hp desktop pcs, Windows NT workstation 4.0 - the easiest upgrade to Windows 2000 Professional (Microsoft document)

Page 5

Migration DLL’s do three things:

•

Replace and/or upgrade Windows 9x specific files with Windows NT

Workstation compatible files

•

Move Windows 9x application and user specific settings (that Setup did not

already know about) to their proper location in Windows 2000 Professional

•

Map Windows 9x specific registry keys to the appropriate Windows 2000

Professional locations

Businesses with internally developed line of business applications may want to

evaluate writing migration DLL’s for their in-house applications

. While this may at

first seem to require a lot of work, in many cases it will be possible to utilize a single

migration DLL to upgrade multiple language versions of one product.

Hardware Compatibility

Device Drivers

Some devices and peripherals that worked with Windows 9x will need new drivers

to work with Windows 2000 Professional. The driver update is needed because

some hardware drivers written for Windows 9x and for 16-bit Windows 3x-based

applications running on Windows 9x were based on the older virtual (VxD) driver

model. The VxD driver model is not supported in Windows 2000 Professional.

More recently written drivers based on the Windows Driver Model (WDM) are

compatible with Windows 2000 Professional and will work without modification

Many updated drivers will ship on the Windows 2000 Professional CD. However,

when critical device drivers, such as hard drive controllers, are not compatible with

Windows 2000 Professional and cannot be found on the CD or elsewhere, the

Setup program will abort the upgrade, until updated drivers have been obtained.

File System Support

Windows 2000 Professional will continue to provide support for existing file

systems. Specifically, FAT16 and FAT-32 file system users will have the option to

convert to the Windows NT File System v5 (NTFS5). However, compressed

Windows 9x drives cannot be upgraded, and will need to be uncompressed prior to

performing the upgrade.

Microsoft supplies the Migration Extension Interface to help developers easily create migration DLL’s.

Developers should visit http://www.microsoft.com/msdn/news/feature/110397/migration to access the

toolkit.

Developers can visit http://www.microsoft.com/hwdev/desinit/wdmview.htm for more information.

THE WINDOWS 9X UPGRADE

PROCESS (CONTINUED)