Installing Windows Media Player 9.0 Under Windows 98 First Edition

I have been using this one for forever and a day, yet I have never seen or heard od anyone else using it. I only thought of doucmenting it while I was completing the Windows Media Player 7.1 on Windows NT 4.0 article. This exemplifies the point of Microsoft introducing seemingly artificial limitations into its software.

Attempt to install Windows Media Player 9 under Windows 98 First Edition, and you will receive the following error message:

The installer is actually looking for a SubVersion registry key (and a little more) under:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion

You could substitute this string with " A " if you wanted to, however there is an even easier way to bypass it, simply skip the installer inflators OS check.

Pull up the location of MPSetup.exe into a command window:

1. Click Start, chose Run
2. Type CMD and click OK
3. CD into the location where WMP can be found:
   e.g. cd Desktop
4. Type:
   mpsetup.exe /t:c:\wmp9\
5. Inflate the files wherever you would like them (desktop isn't a great idea because there are a lot of them)
6. manually run:
   setup_wm.exe
7. Enjoy

Simple as that!

Article Revision Date: Friday, 23 June, 2006

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