Disclaimer
I take no responsability for any problems that arise from the download or installation of this service pack. If you have a problem, contact Microsoft Corporation. It is thier service pack. I only removed unneeded files to reduce download time. I did not modify Microsoft's Installation process in any other way.
Why am I doing this?
I download the 90 meg service pack (later they posted a 13 meg VB only service pack) and installed it on my machine. After reviewing the log file I discovered that only a dozen or so VB5 files were updated in this service pack. (2.4 meg compressed.)
I was a little shocked that Microsoft is making everyone download a 13 meg file just to have a 2.4 meg update. I thought back to a few months ago when I had a 28.8 modem and shuddered at the thought of downloading a 13 meg file through a phone line. (I have high speed cable now) I can think back to a number of times a download got to about 70% and suddenly died. Well, I only had 20 free hours a month, and just used up 3 of them.
Does Microsoft think that everyone is on a T1 line?
I thought I would try and give some of you a break who are still
using modems to access the web (+75%) and break out only the files that are required for
the x86 US English version. (Since this was the only one I could test) This reduced
the download size to 2.4 meg. (Best I could do)
I broken the installation into a couple of different sizes
for you to download. If you have a slow or a historically unreliable connection, I HIGHLY
recommend downloading the 2 - 1.44 meg files. I know it's a bit of a pain in the butt but
you'll be glad if you get a socket error half way through the 2.4 meg download. Some
browsers can pick up where it left off, but not all of them.
Installation
The installation is still Microsoft's. I just figured out which files it updates for Visual Basic 5 and removed all the rest. I created a simple install in WISE just so I could easily break the files apart into pieces and also rebuild the directory structure for the service pack. You will still need to run the SETUP.EXE located in the directory where you unpacked the files.
If you get a "Cannot find file..." or "Cannot Find
Directory...." error while installing then you probably have Visual Basic *and*
some other product installed from Visual Studio. The setup is trying to update the other
product. Simply create the directory that setup is looking for and continue or re-run the
install.
This is a temporary Web site. I will only have this up for a short time. Get them
now or you'll need to download the 13 meg setup. (Which is the
all language installation. That is why it is so much larger).
You can order the CD from Microsoft as well. It will not be shipped until Dec 29/97 or later.