Reading Documents from CD designed for Windows 95

[PowerEngineer]

I picked up an older CD containing the service manual and parts catalog for an older car I have. The CD's system requirements are Windows 95 and Adobe Acrobat 6.0, so I guess it's not really surprising it doesn't run using 64-bit Windows 7 (despite trying the obvious compatibility selections). I'm guessing the attendent executables ("start_here", "index", and "run") are 8-bit.

I'm looking for a work-around. Any ideas?

The CD was published by "Original Edition Publications".

Thanks!

 

[lxskllr]

Old Windows in a VM, or maybe FreeDOS in a VM would work.

Edit:
Or try extracting the contents, and see if you can read it that way,

 

[amdhunter]

Explore the CD and launch PDFs manually?
Right click the .exe and compatibility mode?

 

[nickbits]

Try opening the files on the cd in winzip. Good chance one of them is a standard archive containing PDFs.

 

[PowerEngineer]

Old Windows in a VM, or maybe FreeDOS in a VM would work.

Edit:
Or try extracting the contents, and see if you can read it that way,

Resisting VM for now...

Explore the CD and launch PDFs manually?
Right click the .exe and compatibility mode?

First couple of things I tried. The "chapters" have PDF extensions but will not open as PDF's (corrupt file message).

Try opening the files on the cd in winzip. Good chance one of them is a standard archive containing PDFs.

Good thought! Sadly, it didn't work.

Other ideas anyone?

 

[seepy83]

Upload the CD to an FTP or file sharing site somewhere and let random people on the internet compete at getting you the files in a format you can view, and then reward the victor?

 

[lxskllr]

Upload the CD to an FTP or file sharing site somewhere and let random people on the internet compete at getting you the files in a format you can view, and then reward the victor?

^^^

I'll play with it gratis. I doubt I'll accomplish anything, but sometimes being lucky is better than being skillful :^)

 

[seepy83]

^^^

I'll play with it gratis. I doubt I'll accomplish anything, but sometimes being lucky is better than being skillful :^)

Ya, I'd probably mess around with it later on tonight "gratis" as well. It's fun to hack away at stuff like this sometimes.

 

[C1]

I doubt if 8 bit is your issue. I run all kinds of old software (including the old MS DOSes). In fact I think Im still running Acrobat 6 (but it is the full version; ie, comes with the boxed disk). In fact, I can even play Gorilla.bas - remember that game that came with old DOS ( http://www.google.com/search?q=gori...&ei=C_d9UIGTPKzXiAKK7YC4Dw&sqi=2&ved=0CD4QsAQ ).

 

[vailr]

Three possible causes:
1. Damaged disc. May be possible to recover data using something like:
Max Data Recovery
http://www.softeza.com/datarecovery/
A Google search should find some other similar programs.
2. Copy protection.
3. The disc may have been designed using an older, now unsupported (in Windows) format.
Would require creating a DOS-prompt bootable USB thumb drive. Then run a special DOS-mode CD Rom driver (OakCDRom.exe or something like that?), that would then allow reading and copying the entire disc contents over to the hard drive. And then boot back to Windows and burn a replacement CD using the retrieved data.

 

[PowerEngineer]

Thanks everyone for the ideas! :thumbsup:

I did a little more poking around on the CD and discovered that the Start_Here file was signed by a company called Hexalock, which provided copyright protection for CD files many years ago. They still have a website, but some say they're no longer a going concern. Either way, the heart of the problem is that the little executables run to deencrypt the PDF files before loading into Acrobat will not run under Vista or Windows 7. The website offers a fix for Vista, but my CD was way too old for that to work.

Googling, I found this thread:

http://club.myce.com/f80/hexalock-204559/

One of the thread participants (GoldStar611) pulled together a little VB6 program called UnHexaLock that masquerades as acrobat.exe so that the Hexalock happily deencrypts the requested file and passes it to UnHexaLock which then allows me to save the unencrypted file. Of course, I had to do this on a Windows XP laptop I still have access to; but now I can open these PDF files on my Windows 7 workstation. As an added bonus, I can also print pages (Hexalock would not let you save or print from Acrobat).

