M$ bashing
Micro$oft bashing 
Fravia+,

I found this info on the web.  I did not figure out how to do this on
my own nor claim to - but thought I'd share it since it's not posted on
Fravia's site yet.  These hacks pertain to Windows registration and
bypassing it.  First, I'll start with Win95a.

Bypassing Windows registration for WINDOWS 95:

1. Copy all of the installable files (*.cab) over to the hard disk.

2. Use the EXTRACT program to extract setuppp.inf from precopy2.cab.
     extract precopy2.cab setuppp.inf

3. Edit layout.inf and do a text string search for "setuppp.inf".  
   The line will read:
     setuppp.inf=2,,4550
   which you'll need to change to:
     setuppp.inf=1,,4550
   This tells Windows not to extract that file durring setup.

4. Edit setuppp.inf and do a text string search for ProductType= and
   you'll see something that looks like:
     ProductType=9
   This tells Windows that it's a full install requiring a CD key durring
   setup.  Change it to:
     ProductType=6
   and you'll trick Windows setup into thinking it's an OEM upgrade/full
   install.  You'll still be asked for a registration number durring setu
   but when you click on Next you'll be given the opportunity to Ignore
   it and proceed.

You can do the same thing with OSR2 and any current version of Windows
95.  I've noticed that new burns of Win95 and Win98 have a new set of
.CAB files with both setuppp.inf and layout.inf archived in
precopy2.cab.  Just extract both files using EXTRACT.EXE, edit them as
stated above then use the ATTRIB command:
     attrib +r setuppp.inf
     attrib +r layout.inf
to make them read-only.  This is to ensure that Windows setup won't
overwrite the files.

Now lets say you have a Win9X upgrade that won't let you install
because it doesn't detect a previous OS installed.  You can trick it
into thinking that you actually have WinNT installed by doing:
     dir >ntldr
on the root directory of your C: drive.  This will output the dir
command to a file called ntldr.  If you edit the file you'll see what
you should have seen if you just typed dir alone on a line by itself. 
Windows setup is stupid, though.  It doesn't check inside the file to
see if it's valid.  It just checks to see if the file is there.  If it
is, then Windows setup will gracefully continue the install procedure, 
thinking you have WinNT installed... but who runs Windoze when 
there's Linux? ;-)

- DeeEmAye
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