Printing Directly To Acrobat in Win98

[vk6zgo]

In fact, I didn't think I'd get the responses I did as, after all, this is Win98.

I never imagined I would be troubleshooting 8080 systems in 2021 and my much newer CMU200 runs on DOS 6.2.2 (the very latest!) so Win98 is not so shocking at all.   It's surprising how long old tech persists.

In my last job before retirement, we had a relatively modern, ("2000s") Spectrum Analyser, where the only way, (apart from photographically), to get "screenshots" was to save the screen to a floppy  disk!

It had all sorts of ways to control the SA remotely from a computer, but the one thing most likely to be needed was missing.

Normal procedure was to save to the floppy, put the floppy into the workshop computer which still had the requisite drive, save it to a USB thumb drive, take that thumb drive up the stairs to my small office & finally get the screenshot into the computer there.

I could then incorporate the screenshot into a report on that device.

Further on the subject of "old tech", in the same job, I found myself doing something I hadn't done for nearly 30 years-------pushing surface mount capacitors (we called 'em "chip capacitors" in the '70s) around with toothpicks on a PCB to tune an RF amplifier PCB whilst watching an RF sweep of its response.

The "rent an EE"s in the dear old PRC either left before they educated the factory that such things needed individual tuning, or never knew, themselves, so it was left to the customer to work out why we were cooking up unbalance loads on the combining units used to parallel up a bunch of small PAs to make a big one, & hence killing the amplifiers.

Hence, the screenshots & individual reports.

[bostonman]

As I said, try that generic driver I attached. I've personally used it many times and it has supported every USB drive I've thrown at my old computers.

You were correct, the Win98 driver worked. Maybe I made a wrong assumption or Win98 works a bit differently than I remember and what I'm familiar with now, but I installed the application in a new directory and thought that was all I needed. It wasn't until I went into the Device Manager and pointed the unknown USB device to the directory that it installed the driver.

Just for my understanding, and anyone else who decides to use this driver, I noticed a few anomalies. The USB thumb drive is labeled 4GB_USB, but in Win98 Explorer, it showed the USB in lower case. Also, I 'ejected' the drive, however, it was still showing in Explorer. If I attempted to click on it, I'd get an error saying not found (or something to that nature).

Are these faults of Win98 or a few hiccups in the driver? Either way, if these are my biggest USB problems, I'll be quite happy to work around them. 

Having experienced these 'hiccups', I"m wondering if I needed to do something with CutePDF, such as 'adding' it as a printer because it wasn't a device option when I attempted to print something; and then I uninstalled CutePDF.

I'll need to either try it again or send an email to the company asking which version(s) support Win98; and ask if their 'evaluation' version will need to be purchased.

On a side note, I don't know if this oscilloscope can be upgraded to XP. From what I understand, I have a model 54831 with an 'M' at the end. The 'M' means it was a military unit, and a military unit can't be upgraded unless the motherboard is replaced.

Either way, I'm not necessarily afraid to tinker with the software, but I went through some work to get the software running and afraid I'll dig myself into a hole trying to upgrade. When I first purchased the scope, the scope booted just fine. Suddenly I got an error and the HP community thought it was something in BIOS. I kept tinkering with settings in BIOS, then it was assumed the power supply was bad. After probably a month, I stripped the entire thing down to just the motherboard to eliminate any possibilities. In any case, I discovered the mSATA drive that the previous owner installed crashed (or the OS became corrupt). He sent the drive image he had, and Windows booted, but the scope software failed to initialize the scope (normal boot sequence is an Agilent logo covering the entire desktop, and, after about twenty-seconds, the relays click and the screen changes to the oscilloscope). Someone else sent their image and I had a similar experience.

Finally after about three or four drive images (comprised of both Win98 and the scope software), I managed to get one that was bare bones and worked. Unfortunately this also meant it had calibration and self-test data from the scope it came from. Due to the scope having issues in channel 2 and 3, I was unable to calibrate any channel thus making the good channels (and bad channels when used in the only states that weren't broken) to have incorrect measurements.

After discovering a few poorly replaced components, incorrect value components that were installed by a previous owner, and replacing two hybrids (one in each of the bad channels), I finally got the scope working and was able to calibrate it.

