Editing Windows 98 (section)

===Improvements to the system and built-in utilities===

====Performance improvements====
Windows 95 introduced the 32-bit, protected-mode cache driver VCACHE (replacing SMARTDrv) to cache the most recently accessed information from the hard drive in memory, divided into chunks. However, the cache parameters needed manual tuning as it degraded performance by consuming too much memory and not releasing it quickly enough, forcing paging to occur far too early. The Windows 98 VCACHE cache size management for disk and network access, CD-ROM access and paging is more dynamic compared to Windows 95, resulting in no tuning being required for cache parameters.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc768196.aspx|title=Chapter 26 – Performance Tuning|date=February 20, 2014|work=[[Microsoft Technet]]|publisher=[[Microsoft]]|access-date=April 17, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170826132326/https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc768196.aspx|archive-date=August 26, 2017|url-status=live}}</ref> On the FAT32 file system, Windows 98 has a performance feature called MapCache that can run applications from the disk cache itself if the code pages of executable files are aligned/mapped on 4K boundaries, instead of copying them to virtual memory. This results in more memory being available to run applications, and lesser usage of the swap file.

Windows 98 registry handling is more robust than Windows 95 to avoid corruption and there are several enhancements to eliminate limitations and improve registry performance.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc768201.aspx|title=Chapter 31 – Windows 98 Registry|publisher=Microsoft|work=microsoft.com|date=February 20, 2014 |access-date=August 26, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170826175408/https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc768201.aspx|archive-date=August 26, 2017|url-status=live}}</ref> The Windows 95 registry key size limitation of 64&nbsp;KB is gone. The registry uses less memory and has better caching.<ref name=RK1437-8>{{harvnb|Resource Kit|1998|pp=1437–1438}}</ref>

[[Disk Defragmenter (Windows)|Disk Defragmenter]] has been improved to rearrange program files that are frequently used to a hard disk region optimized for program start.<ref>{{cite book|title=Introducing Windows 98, Second edition}}</ref> Despite this, the quirk of the hard drive being rescanned if the contents of the hard drive had changed (denoted by the message "Drive contents changed....restarting.") is still present in this version, and remains identical to that of Windows 95. If it gets stuck on the same area too many times, the program would then ask the user to either continue scanning or give up. This quirk was removed with Windows Me's version of Disk Defragmenter, which can also work on Windows 98 or Windows 95 if it is simply copied over.<ref>{{Cite web|title=PC Hell: Defrag Does Not Complete - Solutions|url=https://www.pchell.com/support/defrag_does_not_complete.shtml|access-date=2020-07-19|website=www.pchell.com|archive-date=July 2, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200702071708/http://www.pchell.com/support/defrag_does_not_complete.shtml|url-status=live}}</ref>

Windows 98 also supports a ''Fast Shutdown'' feature that initiates shutdown without uninitializing [[device drivers]]. However, this can cause Windows 98 to hang instead of shutting down the computer if a buggy driver is active, so Microsoft supplied instructions for disabling the feature.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://support.microsoft.com/kb/187607|title=How to Disable Fast Shutdown in Windows 98|work=Microsoft Support|publisher=[[Microsoft]]|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090505123756/http://support.microsoft.com/kb/187607|archive-date=May 5, 2009}}</ref> Windows 98 supports write-behind caching for removable disk drives. A utility for converting [[FAT16]] partitions to FAT32 without formatting the partition is also included,<ref name=PCMAGp123>{{harvnb|PC Magazine, August|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=4c8Qbd14llIC&pg=PA123 123]}}</ref> however it is not compatible with [[DriveSpace]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=www.helpwithwindows.com |last2=HelpWithWindows.com |first2=Arie Slob |date=14 July 1998 |title=Windows 98, FAT32 |url=http://www.helpwithwindows.com/windows98/fat32.html |access-date=2024-03-30 |website=HelpWithWindows.com |archive-date=March 6, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240306205648/http://www.helpwithwindows.com/windows98/fat32.html |url-status=live }}</ref>