows 98 enables you to connect to a remote network via a modem. To configure a Dial-Up Networking session, follow these steps:

1. Click the Start button, choose Programs, Accessories, Communications, Dial-Up Networking, as shown in Figure D.10.

Figure D.10

2. Double-click the Make New Connection icon in the Dial-Up Networking window, shown in Figure D.11, to start the Make New Connection Wizard. This wizard walks you through the steps of creating a Dial-Up Networking connection.
3. Type a name for the new connection in the text box at the top of the wizard's first screen, shown in Figure D.12. (In this case, leave the name as the default, My Connection.)
4. Select a modem device from the Select a Device drop-down list (click the down-arrow button next to the text box to view the list). The default modem will typically be the one you want to use unless you have multiple modems connected to your PC. When you are satisfied with your selections, click Next.

Figure D.11

Figure D.12

5. In the screen shown in Figure D.13, type the telephone number of the computer to which you will be connecting. (This computer will typically belong to your Internet service provider.) Be sure to select the correct country code. (The one shown here is the default.) Click Next to con-tinue.

Figure D.13

6. Click on the Finish button in the wizard's final screen, shown in Figure D.14. Doing so returns you to the Dial-Up Networking window.

Figure D.14

7. Notice that the connection you created using the wizard now appears in the Dial-Up Networking window, as shown in Figure D.15.

Figure D.15

You can either wait until you use this connection to confirm that the default telephony settings suit your needs, or you can confirm that those settings are correct now by viewing them in the My Connection dialog box. To check these settings using the latter technique, follow these steps:

1. Right-click the newly created My Connection icon and choose Properties from the ensuing shortcut menu, as shown in Figure D.16.

Figure D.16

2. You can make changes to the telephone number and the modem selection in the General tab of the My Connection dialog box, shown in Figure D.17, but you just entered this information while using the Make New Connection Wizard.

Figure D.17

3. Click the Server Types tab to view the screen shown in Figure D.18. For most non-Internet connections, this tab's default settings are adequate. If you seek to connect to an Internet service provider (ISP), however, you need to make a few changes.
4. Because the Internet supports only the use of TCP/IP, you should uncheck the NetBEUI and IPX/SPX Compatible check boxes in the Allowed Network Protocols section of the Server Types tab to free system resources.

Figure D.18

5. To configure your TCP/IP connection, click th TCP/IP Settings button. This opens the TCP/IP Setting dialog box, show in Figure D.19.
6. Most likely, the only settings your ISP will ask you to change are the primary and secondary DNS (domain name server) numbers. To do so, select the Specify Name Server Addresses option and type the appropriate primary DNS, secondary DNS, primary WINS, and secondary WINS. A typical address might be 10.10.5.100. The information that goes into these address boxes will be provided by your Internet service provider (or local system administrator, should you be doing this at work). Click OK to return to the Server Types tab of the My Connection dialog box.

Figure D.19


TIP: DNS addresses represent the TCP/IP address for that particular DNS server. When you connect to the Internet via your local ISP, all you usually need is that ISP's DNS addressing scheme. This usually comes in the form of the primary and the secondary DNS addresses.
7. Click the Multilink tab to view the screen shown in Figure D.20. This screen enables you to use more than one modem and telephone line at a time to increase bandwidth. To do so, begin by selecting the Use Additional Devices option, and then click the Add button to place additional modems in the Multilink tab.

Figure D.20


NOTE: You must have a distinctly separate telephone line for each modem placed in this tab; a party line will not work for this purpose.


NOTE: If you are a home user, you probably will not use this feature.


NOTE: To access the Add button on the Multilink tab, you must have multiple modems already installed and available for use. If the Add button is not grayed out, you can click it and select additional modems to be used with the Multilink process. If it is grayed out, you must add more modems to your Windows 98 installation to use this feature. To do this, and add a modem to the selection list, use either the Add New Hardware or the Modems functions of the Windows 98 Control Panel.
8. To accept all the changes made in the My Connection dialog box and return to the Dial-Up Networking window, click the OK button. Close that window by clicking the Close button (x) that appears in the upper-right corner of the window.

Dial-Up Server

The Windows 98 Dial-Up Server feature enables you to use your own PC as a server to which other computers can dial up for remote access. This feature cannot be configured unless you have installed the proper files for the Dial-Up Networking function. (Refer to the "Components" section for information about installing components, and refer to the "Dial-Up Networking" section for more information about this feature.)

