re-installing ancient software

[TerryinNC]

I have an automobile service manual on CD that uses an old version (2001) of Stirling Technologies installSHIELD that worked fine on Windows XP. Now that I have "upgraded" to Windows 7 I cannot load the program into the new system, even changing the "compatibility" to WindowsXP or Windows2000. Can you suggest some other trick - I need to fix my car.

There are several "install".exe files on the disk. I can't get any of them to run, and the compatibility troubleshooter can't figure them out either.
Is there a way to identify and run the program directly from the disk without installing it?

 

[Darryl Licht]

Hmmmm come to think of it I havent installed my service manual for my 1998 F150 since I upgraded to 64 bit from 32 bit Win7.

If it were to happen to me I would copy the CD over to a folder on HDD and try using Compatability Checker again. If that doesn't work try installing the manual in Windows XP Mode.

 

[MadMaxData]

Has this been resolved, TerryinNC?

 

[TerryinNC]

Hmmmm come to think of it I havent installed my service manual for my 1998 F150 since I upgraded to 64 bit from 32 bit Win7.

Let me know if you get it to work.
Thanks

Terry

 

[Darryl Licht]

Hmmmm come to think of it I havent installed my service manual for my 1998 F150 since I upgraded to 64 bit from 32 bit Win7.

Let me know if you get it to work.
Thanks

Terry

Yep.... I tried installing my service manual and mine wont install either! I have tried XP SP2 compatability and I still get the following error with mine...



Not sure if mine is from stirling, but I'll try a few things with mine and report back. I'm probably going to just use XP Mode as it is intended for apps that just flat out wont run in win7.

Also, since I had it working on Vista 32, and it worked after I upgraded from Vista 32 to Win7 32 bit... I am now running a clean install of Win7 64bit. I am guessing my issue may be that I am now running a 64 bit OS.

 

[Darryl Licht]

Update... I tried copying entire CD contents to HDD and still no success.

So I fired up XP mode and tried the installation in the virtual machine... naturally it works fine in XP Mode (Using Virtual PC).

 

[TerryinNC]

Thanks very much for checking and reporting. Unfortunately I do not have Virtual PC. I hope I can find another way.

But your behavior is very much what I found. And your program screen is the same, so I suspect Ford (or Helms?) used the same software through the early 2000's. I need a Windows 7 guru to tell me how to fool 7 or how to get it to run in XP configuration. Is the problem simply that it is just not signed, or something like that?

Interesting that I couldn't even open the help file - it needed a patch to read the old 32 bit(?) help.

 

[Darryl Licht]

Virtual PC is FREE!!! <--- but you must have Pro version win7 or higher!
Windows Virtual PC: Home Page

Also run the freeware utility Securable from grc.com to determine if your CPU is capable of running virtual machines...Most Popular Freeware on GRC.COM

More on the issue... It also runs fine in my Win7 32 bit virtual machine.

So, in my case I have concluded that the issue must be this app has no idea what to do in a 64 bit environment.

Is your win7 32 or 64 bit???

 

[bobkn]

I have an automobile service manual on CD that uses an old version (2001) of Stirling Technologies installSHIELD that worked fine on Windows XP. Now that I have "upgraded" to Windows 7 I cannot load the program into the new system, even changing the "compatibility" to WindowsXP or Windows2000. Can you suggest some other trick - I need to fix my car.

There are several "install".exe files on the disk. I can't get any of them to run, and the compatibility troubleshooter can't figure them out either.
Is there a way to identify and run the program directly from the disk without installing it?

As you say that you have 6GB of RAM, I suppose that you're running Win7 X64.

That is supposed to not run 16 bit code. I have read that some 32 bit software uses 16 bit installation code, which gives a problem. I wonder whether either of these caused your difficulties.

 

[TerryinNC]

I think you may have put your finger on it - I'm running 64 bit Home Premium. You think this thing may have some native code in it that is 32 bit only? bummer.

It just occurred to me that my wife's MacBook has XP and Bootcamp - I'll try it over there.


Update: It runs fine over on the Mac, so I'm back in business. The question now is which I will get rid of first - my LS or the Mac.
Thanks for your help. But if anyone finds out how to make 16 bit installers work I'd like to hear.

 

[Darryl Licht]

I think you may have put your finger on it - I'm running 64 bit Home Premium. You think this thing may have some native code in it that is 32 bit only? bummer.

It just occurred to me that my wife's MacBook has XP and Bootcamp - I'll try it over there.

Home Premium wont run virtual machines, so thats out. You could easy upgrade to pro...?

I noticed on my install cd that some files had a *16* in the file name and some had a *32*, so I am assuming that the install is a 16 bit file and not compatable with our 64 bit OSes.

My manual is for a 1998 F150 (with the CD updated & copyrighted 2002), so its pretty old by todays standards! @ least we know now that virtual pc is the workaround!

 

[WindowsStar]

I have an automobile service manual on CD that uses an old version (2001) of Stirling Technologies installSHIELD that worked fine on Windows XP. Now that I have "upgraded" to Windows 7 I cannot load the program into the new system, even changing the "compatibility" to WindowsXP or Windows2000. Can you suggest some other trick - I need to fix my car.

There are several "install".exe files on the disk. I can't get any of them to run, and the compatibility troubleshooter can't figure them out either.
Is there a way to identify and run the program directly from the disk without installing it?

As you say that you have 6GB of RAM, I suppose that you're running Win7 X64.

That is supposed to not run 16 bit code. I have read that some 32 bit software uses 16 bit installation code, which gives a problem. I wonder whether either of these caused your difficulties.

