Machinery's Handbook - Frequently Asked Questions

Machinery's Handbook CD-ROM v1.0

Installing on 64-bit Windows Operating System

These instructions represent a workaround for installing Machinery's Handbook 25 CD on Windows 64-bit computers (XP and Vista, or Windows 7). The CD won't install on 64-bit machines because the installer does not run under that OS (since it was developed in the late 90s and is undoubtably full of 16-bit code.) These instructions suggest a way that you can get it setup for testing with a little bit of tinkering.

To do this, you will need to:

1) install the MH25 CD on another machine where the installation works, such as win 2000, Xp, or 32-bit Vista;

2) locate and copy the entire MacHBook directory that gets created by that install, and paste it to a convenient location on your 64-bit machine harddrive. I suggest that you put the MacHBook directory at the root level of one of your drives, such as C:\, or D:\, for example;

3) in the bin subdirectory of the MacHBook directory that you copied to the 64-bit machine, locate the file ebtcom.reg. This file creates required registry entries. You can open this file with a text editor to see what registry edits are being made. These registry entries need to be added to the 32-bit registry, as follows:go to the Start menu and select Run, and type in the following:

%systemroot%\syswow64\regedit

and then click OK. This should open up a view of the 32-bit registry. Then select Registry -> Import Registry File and select the file ebtcom.reg located in the C:\MacHbook\bin directory (assuming you copied the files in Step 1 to the C:/ drive). This should load them in the 32-bit registry. Close the registry editor.

4) locate the file DynaText.ini, also in the bin subdirectory, and edit the lines shown below (they will be slightly different than what you see here): the collection line should point to your CD drive letter; the other lines should point to the harddrive location where you pasted the MacHBook directory:

COLLECTION=R:\MacHBook="Machinery's Handbook"

PUBLIC_DIR=C:\MacHBook\Annots\Public

PRIVATE_DIR=C:\MacHBook\Annots\Private

DATA_DIR=C:\MacHBook\data

LIBRARY_PATH=C:\MacHBook\lib

DTEXT_AUTH=C:\MacHBook\data\security\full.lic

PLUGIN_DIRS=C:\MacHBook\lib\plugins

5) Finally, try to start the browser by opening Dtext.exe, also located in the bin directory. Your CD should be in the drive. If its going to work at all, I think this should do it.

6) If that works you can create a shortcut to Dtext.exe for your desktop or elsewhere. You can then follow the instructions to move the Handbook data files from the CD to your harddrive. These are located at:

http://www.industrialpress.com/ext/staticpages/Handbook/v1.cd.faq/cd2hard.asp

Another option is to upgrade your Machinery's Handbook to the 29th edition. An upgrade for owners of previous Handbook CD versions is available on our website at: http://new.industrialpress.com/.