Windows Galore
Windows 98 Utilities

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Windows 98 comes with some fantastic new utilities that will make your computing life easier and more enjoyable. Some of those utilities are:

We've included some basic information for each utility. For detailed information, check out the book Special Edition Using Windows 98 by Que books.

System Information Utility

The new Microsoft System Information utility keeps track of all your hardware, software, file versions, and computer resources. Very good for troubleshooting. To get to the System Information utility, click Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools. [Back to top]

System File Checker

Scan for corrupted files, update the scan list, extract a file from your CD ROM .cab files. This utility is a big time saver. It will atuomatically search for any and all system (Windows only) files and tell you if it finds corruption. You can then replace the file with the original from your .cab files either on your CD ROM or hard disk.

The Extract utility allows you to extract a file without knowing what .cab file it's in. All you need to know is where your .cab files are.

The System File Checker is accessed by clicking Tools at the top of the System Information utility.  [Back to top]

System Configuration

Fantastic for troubleshooting, this utility allows you to delve into Windows files to check and uncheck individual lines in the config.sys, autoexec.bat, system.ini and win.ini. You can also do system file backup and restores from here.

System Configuration can be found under the Tools option in the System Information utility. [Back to top]

Windows Update

The Windows Update site will search your computer for installed components and tell you if there are updates available. Included are patches for Windows 98, device driver updates (like video card updates) and updates to Internet Explorer, or any other installed Windows component. [Back to top]

Maintenance Wizard

Maintenance Wizard is the updated version of the Task Scheduler. Scandisk and Defrag have both been updated, and the option to search for, and remove, unwanted files has been added. The system can search for temporary files, old Internet files, and even files used during the installation process and remove them to free up disk space. [Back to top]