Bollocks,
I had the same problem - an OEM WIN98 that wouldn't upgrade Win95. After trying to find a way around the problem like you're doing, I gave up, re-formatted and started afresh.
Suggest when you do this, if you have a big enough disk, you create a number of partitions and try to keep just system stuff on your C drive. It minimises the pain if you have to format and re-install in the future.
Eg, I have 3 physical drives. One is the C drive and I never install anything or keep data files there, just Windows.
A second, larger drive has 4 partitions. The first is where I install all my applications. (I always over-ride the default location of C
Program Files that many installation routines use). The second is where I tell the applications to keep their data. The third is where I keep all my downloads, each in a folder of its own so it's easy to find and re-install if necessary. In the fourth I keep a current back-up of the C drive (system disk) and the data partition.
The third physical drive is an old, slow one which I use as a scratch pad for temporarily keeping things of interest until I figure out if I want to keep or dump them.
This all probably seems a bit anally retentive, but I've had to format and reinstall Win98 and apps a couple of times and this method makes a big job a bit easier, plus data files and downloads are kept fairly well out of harm's way.
I think it would be worth your while to set up something like the above - just use partitions if you have only one hard disk - then bite the bullet and do a clean install. Good luck!
AA
[This message has been edited by Ausatco (edited 19 September 2000).]