You will need the "kcap.exe" application to unpack the the applications from the Application recovery CD. This utility should be in a directory labeled "ucd" on your "c:\" drive. However, if you don't want to look for it or can't find it here is the "kcap" application.
There are two ways to extract the files. The two solutions are detailed below;
This solution was provided by Cliff and is much simpler than the original solution.
Assuming your cd drive is E:\ and the directory that you want to put the recovered apps in is "d:\apps" type the following at a command prompt.
e:\image\kcap e:\image\sony.pac d:\apps\Then read e:\bin\SonyInstall1.ini for a cross reference of the names of the programs from the weird image names .
July 15, 2001
-- Roger has discovered how to install the bundled apps for WinME that came on the FX210 and FX215 under Win2K. The trick is that it takes lots of harddrive space about 1.5GB.
Step 1 -- create a directory on your drive such as c:\sony.
Step 2 -- Copy both files from the image subdirectory on you Application Recovery CD to the directory you created in step 1. There will be two (2) files in the directory KCAP.EXE and SONY.PAC.
Step 3 -- Enter the following command in a Command.com or CMD.Exe Prompt in the directory you created in step 1. The command below is an example
c:\sony>kcap sony.pac c:\sony\
Step 4 -- After entering the above command the compressed images of all of the bundled programs will be created as subdirectories in the directory created in step 1. The directory names are very funny and not intuitive. You will have to run the install programs in each of the directories to figure out what each one is. Two of the programs I was interested in were the Adobe Photoshop Home Deluxe and the WinDVD. Not all of the apps will work under Win2K but most of them will.
Warning you will need lots of harddrive space to do this. I would guess that you need at least 1.5GB of free disk space to copy the SONY.PAC file and then store the directories.
September 16, 2001
The following is a detailed description for installing the applications included on the application recovery CD under WinME. This description goes with the previous information on how to unpack the applications off of the Recovery CD. Thank You, Steve, for this information
I didn't like the way my hard disk came from the factory so I formatted the hard disk and installed my own version of Windows me. After that I could not play DVDs. So I got out my Application Recovery CD to install WinDVD and it wouldn't let me. This didn't seem fair, as I already paid for WinDVD, so I figured out how to make the Application Recovery CD work.
I had to enter this into my registry:
*************************************
REGEDIT4
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Sony Corporation]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Sony Corporation\Shared Info]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Sony Corporation\Shared Info\Shared EXEs]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Sony
Corporation\Shared Info\Shared DLLs]
"SONYCHK.DLL"="C:\\Program Files\\Common Files\\Sony Shared\\SonyChk\\SonyChk.dll"
"C:\\Program Files\\Common Files\\Sony Shared\\DMICall\\dmicall.vxd"=dword:00000001
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Sony
Corporation\Shared Info\Shared VXDs]
"DMICALL.VXD"="C:\\Program Files\\Common Files\\Sony Shared\\DMICALL\\dmicall.vxd"
*****************************************
Just cut and paste everything between the lines with the asterisks and save it in a file. Name that file LMSony.reg and then double click on it. That should place the needed items into the registry.
I also put two files on my hard disk. I got these from the original hard disk. The two files are
c:\Program Files\Common Files\Sony Shared\DMICall\dmicall.vxd
c:\Program Files\Common Files\Sony Shared\SonyChk\sonychk.dll
and of course I put them in the folder with the same name after creating those folders.
That is all there was to it. I don't know if the application recovery CD can be made to work on a non-sony computer. I suspect the vxd somehow checks to make sure it is a sony laptop.
Alas, Windows 2000 does not use vxds. Perhaps someone can carry the torch to find out how to make it work without any vxd. The sonychk.dll has a single function (named _sonychk). I suspect all one would have to do would be to make a dll with that function that would return the right answer and you wouldn't need the vxd. I am guessing that the install exe on the Application Recovery CD just calls _sonychk in sonychk.dll and looks to see if it returns a 0 or a 1. Sonychk.dll then calls the vxd which checks the computer's hardware to see if it is a sony laptop. If there was a sonychk.dll that simply returned the correct answer you wouldn't need a vxd and could then load the apps onto Windows 2000.