This is exactly what I was going to say. Yes you are completely right the installer is 16bit and the application is 32bit.....or well....I looked at the application it could be 16bit too. You CANNOT run 16bit software on Windows 7 64bit. - Added some REP!!!

Here is a work around if the installer is 16bit and the application is 32bit. (Note: the application has to BE 32bit):

A limitation to many 16bit installers was that they were not very sophisticated and basically just copied the files from the CD to the hard drive and then created the shortcuts. Or they just unpacked the files from some compressed file and then copied them to the hard drive and created the shortcuts. So the work around is to install the software on Windows XP or such and then just copy the entire directory from Windows XP C:\Program Files\<application> to Windows 7 C:\Program Files\<application> then copy or create your own shortcuts and the software 90% of the time will work. (Another Note: you must copy to C:\Program Files\<application> because that old application has no idea about C:\Program Files (x86)\<application> and since the installer never ran Windows 7 cannot force/redirect the software to use C:\Program Files (x86)\<application>.

I have done this with many 16bit installers for a 32bit applications and have had a very good success rate on the software working.

 

[FuturDreamz]

How does the program display the instructions?
you could probably use winrar or something to extract the documents depending on how they are formatted. IDK; I'm used to the mac pkg system.

Things like this is why I prefer the hardcopy version of service manuals; you don't have any compatibility issues with old books (unless they're in arabic or something)

 

[Darryl Licht]

So the work around is to install the software on Windows XP or such and then just copy the entire directory from Windows XP C:\Program Files\<application> to Windows 7 C:\Program Files\<application> then copy or create your own shortcuts and the software 90% of the time will work. (Another Note: you must copy to C:\Program Files\<application> because that old application has no idea about C:\Program Files (x86)\<application> and since the installer never ran Windows 7 cannot force/redirect the software to use C:\Program Files (x86)\<application>.

Unfortunately, in my case the CD is damaged just enough that I cant copy its contents to a folder nor make an iso from it! Also, I cant copy from a vhd to my boot drive... already tried that!

 

[WindowsStar]

So the work around is to install the software on Windows XP or such and then just copy the entire directory from Windows XP C:\Program Files\<application> to Windows 7 C:\Program Files\<application> then copy or create your own shortcuts and the software 90% of the time will work. (Another Note: you must copy to C:\Program Files\<application> because that old application has no idea about C:\Program Files (x86)\<application> and since the installer never ran Windows 7 cannot force/redirect the software to use C:\Program Files (x86)\<application>.

Unfortunately, in my case the CD is damaged just enough that I cant copy its contents to a folder nor make an iso from it! Also, I cant copy from a vhd to my boot drive... already tried that!

Depending on the damage: You could try a cleaning/re-surfacing machine or system. I know I have fixed many CD/DVDs that I thought would never work again doing that. We have a place in town that has a $5000 special machine, for $3 they will clean/re-surface the disc. It takes the machine 30 minutes but once it is done the disc looks just like new. I don't know if that is an option but it has saved me a few times.

 

[MilesAhead]

I have Vista Home Premium 64 bit and VirtualBox will create a VM on it. It should also work on 7 64 bit. If you have an XP install CD you should be able to at least install and use the software on the VM. Of course if you have an XP install CD there's also the option of installing it on its own partition(providing drivers are available for your hardware.) The trick is to find a step by step guide that includes the fix for "ntldr is missing or corrupt" once you fix the W7 boot loader. Googling on that phrase should find the fix though.

VirtualBox is probably easier to set up than rounding up the XP drivers. Depends how much stuff you want to run in XP.

edit: if you venture into the Virtualization forum, Kari is very knowledgeable when it comes to VirtualBox.

 

[Darryl Licht]

I think you may have put your finger on it - I'm running 64 bit Home Premium. You think this thing may have some native code in it that is 32 bit only? bummer.

It just occurred to me that my wife's MacBook has XP and Bootcamp - I'll try it over there.

ANy luck thru bootcamp? You may want to run this app to see if your PC is vm capable Securable GRC|SecurAble: Determine Processor Security Features|

If so, a MS Easy upgrade to Pro might be for you!

 

[TerryinNC]

This is exactly what I was going to say. Yes you are completely right the installer is 16bit and the application is 32bit.....or well....I looked at the application it could be 16bit too. You CANNOT run 16bit software on Windows 7 64bit. - Added some REP!!!

Here is a work around if the installer is 16bit and the application is 32bit. (Note: the application has to BE 32bit)....:

You have identified my problem. The application installed on my old XP system and copied over in the transition is VIEW16.EXE. And of course it gives me the error message that its incompatible. This is the same result when I try to run WINSTALL.EXE from the CD.
However, the original disk seems to have a 32 bit version. But when I try to open WINST32.EXE an error message flashes through the screen too fast to read then nothing happens. I've changed it to run in XP compatability mode - same result.

 

[mlevy]

Virtual PC is FREE!!! <--- but you must have Pro version win7 or higher!
Windows Virtual PC: Home Page

Not ENTIRELY true. One can go and download MS Virtual PC 2007 and use that...

Download details: Virtual PC 2007

 

[pparks1]

Virtual PC is free...however you are not able to download and use Windows XP Mode (which comes with a free activated copy of Windows XP) unless you are using Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise or Ultimate.

You have other great choices out there like VMWare Player and Sun Virtual Box...both of which are free. However, neither of them comes with a free activated copy of Windows XP...so you would have to have the license or get a license to run Windows XP under either of those products.