To configure the Dial-Up Server feature, follow these steps:

1. Click the Start button, choose Programs, Accessories, Communications, and Dial-Up Networking, as shown in Figure D.21.

Figure D.21

2. Click the Connections menu option and select Dial-Up Server, as shown in Figure D.22.

Figure D.22

3. The ensuing Dial-Up Server dialog box, shown in Figure D.23, enables you to configure this service. To permit others to dial into your PC, select the Allow Caller Access option. Next, click the Server Type button to specify what type of dial-up connectivity is supported by your PC.

Figure D.23

4. Because you are using Windows 98, select the PPP: Internet, Windows NT Server, Windows 98 option from the Type of Dial-Up Server drop-down list in the Server Types dialog box, as shown in Figure D.24.

Figure D.24

5. If the clients dialing in are not necessarily going to be using Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows NT, you should uncheck the Require Encrypted Password check box because non-Windows clients might have difficulty transmitting an encrypted password.


NOTE: The Enable Software Compression option should be left as is (selected), unless your modem's hardware functions better (that is, it can transmit more data in the same period of time) than the software compression that is built in to Windows 98.
6. Click the OK button in the Server Types dialog box, and then in the Dial-Up Server dialog box to complete this process.

Direct Cable Connection

The Direct Cable Connection feature is useful if you want to exchange files between two computers but you don't want to set up a network. To configure a direct cable connection, follow these steps:

1. Click the Start button, choose Programs, Accessories, Communications, Direct Cable Connection, as shown in Figure D.25.

Figure D.25

2. The Direct Cable Connection Wizard opens. In the first screen, shown in Figure D.26, you must specify whether you are currently using the Host computer or the Guest computer. After you make your selection (for this example, choose Guest), click Next.

Figure D.26


NOTE: The host computer contains the resources that you want to access; the guest computer is the system that will be performing the accessing. It is important to note, however, that regardless the connection type, a guest computer can still copy its own files to the host computer. This means that a guest computer can act like a host computer even though it is the guest.


NOTE: To begin the connection process, you must have a serial or parallel cable to connect the two computers.
3. In the ensuing screen, shown in Figure D.27, highlight the connection method--parallel or serial--along with the port on which the connection will be made.

Figure D.27


NOTE: A parallel cable connects into the parallel port of each computer--on the guest side as well as on the host side. This cable closely resembles a standard parallel printer cable, and transfers data much faster than a serial cable could (average transmission rate is roughly three times faster over a parallel cable than a serial one).

A serial cable connects into a serial port of each computer--on the guest side, as well as on the host side. Note that it can be connected to the COM1: port on the guest side, while using the COM2: port on the host side. The serial cable closely resembles a standard modem cable, and provides a relatively slow transmission rate (especially when compared to that of a parallel cable).


4. Connect the serial or parallel cable to both computers. If you do not know how to do this, consult your computer's manuals.
5. Click the Next button to view the screen shown in Figure D.28. This dialog box informs you that you have successfully configured the guest computer. Click the Finish button.

Figure D.28

6. Before a direct cable connection can be made, you must run the same wizard process on the other computer and configure it as the host computer (just select the Host option in step 2). After you complete the steps in the wizard, click Finish.
7. If the dialog box shown in Figure D.29 (or one like it) appears after you click the Finish button, you should check to make sure that the cable connections are solid.

Figure D.29

8. After the connection is complete and you have transferred all the data that you want, click on the Close button to terminate the direct cable connection. Remember that after you click on the Close button, the session will end and you can no longer use that direct cable connection
session.

Discover Windows 98

Microsoft's Discover Windows 98 application demonstrates a vast improvement over the online assistance offered in Windows 95. To use this new online tutorial, follow these steps:

1. Click the Start button, choose Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Welcome To Windows, as shown in Figure D.30.

Figure D.30

2. To begin the tour, click the Discover Windows 98 option in the Welcome to Windows 98 screen, shown in Figure D.31.

Figure D.31


TIP: Note the Show This Screen Each Time Windows 98 Starts check box at the bottom of the screen shown in Figure D.30. If you leave this option checked (the default), you will automatically see this screen every time you start Windows 98. To disable this option, just click it to remove the check box.
3. Click the Discover Windows 98 option to change the text message to the right of the menu, as shown in Figure D.32.
4. As shown in Figure D.33, the Discover Windows 98 tour is split into four components:

Figure D.32

Figure D.33

5. Click the Computer Essentials option to view the screen shown in Figure D.34. You can continue the tour as long as you like, and can quit at any time.