Having said all this, I haven't found an actual installation CD for just the scope software, meaning, I can't install Win98, and then install the scope software. This makes trying to upgrade to XP difficult, and most people I've found have upgraded to Win10 which requires the motherboard upgraded. While they are at it, they replace the screen with a higher resolution version.

Performing all these upgrades would certainly be nice, it's an old scope, and I feel due to obsolete parts, dumping too much cash into upgrades is more of a gamble.

[Halcyon]

I'm glad to hear you got it up and running. Not sure why the USB is playing up. The (mostly) sorted out the hot-plugging issues by the time Windows 98 came around.

Since you don't have the original media or a way to restore the operating system if it fails, can I recommend you image the disk now so you have a backup, in case the drive dies or something goes screwy.

Windows 98se was better and more stable. Perhaps after you do a backup, you could try an upgrade to 98se and see what happens?

[bostonman]

I do have the image someone gave me. I kept all the images I got should something go wrong. As I mentioned, removing the drive isn't easy. Attached is what I think is the scope in its original configuration with a 5.25" hard drive.

Mine is basically laid out in the same fashion except the mounting plate is plexiglass (or some sort of plastic) and I have an SSD with a IDE to SSD convertor. To remove the drive, all those boards need to be removed, cables, etc... It's a gamble because the working drive image I have can be restored, and I'd need to rerun calibration and self-test; and hope it passes at that point in time. If I remove the drive now to image, I need to disturb all that hardware/cables, and then I may want to image the drive again and again as I keep making changes.

If I can just connect to the IDE ribbon cable, then it would be much easier, but I don't have an adapter that connects IDE female to IDE female. I have a USB to IDE, but it's not male connector.

I need to dig deeper as to how people upgraded to Win10 because they somehow were able to install the scope software. I'd be happy with XP, but, for what it's worth, Windows is useless to me because (as of now) I just need a virtual printer (print to PDF) and USB.  My only need for a newer OS would be to keep the scope in a newer configuration that will be easier to work around in the future rather than dealing with Win98 issues in another decade. I do feel a newer OS would provide some comfort knowing it's more stable. When the hard drive crashed (or the OS), I was getting the BSOD (blue screen of death) and had a helpless feeling running through me.

I may try installing Win98SE. The worst that can happen is I need to dump my image back onto the drive and re-run calibration. After running calibration before, I did a search for any files that changed and found two text files that I assume is what the system reads since they contain the calibration data information. I saved them so most likely I can just overwrite those files should I have calibration issues in the future.

Now would be the best time to install SE because I have active support on here rather than dealing with this down the road when who knows what will exist. The only reason this scope is up and running is about 95% due to the contributors on EEVblog. In a decade from now, who knows what information will be available for an already outdated scope and an OS that most young people today haven't heard of.

[Halcyon]

Was the software ever available online to download? If so, I usually find all those old, broken links through archive.org with a good deal of success. That way you can still get the old stuff from the source.

[Halcyon]

Also, if you have some cash to spare, I would seriously look at replacing that old clunking drive with CompactFlash storage. It's going to be far more reliable in the long term, particularly if you're able to do a completely clean format/re-install of everything.

[bostonman]

Was the software ever available online to download? If so, I usually find all those old, broken links through archive.org with a good deal of success. That way you can still get the old stuff from the source.

It was taken offline, but someone extracted the whole website and provided it on a FTP site (or whatever the proper term is). I downloaded the software which included (if I remember correctly) Ghost to install the image. Unfortunately the scope failed to initialize after Windows booted. This was the same result I got from the previous owner who provided the drive image he extracted (and installed) when he upgraded to a SSD (technically a mSATA).

Someone else provided their entire drive which was about 23GB, however, another person provided their (very clean) drive image which worked, so I never installed the 23GB (although all I had was a full extraction and not an actual install image.

Also, if you have some cash to spare, I would seriously look at replacing that old clunking drive with CompactFlash storage. It's going to be far more reliable in the long term, particularly if you're able to do a completely clean format/re-install of everything.

