Win 98 SE is no sweat, as it supports USB natively. The Original 98 can still be easily conned into behaving though. There was even a workthrough for Win 95 and USB.
The cardreader is the way to go for all digital users. Puts less strain on your camera and if an earlier camera it will save buckets of batteries within a short time. Later cameras are better behaved with batteries.
Conan