Figure D.34

6. After you finish with the tutorial, you will be presented with a message asking whether you are sure you want to close the Discover Windows 98 tutorial session. Click Yes to end the process.

Disk Cleanup

The Disk Cleanup function is an automated way for Windows 98 to delete extraneous files such as temporary Internet files, other temporary files, downloaded ActiveX and Java program applets, documents in the Recycle Bin, temporary Windows 98 files, and remove the Windows 98 uninstall information. To use the Disk Cleanup feature, follow these steps:

1. Click the Start button, choose Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Disk Cleanup, as shown in Figure D.35.
2. The first Disk Cleanup dialog box, shown in Figure D.36, shows Windows 98's progress as it determines how much hard drive space can be saved by the Disk Cleanup program.
3. After Disk Cleanup determines how much space will be saved, the screen shown in Figure D.37 appears. In the Disk Cleanup tab, place a check mark next to the types of files you want removed, and then click OK.

Figure D.35

Figure D.36


NOTE: Click the View Files button to view a list of files contained within the highlighted bin. In the case of Figure D.37, clicking the View Files button would reveal the names of the temporary Internet files that you are about to delete. The View Files button is only present for use with temporary Internet files, downloaded program files, and the Recycle Bin.


NOTE: If you use the Internet as much as I do (which is about 30 to 45 minutes daily), the Temporary Internet Files entry will probably contain most of the disk-cleanup opportunities.
4. If the Total Space to Be Cleaned section of the Disk Cleanup tab reads
0 MB, click the More Options tab, shown in Figure D.38.

Figure D.37


warning... Be very careful about deleting files that you do not understand. In the case of Recycle Bin and temporary Internet files, this warning might not apply. But with the others, please think about what you are doing prior to performing the cleanup process. It is always better to be safe than sorry when it comes to your PC.
5. Click the Clean Up button in the Windows Components area to open the Windows Setup tab of the Add/Remove Programs Properties dialog box, shown in Figure D.39. (For more information about this dialog box, refer to the section titled "Add/Remove Programs.") From here, you can safely delete any nice-to-have-but-not-necessary Windows 98 options. If you don't have vision or dexterity problems, for example, consider deleting the Accessibility Options. (Refer to the section titled "Accessibility Options" for more information about this feature.) This can save as much as 6 MB of hard drive space.

Figure D.38

Figure D.39

6. After you have made your selections, click the OK button to process the changes. This returns you to the Disk Cleanup screen.

7. Click the Clean Up button in the Installed Programs area to open the Install/Uninstall tab of the Add/Remove Programs Properties dialog box, shown in Figure D.40 (for more information about this dialog box, refer to the section titled "Add/Remove Programs"). From here, you can safely delete any third-party applications that you do not require by selecting them in the list and clicking the Add/Remove button.

Figure D.40

8. After you finish deleting/removing programs, click the OK button to exit the dialog box. This returns you to the Disk Cleanup screen.


NOTE: It is strongly recommended that you do not remove applications you do not recognize, unless you are the only user of the PC and it is a computer for home use. Deleting things you do not understand can lead to computing oblivion.

Disk Defragmenter

The Windows 98 Disk Defragmenter enables you to rearrange files on your hard drive so that software programs can find files faster. This, in turn, will help applications run faster. Another plus of the Disk Defragmenter is that it automatically rearranges the free disk space on your hard drive, which might give you more free space to work with. To use the Disk Defragmenter, follow these steps:

1. Click the Start button, choose Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Disk Defragmenter, as shown in Figure D.41.

Figure D.41

2. Select the drive you want to defragment from the drop-down list in the ensuing Select Drive dialog box, shown in Figure D.42. Click Settings to continue.

Figure D.42

3. Use the Disk Defragmenter Settings dialog box, shown in Figure D.43, to configure the disk defragmentation process either for every defragmentation operation or for only the current one. I recommend that you check both options in the When Defragmenting My Hard Drive section (note, however, that checking these options slows the defragmentation process) and that you use these options every time you defragment your hard drive. After you make your selections, click OK to start Defragmenter.

