Solve : Windows 95 hanging at an Error upon clean install?

1.	Solve : Windows 95 hanging at an Error upon clean install?
Answer» Greetings! I am struggling to install Windows 95 on an older PC running a 386. I get the following error after getting into setup: "ERROR SU0410 Cannot open C:\WININST0.400\override.inf. The file may be missing or damaged or there may not be enough memory to continue. Free some memory or increase your swap file size, and then try running Setup again. " PC had a copy of freedos when i received it and it refused to boot that. i fdisked the drive formatted it, booted from win95 floppy and the CD rom driver booted and went into the setup. TOOK over 30 minutes to select which directory i install windows on and then that error. I attempted to format the 1200mb Drive but Fdisk in Windows 95 only wants to see it as a 500mb drive and i am unsure why. Bios limitation? Specs are 386 CPU ISA-386U3 motherboard 4mb ram floppy, CD ROM Trident GPU. Thank you in advance. If able to locate 8MB RAM for it it will be better. I have run 95 on 4MB RAM but its crippled at 4MB. There was a limit to 512MB HDD but even a 1.2GB drive only with 512MB allocation should be plenty as I had 95 running on a 300MB drive and still had plenty of free space.If you get it to run on 4MB of RAM there will be excessive swapping to compensate for low RAM. Additionally hopefully this 386 is a DX and not a SX as SX's are low end and struggle with 95 while DX processors handle it far better. Lag in selecting directory to install to could be a HDD health issue or because SX processor and low RAM Is this a real legal copy of 95 being installed off original CD or large stack of floppies, or an altered image that you installed from off the web?As Dave said it is likely a hard drive issue or the drive is not correctly setup in the Bios. It is likely a type 47 which you will need to get the correct heads, cylinders, sectors to put into the bios. A PROGRAM to help get the parameters is MHDD also to test the drive it is available from here https://hddguru.com/software/2005.10.02-MHDD/ The parameters should also be on the drive Label or if you google the drive model it will be in the spec sheet. The bios would not located the drive automatically. I did not selected type 47 but i typed in the heads, cyl, sectors and it figured out the size itself. I appreciate the link as i have been using a old Core 2 Quad Machine to test the drive and such with it. Quote from: DaveLembke on July 22, 2021, 09:01:48 AM If able to locate 8MB RAM for it it will be better. I have run 95 on 4MB RAM but its crippled at 4MB. There was a limit to 512MB HDD but even a 1.2GB drive only with 512MB allocation should be plenty as I had 95 running on a 300MB drive and still had plenty of free space.If you get it to run on 4MB of RAM there will be excessive swapping to compensate for low RAM. Additionally hopefully this 386 is a DX and not a SX as SX's are low end and struggle with 95 while DX processors handle it far better. Lag in selecting directory to install to could be a HDD health issue or because SX processor and low RAM Is this a real legal copy of 95 being installed off original CD or large stack of floppies, or an altered image that you installed from off the web? Sadly for 30 pin ram i have nothing else lying around. So 4mb will have to be for now. the CPU appears to be a 386-DX40 so thats at least that. I will check the HDD using another machine but to my recollection everything was fine. As for installation media. ALL original. Im using an original microsoft boot floppy and an OEM windows 95 CD with my booklet and serial ready. Strange in that the file has an error at clean install. Is the installation CD free of scratches? Maybe a scratch on the disc in the location that that file resides and so a corrupt version of it is being placed onto the HDD upon install.... Looked at google to see what the override.inf is and no helpful info to suggest its purpose. Cool that its a DX 40Mhz. One screaming 386 back in the day as most were 16Mhz to 33Mhz and it can get the memory in a single fetch vs 2 fetches that the SX required.DaveLembke, Yeah i suppose i lucked out it being a better 386 then the others haha. From what i can see the CD is NICE and clean. You did give me an idea though and that is to try a different DISK drive, perhaps this ones not the best of SHAPE. I will try a different disk drive, ensure the CD is clean and give it another go. I will report back. Thanks for the help. override.inf is in \Win95\precopy2.cab. The contents of the two cabs get copied as part of the setup bootstrap. You could confirm the contents of the cabinet file itself. It can be opened with a few utilities. Depending on where your "OEM" CD is from it's possible there have been changes to the installation media. Late reply, but i wanted to give an update. I ended up upgrading the ram to 8mb and it got PAST that error. The system took over 5 hours to install win95 only for me to realize after checking CPU-z that the Turbo button was invetered and when off, it was running at 27mhz and when on, it was running at 40mhz. Problem solved. Thank you everyone for your input. Awesome that you got it all figured out and surprised 5 hours for the install. Wonders if the CD-ROM drive is a single-speed only drive with a slow read rate or borderline to where its seeking over and over to read a section but doesnt get to the fail condition to bail out. Maybe the CD ROM was making a optical lens track adjustment noise over and over again through the install. Longest install of Windows 95 for me was like 2 hours on a Everex Step 20 Mhz 386. For yours to take 5 hours at a faster clock 386 CPU makes me wonder if the CD ROM might not be the healthiest and so it was slow to get the info built to hard drive. But anyways you got it onto the C: drive and should run ok at 8MB with some minor lag. Windows 95 really ran better on a 486 DX 33Mhz or faster with 32MB RAM.