As mentioned in previous posts (and this one) the HD has been upgraded to a SSD. After the mSATA crashed, I bought a Western Digital SSD, installed the clean image provided by someone, and it works just fine now.

[spostma]

I use DoroPDF on Win98, works fine for me on all windows versions:
https://www.techspot.com/downloads/6100-doro-pdf-writer.html

If your scope program uses direct hardware access, then you might need to use a driver like giveIO to allow IO port access to user space programs.

Use google translate for a lot of useful info on getting old software to work on newer windows versions:
https://www-user.tu-chemnitz.de/~heha/basteln/PC/LPTISA/emulate.de.htm
https://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/vstudio/en-US/dc5bfae6-21d6-4e70-a7c1-4f548b607625/giveiosys-on-win764?forum=vcgeneral

direct LPT port access under 64-bit Windows:
https://github.com/NMCity/lpt1giveiosys64bit

Probably you will have better chances on a 32-bit win7 or win10 than on a 64-bit version.

Anyway, use virustotal.com to verify all downloads first!

[bostonman]

Thanks for the information.

I got a reply from CutePDF and will try these files tomorrow:


First, Please download and install the latest version of FREE converter " gs950w32.exe" off
https://download.cutepdf.com/public/gs950w32.exe

Then install  https://download.cutepdf.com/public/cutewriter28.zip

[bostonman]

I use DoroPDF on Win98, works fine for me on all windows versions:

Unfortunately DoroPDF didn't work. It installed and printed a Notepad document, however, when it came time to print a scope screen, it printed just squares. I sent an email to the creator and we exchanged a few emails. When I sent an email with screenshots showing the issues, I didn't get a reply. Today I sent a follow up email and the email was returned.

Odd that the person would delete their email after all this time, so I'm wondering if he placed me on some block list to avoid having to deal with me.

Unfortunately I still haven't found a piece of software that will work.

[Halcyon]

As others have suggested, can't you just use the 'Print Screen' function and save the image as a file. I know it's an extra step. Maybe you can set up a macro?

Grab one of these https://techkeys.us/products/onekeyboard as a shortcut button to "Print Screen and Save" all in one action?

[magic]

I wonder if it might be possible to set up the PDF printer on a different computer and make it available to the scope over network?

[bostonman]

s others have suggested, can't you just use the 'Print Screen' function and save the image as a file. I know it's an extra step. Maybe you can set up a macro?

I believe I commented on that. It may be possible, but the scope prints additional information (if selected) such as the scope waveform settings.

I can try it, but think the resolution would be quite bad.

I wonder if it might be possible to set up the PDF printer on a different computer and make it available to the scope over network?

This is something I alluded to earlier. Maybe use a Raspberry Pi to connect via a network and trick the scope into thinking it's printing to a printer. Unfortunately this is an area I know almost nothing about.

After digging deeper, I found someone who used PrimoPDF v3 and said that was the only version they could get working on a Win98 machine. I just downloaded it and will try it later this afternoon.

[rsjsouza]

Wow, I am very impressed that you were able to make the "print to PDF" driver work on Windows 98. 

Back in those days, Adobe tightly controlled the PDF file format and, IIRC, the handsomely priced Adobe Acrobat SW (not the free Acrobat Reader) came with the Adobe Distiller, which was the de facto "print to PDF" driver at the time.

[bostonman]

No, I haven’t yet, someone online got it to work.

[magic]

You shouldn't need RPi. AFAIK any Windows machine can share printers with other Windows machines if they have a network connection.

That's assuming that the scope has a LAN port. Or at least COM or LPT - those too could be used for networking in W98 ("direct cable connection" IIRC), although I have no idea if it's still supported in newer Windows.

[Halcyon]

You shouldn't need RPi. AFAIK any Windows machine can share printers with other Windows machines if they have a network connection.

That's assuming that the scope has a LAN port. Or at least COM or LPT - those too could be used for networking in W98 ("direct cable connection" IIRC), although I have no idea if it's still supported in newer Windows.

The problem will still be getting a Win98 print driver that is compatible.

[rsjsouza]

One thing that I used at the time (in the absence of the Distiller) was to set up a Postscript printer (use the Apple Color Laserwriter driver, as the HP drivers borked the Postscript file with their own special characters) and then use Ghostview/Ghostwriter to convert it to PDF.

