Play DVD on Windows 98/ recover Windows Me ?

[DaveBo]

Any suggestions on how I can get my HP laptop to play DVDs again?

Here's the sad story:
It used to play fine under the original Windows Me with WinDVD that came with it.

WinME was such a pain I partitioned the HD dual-boot and use Windows98 almost exclusively now.

In the meantime I biffed WindowsMe somehow.

I installed Media Player 9 under Win98 but it says it can't do DVDs except under XP.

I was thinking I could do a factory recovery of the original WinMe, but it looks like that will blow away my Win98 and other partitions as well.

Several questions here:
Can I get Media Player to play DVDs under Windows 98?
or
Is there another player that will do it?
or
Can I do a recovery of my Windows Me to its current boot partition without losing the Win98 and other partitions?

Thanks and Happy New Year, DaveBo

[dglienna]

I think ghost runs automatically when you recover, so I *think* that there may be a way to run it manually to recover part of the file. not sure, though, and I never got it working a few months ago. (we wiped out the partition twice, and then just installed XP instead.)

Why no just use XP instead?

[<ABX]

Cyberlink PowerDVD is good $44.95/ $69.95 (Deluxe/Standard)
The Core Media Player (TCMP) is good $~10 USD for DVD Support (paypal).

I would suggest upgrading to xp because ME's preformance is horrible.

[dis1411]

there is no release of WMP9 that is meant for windows 98

grab WMP10 and things will probably sort themselves out

[DaveBo]

Does anyone know if I can do the factory recovery/restore of Windows ME into its original partition without blowing away the entire HD?

Scenario:
HP N5340 laptop
2 bootable primary partitions: WinME & Win98SE
3 data partitions, I think all are FAT32
using Powerquest BootMagic

BTW Windows Media Player 9 is working under Win98, it just doesn't see the DVD because it's missing the decoder/codec thingie, so I don't think WMP10 would make much difference.

Thanks, DaveBo (I hate computers!)

[dglienna]

I wouldn't count on keeping your data.

You can download plug-ins for WMP that would prolly get the DVD option that you want.

[dis1411]

BTW Windows Media Player 9 is working under Win98

yup, i was thinking of WMP 8

also doing a factory restore will wipe out anything you have on partition (possibly drive)