Figure D.43


NOTE: Disk Defragmenter's help text states that you can run other programs while using Disk Defragmenter. Although this might technically be a true statement, it is strongly recommended that you run Disk Defragmenter program by itself because Disk Defragmenter greatly affects the performance of other running programs. Even worse, running other programs, such as word processors, alongside Disk Defragmenter can cause Disk Defragmenter to continually lose its place and start over because word processors and other programs write to the hard drive that Defragmenter is trying to defragment. I have seen people use Disk Defragmenter throughout the course of an entire day, never finishing the process while dramatically slowing their PCs.

Even when other applications aren't running, Defragmenter can take a long time to complete. Do not fret if it takes several hours to run the Disk Defragmenter utility, especially if it has been a long time since you last ran this utility. I recommend that you run Defragmenter during a down time, such as during lunch, just as you are leaving work (letting it run overnight while you are out of the office), or just before you go to bed. One way to avoid some of the headaches you are bound for is to use the Task Scheduler component of Windows 98. Refer to the section titled "Task Scheduler" for more information.


4. During the defragmentation process, you will see a dialog box containing a progress bar, as shown in Figure D.44. If you want to end the defragmentation process prior to its completion, click the Stop button.

Figure D.44

5. You are presented with a completion box. Click Accept (it is your only choice), and the program will end automatically.

Disk Management

The art of disk management is only as complex as you make it. That is, how you arrange programs and directories on your hard drive largely depends on your own organizational skills or lack thereof.

The Windows 98 Explorer feature provides a directory-tree structure for finding files and folders (in Windows 98, a subdirectory is known as a folder). When viewed through Explorer, a folder looks just as you might expect: like a manila folder. When you click a folder, the icon changes from a closed manila folder to an open one, and the contents of the folder are revealed. The applications you use are typically spread among multiple folders.

Most programs produced by commercial companies (such as Microsoft) probably install in the C:\Program Files directory. This, for the most part, is helpful because it leaves you with a common starting point for most of the applications on your hard drive. Some commercial packages, however, do not follow this trend, nor do some applications that you produce yourself. It does not hurt anything to install applications all over the hard drive, but it might make it more confusing to find them by using the Windows 98 Explorer
feature.

As a rule of thumb, you should minimize the number of files that you copy or install into your root (C:\) directory. This will make troubleshooting Windows 98 operating system errors a bit easier, and might limit problems that can occur as a result of copying too many similarly named files to the same
directory.


NOTE: By file, I mean documents, spreadsheets, and the like--not file direc-tories.

For more information about disk management, see the following sections in this book:

Display Options

Windows 98 display options enable you to change how your computer desktop is displayed, as well as to manipulate the various screen fonts and colors that will be present throughout the many Windows applications on your PC. To make changes to the display options, follow these steps:

1. Right-click a blank portion of the desktop and choose Properties from the ensuing shortcut menu, as shown in Figure D.45.
2. The Display Properties dialog box appears with the Background tab selected by default, as shown in Figure D.46. Here you can specify an HTML document or picture to use as a background for your desktop.


NOTE: The tabs in your Display Properties dialog box might differ slightly from the ones shown here. The core tabs--which you will have on your machine--are Background, Screen Saver, Appearance, Effects, Settings, and Web. The STB Vision tab shown in Figure D.46 pertains specifically to the video card that came with my PC. Chances are that your computer will have a vendor-specific tab as well.

Figure D.45

Figure D.46

3. Click the Screen Saver tab to view the screen shown in Figure D.47. Here you can choose a screen saver to be displayed on your machine, establish how long your computer must be idle before the screen-saver image is displayed, and, if desired, set a password for returning to your work after the screen saver has been displayed.

Figure D.47


NOTE: The original purpose of screen savers was to prevent a phenomenon known as burn-in, in which a faint image of the contents of your screen remained present even after you turned off your computer. Although people with older monitors still use screen savers for this purpose, screen savers are now used primarily for entertainment value.


NOTE: Details on modifying screen-saver components, as well as further instructions on configuring a screen saver, can be found in the section titled "Screen Savers."
4. The Screen Saver tab also enables you to configure your monitor's
energy-saving features. To change these settings click the Settings button, make your choices in the ensuing dialog box (shown in Figure D.48), and click OK to return to the Display Properties dialog box. Note that these same settings can be changed through the Windows 98 Power Management option found in the Control Panel (refer to the "Power Management" section for more information).