So, a happy ending. :biggrin:

I imagine that some may feel a bit uneasy over my circumvention of copyright protection, but I was pretty much forced into it by their failure to provide means for me to continue to access the material on the CD. I don't think it's reasonable for users who have purchased copyrighted material to lose access to it due to outdated software.

Thanks again for your help!

 

[lxskllr]

I imagine that some may feel a bit uneasy over my circumvention of copyright protection, but I was pretty much forced into it by their failure to provide means for me to continue to access the material on the CD. I don't think it's reasonable for users who have purchased copyrighted material to lose access to it due to outdated software.

Thanks again for your help!

No moral person would feel uneasy about that. Remember kids, say no to DigitalRestrictionsManagement!

Glad you got it worked out. A shame you had to resort to hackery for something that should have been trivial to accomplish through standard methods.

 

[HexNails]

I picked up an older CD containing the service manual and parts catalog for an older car I have. The CD's system requirements are Windows 95 and Adobe Acrobat 6.0, so I guess it's not really surprising it doesn't run using 64-bit Windows 7 (despite trying the obvious compatibility selections). I'm guessing the attendent executables ("start_here", "index", and "run") are 8-bit.

I'm looking for a work-around. Any ideas?

The CD was published by "Original Edition Publications".

Thanks!

I also have a problem with some cd's that I got with an old MGA car that I am restoring. Could you please share the method you used to solve the problem with me? I would be grateful. thank you, Nails

 

[PowerEngineer]

The method I used (and now only vaguely remember) is summarized in post #11 in this thread. It wouldn't surprise me if Hexalock is the root of your problem too, as it seems that it was used to prevent copying of PDFs from the CDs documenting many older British cars (mine is a Daimler SP250).

Sadly the link to the thread I referenced is no longer valid. The copy of the Unhexalock VB script and the old computer I used to run it are long gone.

I googled Unhexalock just now and the search results all appear to be from the same 2011-2012 time frame and the files referenced are no longer available (and only work with W95). Perhaps someone has posted a more contemorary solution in one of the British car forums?

Best of luck! 🤞🏼

 

[HexNails]

The method I used (and now only vaguely remember) is summarized in post #11 in this thread. It wouldn't surprise me if Hexalock is the root of your problem too, as it seems that it was used to prevent copying of PDFs from the CDs documenting many older British cars (mine is a Daimler SP250).

Sadly the link to the thread I referenced is no longer valid. The copy of the Unhexalock VB script and the old computer I used to run it are long gone.

I googled Unhexalock just now and the search results all appear to be from the same 2011-2012 time frame and the files referenced are no longer available (and only work with W95). Perhaps someone has posted a more contemorary solution in one of the British car forums?

Best of luck! 🤞🏼

Thank you for the kind response, I will rundown the suggestion.

 

[manly]

The method I used (and now only vaguely remember) is summarized in post #11 in this thread. It wouldn't surprise me if Hexalock is the root of your problem too, as it seems that it was used to prevent copying of PDFs from the CDs documenting many older British cars (mine is a Daimler SP250).

Sadly the link to the thread I referenced is no longer valid. The copy of the Unhexalock VB script and the old computer I used to run it are long gone.

I googled Unhexalock just now and the search results all appear to be from the same 2011-2012 time frame and the files referenced are no longer available (and only work with W95). Perhaps someone has posted a more contemorary solution in one of the British car forums?

Best of luck! 🤞🏼

The Wayback Machine sometimes helps (usually not for hosted files unless they are static links):

Wayback Machine

web.archive.org

 

[Steltek]

The Wayback Machine sometimes helps (usually not for hosted files unless they are static links):

Wayback Machine

web.archive.org

This.

If you search for the following link in the Wayback Machine at Archive.org, there is a capture from 05/27/2019 that has a static link to the last version of the software as well as to a tutorial on how to use it.

https://club.myce.com/t/most-recent-link-to-hexalock/401233

I can verify that the software archive file is downloadable from that link.