Resolved AddressBook Plus--Beloved 32 bit Legacy App

The backup disks are tied to your specific hardware & would not install,as you have already found out, on any other computer.

If you could lay your hands on retail disks, it would work like charm.

 

Success!! Address Book Plus under XP under VirtualBox

At long, long last I have succeeded in getting new life from my beloved Address Book Plus (also called Instant Address Book) last released for Win 98 and probably a 16 bit application. At rsinfo's suggestion, I installed VirtualBox and its extension pak on my 64 bit Win 7 Home Premium laptop. I got a no-longer-in-use retail full version of XP Pro and installed it under VirtualBox. I updated XP to SP2 and then to most current updates. I then installed the Address Book Plus application. This all went extremely smoothly and the application executed fine. However, I couldn't write a file nor could I read an old file. I got a file incompatibility error. Researching the error didn't lead anywhere so I gave up. That was about three months ago. Last week I decided to try again. I'm not sure what I did differently, but it worked like a charm. I could read and write files shareable the Win 7 desktop and also to USB flashdrive. The application response time is instantaneous, just like it was under native 32 bit Vista, XP, Me, and 98. A complete success!!

I am really impressed with VirtualBox. It installed flawlessly as did the extension pac. It didn't ask questions I couldn't answer. In the three months between my two attempts, there was one update to the VirtualBox and extension pac and that update was flawless. I didn't have to learn much about VirtualBox. It just worked. I am very impressed with that. Switching between the application under XP and the native Win 7 is trivially easy -- just move the cursor.

I am a happy camper. Thanks everyone. Maybe over the next year or two I'll find a new application that has the functionality and ease of use of my legacy application.

Now I'll see if I can use my legacy Canon Multipass printer which has no Win 7 drivers. Ink cartridges are only $1.20 each and that is less than 1/10 the price of current printer cartridges. No wonder Canon wanted to make it obsolete.

..Paul..

 

Good to know you succeeded.

Regarding your printer, try Xerox Mobile Express Driver. I haven't personally tested it, but its worth a try.

 

I looked at Xerox Mobile Express Driver per rsinfo's suggestion. It looked promising but I didn't find any descriptions of user experiences for non-Xerox printers. I'll come back to it later and do some more searching.

Given my success with VirtualBox, I figured I would try installing the Canon drivers for XP (the most recent drivers available) on my XP running under VirtualBox on my Win 7 64 bit laptop. Much to my surprise and delight, it installed easily and seems to work fine for normal B&W and color printing. I haven't tried scanning. I've got some questions about VirtualBox but I guess I should go to the VirtualBox support site for those.

..Paul..