THE WAIT IS OVER! Finally, after many months of delay, Windows 98 is here. We've been hearing about Windows 98 for a long time, it was even supposed to be named Windows 97 ( note: there is no Windows 97, the Windows 95 OSR2 release is often referred to, by pirated CD's, as Windows 97). Microsoft includes many new things that were not in Windows 95 with this new OS . The FAT32 converter , the controversial integration of the IE4 and improved support for new hardware, specifically for devices using the Universal Serial Bus (USB), are only some of the improvements that come with this product.

With all the attention this product is getting should you consider upgrading? Should you forget all about your old OS and buy the product immediately? As with all products their pros and cons should be considered. Windows 98 has a few things which should make your computer perform better.

Will Windows98 REALLY solved Windows95's problems?

Files on PCs are stored and retrieved on hard disks by a filing system called the File Allocation Table--FAT for short. To save more space in your hard disk Microsoft introduced its FAT32 converter. This utility can convert a hard disk from a FAT 16 file system to a FAT 32 file system. The FAT32 file system is better than its predecessor because it can handle more clusters(thus smaller) in the same sized hard disk. To illustrate this, hard disks greater than 1 GB uses 32 K clusters in the FAT16 file system. A 1 byte file, for example, would occupy the same 32K sized cluster as a 31K file. Similarly a 33K sized file would occupy 2x32K

clusters(64K). Whereas in FAT32 the cluster sizes can go as small as 4K, thus making it a more efficient way of storing your data. So what? This simply means that you can recover space wasted when you convert your drive from FAT16 to FAT32. In fact you could save more than a 100 megabytes of free space. This is one of the most important feature that Microsoft included with Win 98. Actually they introduced the FAT32 file system with the OSR2 release of Win 95, but many could not shift to this more efficient file system because they had to delete their partitions and reformat their hard disk.

Another cool feature in Win98 is the Maintenance Wizard, which includes the Disk Defragmenter. This utility dramatically improves application (like Word, Adobe and Excel) loading times. To do this, Windows 98 tracks which files you commonly use. And when the disk defragmenter is run it places the files you use more often into the fastest part of your hard disk . The loading times of some application greatly improved. In a test by the PC Magazine using a Pentium 166, the loading time of Word dropped from 5.4 seconds to 1.8 seconds and Photoshop's dropped from 10.7 to 6.2 seconds. To maximize the advantage of this feature, however, one must periodically run the Maintenance Wizard. Your

applications will simply load faster in Win 98 after you run the Maintenance Wizard. The Maintenance Wizard also includes Scandisk which helps you check your hard disk for errors.

The start-up and shutdown of Windows 95 tested the patience of some people. With Windows 98, Microsoft claims a decrease in the start-up and shutdown times. The shutdown time seems to have improved. But the same can not be said when it is starting up, it showed no apparent improvement. Also the controversial integration of the IE4( which other internet browser companies consider to be unfair competition) , somewhat slowed down performance of the computer, especially when reading drives.

Windows 98 also includes a better support for Universal Serial Bus(USB) devices(which include mouse, scanners and keyboard) and support for multiple monitors(up to 9) which until now only the Macintosh could do. It also includes 3,000 bug fixes according to Microsoft.

Windows 98 requires a minimum of 16MB of memory, a 486DX/66Mhz processor or higher with a range of 165 to 300MB of hard-disk space (225MB is typical). Though as in all minimum requirements, it would be

impractical to run Win 98 with these specs. A Pentium-class processor with 32 megs of memory would be adequate.

With the FAT32 to recover lost space, the integration of IE4 and the new Disk Defragmenter there should be a significant boost in system performance. Those with the OSR2 Version of WIN95(FAT32 installed) and IE4 may not find upgrading to WIN98 necessary, though. But there are also other features of WIN98 aside from these which make WIN98 a very valuable upgrade to all WIN 95 users.