Figure D.48


NOTE: If the Settings button is grayed out, that indicates that your monitor does not support energy-saving features.
5. To modify the PC colors, fonts, and general appearance, click the Appearance tab. Click the down-arrow button to the right of the Scheme text box to view the Scheme drop-down list, shown in Figure D.49. Select the scheme you want from the list; a preview of the scheme will appear in the display window above the Scheme text box.

Figure D.49

6. Click the Effects tab to view the screen shown in Figure D.50. Here you can change the icons associated with various Windows 98 features. Select the icon you want to change in the Desktop Icons area, and then click the Change Icon button.
7. The dialog box shown in Figure D.51 prompts you for the name of a file that contains Windows-compatible icon graphics. After you have entered the filename, press the Enter key; any available icons will appear in the box. Click OK to return to the Effects tab of the Display Properties dialog box after you have made your selection.

Figure D.50

8. If you want to hide icons when using the Active Desktop feature of Windows 98, click the Hide Icons When the Desktop Is Viewed as a Web Page check box in the Effects tab.

9. Alter the manner in which icons and the Windows 98 desktop appear to users by checking or unchecking features in the Visual Effects section. Play around with these options to find the effects that please you most.

10. Click the Web tab to view the screen shown in Figure D.52. To use the features of the Web from Windows 98, you must first activate the Active Desktop. Do so by checking the View My Active Desktop as a Web Page check box. You can now add HTML and Web-related content (such as JPEG and GIF graphics, as well as animated GIF files). To add a file, click the New button and pick a file from your local hard drive.

Figure D.51


NOTE: When you click the New button, you are just telling Windows 98 that you want to use an existing file (regardless of whether it is already on your hard drive). Although the content might already be on your hard drive, it is not in a location that Windows 98 can see. Following this process puts the content into the correct location so that Windows 98 can use it.
11. Click the Settings tab to view the screen shown in Figure D.53. This screen enables you to alter the resolution of your monitor, as well as to set the number of colors available for use.


NOTE: The lower the screen resolution (for example, 640x480), the larger the characters and graphics will appear to be. If you were to choose a higher resolution (such as 800x600), the screen characters and graphics would appear to be smaller.

Figure D.52


NOTE: If, in the Colors area, you specify that a large number of colors be used, as is the case when you select High Color (16 bit), it might negatively impact your system's overall performance.
12. To accept your changes in the Display Properties dialog box and return to the desktop, click OK.

Document Templates

A document template is a file that permits you to easily create a certain type of document for a specific Windows 98 application. Windows 98 comes with several predefined templates, including the following:

If you create your own document templates, you can better customize the starting point for document creation. The Microsoft Word template, for instance, just gives you a blank document. If you make your own template within Microsoft Word (a DOT file) and save it into the Document Templates folder for Microsoft Office (usually C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\ Templates), you can apply this template to your Microsoft Word documents. This becomes very useful if you create the same types of documents over and over, such as office memos that have a standard letterhead.

Documents

In Windows 98, document refers to any file you generate using a Windows 98-compatible application. For example, a document could be a business letter typed in WordPad, a spreadsheet generated in Excel, or a picture created in Paint.

Figure D.53

Documents Menu

The Documents menu selection found in the Windows 98 Start menu, shown in Figure D.54, provides a quick way to access a recently used document.

To use the Documents menu, click the Start button and then choose Documents. You can click a folder appearing above the solid line at the top of the Documents menu to open that folder's window. The filenames appearing below the solid line are the files that you have used most recently on your computer. You can open one of these files by clicking it; Windows 98 will then automatically start the file's application and opens that file inside the appli-cation.

Figure D.54


NOTE: Not all applications are capable of putting their most recently accessed files into this area. Typically, only 32-bit Windows applications with the Windows 95 (or later) seal of approval will place the names of their most recently accessed files into this holding area. It is, for the most part, safe to assume that most Microsoft-built applications will place their most recently used files here.


NOTE: To learn how to delete filenames from this area, see the section titled "Taskbar Properties."

Driver Converter (FAT32)

The purpose of the FAT32 driver converter is to help you convert your existing 16-bit FAT drives to FAT32. FAT32 is an improvement of the file allocation table (FAT) file system that improves hard drive disk space efficiency on drives larger than 512 MB. FAT32 is not recommended for users whose hard drives are smaller than 512 MB or for users who need to dual-boot between Windows 98 and another operating system (you cannot dual-boot after FAT32 has been installed).

To use Drive Converter, follow these steps:

1. Click the Start button, choose Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Drive Converter (FAT32), as shown in Figure D.55.

