How to Fix Windows Protection Error on Windows 95 / 98

This article will examine how to fix the “Windows Protection Error” encountered when installing old Windows systems such as Windows 95, 98, or 2000 with Oracle VM VirtualBox or VMware Workstation virtualization program on a computer with a virtualization feature turned on.

How to Solve Windows Protection Error When Running Windows 95, 98, 2000, or ME with VirtualBox / VMware

With Oracle VM VirtualBox or VMware Workstation virtualization program, you may encounter Windows Protection Error while installing an old operating system, Win95, or other systems on your host computer, virtual machine, or later.

When you start the system immediately after installing Windows 95 or restart the virtual machine to finish the final stages of installation, you are likely to get an error: “While initializing device OS: Windows Protection Error. You need to restart your computer.”

What Causes Protection Error?

Incompatible hardware drivers, wrong ISO files, unsupported hardware, or startup applications can usually cause a Protection Error.

1. Virtual Machine Configuration: You may have needed to set the virtual hardware settings of your guest machine correctly to support an older operating system such as Windows 95. In particular, it can be caused by memory, processor count, or incorrect disk configuration.
2. Memory Limitations: Since Win95 has a different structure from modern operating systems regarding memory management, the amount of memory you assign to your VM may prevent your system from running and cause a “Protection Error.”
3. Virtual Disk Drive Issues: Older Windows systems use a different structure to recognize and manage hard disk drives. Therefore, driver incompatibilities or errors can prevent your system from working correctly.
4. Hardware Incompatibilities: You may encounter problems such as hardware incompatibility, which is one of the essential items, and protection errors related to the hardware of your host computer. There may be differences in your physical PC with old or new technology. Therefore, some virtual machine software may have limitations in supporting and running older operating systems.

Based on our experience with Windows protection failure, for example, we encounter processor frequency errors when running Windows nostalgia systems on a computer with a new generation Intel processor. Some Patch software is available to fix such problems. On the contrary, you can run old systems more efficiently on a PC with a mid-generation processor, even without Patch software.

How to Troubleshoot Protection Errors in Windows Nostalgia Systems

Sometimes, when you experience running legacy systems, and even in Oracle software running on different computers, you can clear the protection fault simply by turning off the VT-x/AMD-V feature.

Step 1: Disable VT-X/AMD-V Feature

When installing Windows 95 in your VirtualBox or VMware software, one of the first things you should do when encountering a Protection Error like the image below is turn off the virtualization feature.

First, try to avoid getting this error by turning off the VT-x feature and completely shutting down your guest system. To do this, click X, select Power off the machine from the Close Virtual Machine window that opens, and click OK.

View the settings of your Windows guest machine and uncheck the Enable VT-x/AMD-V option from the Hardware Virtualization settings in the Acceleration tab in the right panel of the System section.

Step 2: Change the Memory Amount

Do not assign a size larger than the supported limit to your virtual system, as older Windows systems have limited memory. For example, a 4 GB RAM size may cause your VM not to work correctly. Therefore, the appropriate RAM size for older operating systems is 256 or 512 MB.

Step 3: Use Another ISO File

ISO files you can get from many websites on the Internet may need to be fixed. We highly recommend acquiring the installation media from a trustworthy source to ensure a secure installation process.

Step 4: Set the USB Controller to 1.1

As mentioned earlier, it is essential to thoroughly examine the configuration of your virtual computer as it may not be fully compatible with contemporary technologies. For example, they do not support USB 3.0 as Microsoft developed the Windows 95 or 98 system years ago. We also recommend setting the USB version number to 1.1 on your VM.

Step 5: Reduce Virtual Disk Size

Older Windows systems need less disk space because the system files are relatively scarce. So, it’s unreasonable for you to configure a disk size of 100GB for an older system. You may also get the Windows Protection Error due to these situations. If you prepare a new Windows 95 in the Virtual PC wizard, set the disk size to 1 or 2 GB to avoid errors.

Step 6: Disable All 32-bit Protect-Mode Disk Drives

Even if you have installed your system, protection failure may occur occasionally. Still, another method that can be tried to eliminate this problem is to enable the “Disable all 32-bit protect-mode disk drivers” option.

To enable this option, open System Properties / Performance / File System settings and select “Disable all 32-bit protect-mode disk drivers” in the Troubleshooting tab of the File System Properties window and save the settings.

Conclusion

As a result, we can run older Windows systems such as Windows 95, 98, or 2000 in virtual environments. However, there may sometimes be problems with virtualization programs such as Oracle VM VirtualBox or VMware Workstation. For example, encountering “Windows Protection Error” is quite annoying.

However, you can fix this problem by carefully adjusting the virtual machine configurations. Moreover, by turning off certain features, you should pay attention to hardware and file compatibility.

The methods I explained in this article definitely work. So you can still enjoy older operating systems without encountering protection errors.