When selecting the printer port, use FILE: instead of an LPT or LAN port.

(Sorry if someone suggested this already)

Edit: these drivers are part of every windows install since 3.11.

[ve7xen]

Back in those days I always used PDFCreator, I believe it supported Win98 until sometime around version 1.2, but may need the .NET runtime.

As for a 'print to PDF server' this is also totally viable. CUPS is the standard Linux print server and should run fine on an RPi. Install the cups-pdf driver, add it as a printer and share it. On the Windows side, any generic PostScript driver should print over the network to this just fine. Then it will dump its output in /var/spool/cups-pdf which you can share over the network with Samba or whatever.

[magic]

I don't think Windows (particularly Windows 9x) and CUPS would want to talk to each other

If there is a way to hack some Postscript printer driver to write to a Postscript file instead of a real printer, that could be the winner
I'm not sure how the procedure is supposed to work, though.

[bostonman]

When I tried installing PrimoPDF, I got two errors:

Your MSI version 0.0.0.0, requires 3 or greater
Your NET Framework version required version 2 or greater

I assume one or more possibilities. Any versions it downloads will be too new for Win98. A possibility exists any installation of these will compromise the scope software and/or working function of Win98 that allows it to turn off without having to shut down.

Also, if these successfully install, the scope is still a slave to relying on obtaining additional software that may not be available in the future. Obviously I can make drive images, backup any downloaded files, etc... but since I have the resources now, I'd much rather solve this in a much simpler method.

I just looked at MSI and it requires XP which eliminates using PrimoPDF. I'm assuming the issues I have with the other pieces of PDF printing software is similar; Win98 on this machine doesn't have enough updated files.

Unfortunately I don't know anything about drivers (except the plug and play aspect), but I still think the best approach would be a Raspberry Pi that connects via the network and tricks the scope into thinking it's printing to a printer, and the Pi automatically converts it to PDF.

For the price of a Pi, it would be worth tying up one to work exclusively for this scope.

[ve7xen]

I don't think Windows (particularly Windows 9x) and CUPS would want to talk to each other

What would make you think that? Windows 98 supports network printing and will print to CUPS just fine via IPP or 'raw TCP', or even Samba if you went to the trouble of setting that up.

If there is a way to hack some Postscript printer driver to write to a Postscript file instead of a real printer, that could be the winner
I'm not sure how the procedure is supposed to work, though

IIRC you can change the output port to FILE:filename or something like that to print the driver's output stream to a file, but it's a bit cumbersome.

[magic]

I assumed that CUPS is limited to common UNIX protocols while Windows would use its own solution, like it does with most things.
IPP supposedly came out in 1999, by the way.

I dunno, printing to a local PS file seems easier than setting up an RPi with Samba. And Halcyon said that modern Windows requires potentially insecure configuration tweaks before it talks to W98.

[ve7xen]

I assumed that CUPS is limited to common UNIX protocols while Windows would use its own solution, like it does with most things.
IPP supposedly came out in 1999, by the way.

Yeah, it looks like my recollection was incorrect and Windows 98 doesn't support TCP printing at all natively...oops, but CUPS does support basically all the simple protocols out there, LPD/JetDirect/IPP, you can easily print to it directly from any Windows that supports TCP printing. It looks like Samba would be the simplest path, but using HP's JetDirect software would probably work too.

I dunno, printing to a local PS file seems easier than setting up an RPi with Samba. And Halcyon said that modern Windows requires potentially insecure configuration tweaks before it talks to W98.

Printing to the network potentially kills two birds with one stone, getting the file off the scope onto the network and handling PDF conversion, but there are of course many ways to skin this cat. I assume you can set up such a print server using Windows too, I'm just not a Windows guy.

[amyk]

archive.org might have a suitable version of real Acrobat that you can use.

As for the comments about installing Win10(!?), I surely hope you're joking because Win98-era hardware is probably going to already be too slow for XP, and it being a scope means the DOS-based Win9x could be allowing scope software access to the hardware directly.

Upgrading to 98SE is probably doable, however.