Figure D.55

2. This starts the Drive Converter Wizard, the first screen of which is shown in Figure D.56. Click Next to continue.

Figure D.56

3. In the next screen, shown in Figure D.57, click the hard drive that you want upgraded to the FAT32 format, and then click Next.

Figure D.57

4. Carefully follow the rest of the wizard's prompts. When you finish, you will have a hard drive whose contents are now properly converted into the FAT32 format.

DriveSpace

DriveSpace enables you to artificially expand the size of your hard drive, which enables you to save more information on that hard drive, even though its physical size has not changed. DriveSpace might seem a bit like magic; it just uses a different storage algorithm for mapping bytes of information to a drive.


NOTE: DriveSpace 3 is not compatible with a FAT32-formatted hard drive. Therefore, if you are using FAT32, this application is not for you. When you run out of space on FAT32, you will need to purchase another hard drive.

To use DriveSpace, follow these steps:

1. Click the Start button, choose Programs, Accessories, System Tools, DriveSpace, as shown in Figure D.58.
2. This opens the DriveSpace 3 window. To compress a drive, click the Drive menu and choose Compress, as shown in Figure D.59.
3. This starts the Compression Wizard. Carefully follow each of the steps to complete the process.
4. After you complete the wizard, you will have considerably more free hard drive space, as well as two hard drives. (One is a physical drive; the other is a logical drive.) This new logical drive is actually your C: drive, and the physical hard drive becomes known as another drive letter (probably H:). Continue to use your C: drive just as you have in the past, and try not to place any files or applications on your new drive.

Figure D.58

Figure D.59


NOTE: You do not want to put files on the new drive because that would actually lower the amount of free space available on the C: drive.

Sound confusing? It is. Think of it this way: Pretend you have a cup of water (your C: drive) floating in a bowl of water (your H: drive). As you add more water (files) to the cup (your C: drive), it begins to fill. That is okay, as long as the water in the bowl (the H: drive) doesn't overflow (signifying that the hard--H:--drive is completely full). If you add wa-ter (files) to the bowl (the H: drive), it directly relates to how much water (files) you can add to the cup (your C: drive) before the bowl (your hard drive) overflows.


Another choice is to create a new drive from your current drive's free space. This process eliminates the need to compress any of your current drive's files or applications, but will result in less free hard drive space upon completion. To compress just the free space on a drive, follow these steps:

1. Click the Advanced menu option and choose Create Empty, as shown in Figure D.60.

Figure D.60

2. This starts the Compression Wizard. Follow each of the steps carefully to complete the process. Upon completion, you will have approximately double the free hard drive space as you did before, as well as the two hard drives. (One is a physical drive; the other is the logical drive.)


NOTE: For the nonbelievers in the crowd: Yes, DriveSpace is a safe application that will not corrupt your data at whim.

Drop-Down List Box

Windows 98 uses a software programming feature known as a drop-down list box throughout the operating system. This list box usually contains a list of items or options from which you are to select. The primary purpose of a drop-down list box is to limit the choices for whatever you are attempting to do. In the "Desktop Themes" section of this book, for example, you had to choose which theme you wanted for your PC. The list containing the themes was a drop-down list box. (See? You have already used them like an expert!)

DVD Player

The Digital Versatile Disc (DVD) Player uses a revolutionary new format for DVD discs. DVD discs look and act just like CD-ROMs, except that they can store quite a bit more data (roughly 2600 MB on DVD versus 640 MB on CD-ROM). As the DVD standards evolve, this storage level is expected to increase immensely (at least double). Both DVD discs and CDs can be read by the DVD-ROM drive, and the drive will function just as your old CD-ROM drive did.

The most noticeable difference will be in the operation of a DVD-ROM drive. Because a DVD disc can store not only audio and computer data (the two things a CD-ROM can store), but video as well, you must have special hardware and software to access this video portion. The hardware is called an MPEG decoder card (MPEG stands for Moving Picture Experts Group). The DVD software required is the DVD Player that is built in to Windows 98.

To start the DVD Player, click the Start button, choose Programs, Accessories, Entertainment, DVD Player, as shown in Figure D.61.

Because most DVD-ROM players require specialized software specific to their decoder card, the DVD software support built in to Windows 98 might not be sufficient for your DVD-ROM drive. For this reason, you are generally better off using the custom DVD playing software that came with your DVD-ROM drive than you would be using the Windows 98 DVD Player software.

Figure D.61


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