Answer»

Greetings!

I am struggling to install Windows 95 on an older PC running a 386. I get the following error after getting into setup:

"ERROR SU0410

Cannot open C:\WININST0.400\override.inf. The file may be missing or damaged or there may not be enough memory to continue. Free some memory or increase your swap file size, and then try running Setup again. "

PC had a copy of freedos when i received it and it refused to boot that. i fdisked the drive formatted it, booted from win95 floppy and the CD rom driver booted and went into the setup. TOOK over 30 minutes to select which directory i install windows on and then that error.

I attempted to format the 1200mb Drive but Fdisk in Windows 95 only wants to see it as a 500mb drive and i am unsure why. Bios limitation?

Specs are

386 CPU
ISA-386U3 motherboard
4mb ram
floppy, CD ROM
Trident GPU.

Thank you in advance. If able to locate 8MB RAM for it it will be better. I have run 95 on 4MB RAM but its crippled at 4MB. There was a limit to 512MB HDD but even a 1.2GB drive only with 512MB allocation should be plenty as I had 95 running on a 300MB drive and still had plenty of free space.If you get it to run on 4MB of RAM there will be excessive swapping to compensate for low RAM. Additionally hopefully this 386 is a DX and not a SX as SX's are low end and struggle with 95 while DX processors handle it far better.

Lag in selecting directory to install to could be a HDD health issue or because SX processor and low RAM

Is this a real legal copy of 95 being installed off original CD or large stack of floppies, or an altered image that you installed from off the web?As Dave said it is likely a hard drive issue or the drive is not correctly setup in the Bios. It is likely a type 47 which you will need to get the correct heads, cylinders, sectors to put into the bios.

A PROGRAM to help get the parameters is MHDD also to test the drive it is available from here https://hddguru.com/software/2005.10.02-MHDD/

The parameters should also be on the drive Label or if you google the drive model it will be in the spec sheet.

The bios would not located the drive automatically. I did not selected type 47 but i typed in the heads, cyl, sectors and it figured out the size itself.

I appreciate the link as i have been using a old Core 2 Quad Machine to test the drive and such with it. Quote from: DaveLembke on July 22, 2021, 09:01:48 AM

If able to locate 8MB RAM for it it will be better. I have run 95 on 4MB RAM but its crippled at 4MB. There was a limit to 512MB HDD but even a 1.2GB drive only with 512MB allocation should be plenty as I had 95 running on a 300MB drive and still had plenty of free space.If you get it to run on 4MB of RAM there will be excessive swapping to compensate for low RAM. Additionally hopefully this 386 is a DX and not a SX as SX's are low end and struggle with 95 while DX processors handle it far better.

Lag in selecting directory to install to could be a HDD health issue or because SX processor and low RAM

Is this a real legal copy of 95 being installed off original CD or large stack of floppies, or an altered image that you installed from off the web?

Sadly for 30 pin ram i have nothing else lying around. So 4mb will have to be for now. the CPU appears to be a 386-DX40 so thats at least that.

I will check the HDD using another machine but to my recollection everything was fine.

As for installation media. ALL original. Im using an original microsoft boot floppy and an OEM windows 95 CD with my booklet and serial ready. Strange in that the file has an error at clean install. Is the installation CD free of scratches? Maybe a scratch on the disc in the location that that file resides and so a corrupt version of it is being placed onto the HDD upon install.... Looked at google to see what the override.inf is and no helpful info to suggest its purpose.

Cool that its a DX 40Mhz. One screaming 386 back in the day as most were 16Mhz to 33Mhz and it can get the memory in a single fetch vs 2 fetches that the SX required.DaveLembke,

Yeah i suppose i lucked out it being a better 386 then the others haha. From what i can see the CD is NICE and clean. You did give me an idea though and that is to try a different DISK drive, perhaps this ones not the best of SHAPE. I will try a different disk drive, ensure the CD is clean and give it another go.

I will report back. Thanks for the help. override.inf is in \Win95\precopy2.cab. The contents of the two cabs get copied as part of the setup bootstrap.

You could confirm the contents of the cabinet file itself. It can be opened with a few utilities. Depending on where your "OEM" CD is from it's possible there have been changes to the installation media.
Late reply, but i wanted to give an update.

I ended up upgrading the ram to 8mb and it got PAST that error. The system took over 5 hours to install win95 only for me to realize after checking CPU-z that the Turbo button was invetered and when off, it was running at 27mhz and when on, it was running at 40mhz.

Problem solved. Thank you everyone for your input. Awesome that you got it all figured out and surprised 5 hours for the install. Wonders if the CD-ROM drive is a single-speed only drive with a slow read rate or borderline to where its seeking over and over to read a section but doesnt get to the fail condition to bail out. Maybe the CD ROM was making a optical lens track adjustment noise over and over again through the install.

Longest install of Windows 95 for me was like 2 hours on a Everex Step 20 Mhz 386. For yours to take 5 hours at a faster clock 386 CPU makes me wonder if the CD ROM might not be the healthiest and so it was slow to get the info built to hard drive.

But anyways you got it onto the C: drive and should run ok at 8MB with some minor lag. Windows 95 really ran better on a 486 DX 33Mhz or faster with 32MB RAM.

Solve : Windows 95 hanging at an Error upon clean install?

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