This page is dedicated to showing how to install the Seattle FilmWorks PhotoWorks desktop software on a Win7 64-bit system, followed by using the PhotoWorks software to convert Seattle FilmWorks / PhotoWorks .sfw, .pwp, and .#nn files into other formats (eg, .jpg, .bmp, etc).
Hint:
After experimenting more with Win7 --
after the instructions on this page were used --
I've discovered that Win7 can be quite crafty
about making behind-the-scenes adjustments
(via "registry virtualization", etc)
so an unprivileged user can complete actions that otherwise would be
immediately terminated. For this reason, I suggest
you might want to first try to perform
step 1 and step 3 below,
followed by running the pwx95.exe executable
directly -- without unzipping pwx95.exe first,
without forcing anything to run in WinXP SP3 Compatibility mode,
and without forcing anything to run as Administrator,
but simply being logged into an Administrator account --
to see if that simpler method can be used to install PhotoWorks
on Win7. I didn't try that obvious, simple approach during my
testing. It just might work for you. Otherwise...
Here's the short summary of the steps that worked for me to install PhotoWorks on Win7-Pro 64-bit:
Download the PhotoWorks pwx95.exe self-extracting WinZip executable from the Wayback Machine Internet Archive as explained in How to locate, download and install PhotoWorks software.
Unzip pwx95.exe using 7-Zip, WinZip, ALZip, or some other utility capable of unzipping self-extracting WinZip executables. <<< This is crucial so you can right-click on the SETUP.EXE executable which is unzipped from pwx95.exe!
I'd suggest unzipping it to a new directory in your Downloads folder or to a new directory on your Desktop.
Login to an Administrator account on your target Win7 system.
Copy the directory created by unzipping pwx95.exe over to the target Win7 system. This step is only necessary if you happen to have performed the download and unzipping on another system.
If you have to perform this step, I'd suggest copying as a new directory into your Win7 Administrator account's Downloads folder or to that Administrator account's Desktop.
From the Administrator account:
Hopefully, that got PhotoWorks installed.
Then do some additional setup, before beginning the conversion of the Seattle FilmWorks / PhotoWorks format files into some commonly used, standard format(s).
Further setup can probably be done:
If you have SFW93A format .#nn files, then rename them from the rrrrrrrr.#nn form to rrrrrrrr_nn.sfw. That'll make their conversion much more convenient.
Run PhotoWorks and convert your .sfw and .pwp files to the desired target format.
The remainder of this page is a (coalesced and simplified) detailed list of the steps that I took to verify PhotoWorks v2.41 could indeed be installed on a Win7 64-bit system, and to perform what I consider to be the most essential conversions that someone might need to perform on any of the Seattle FilmWorks / PhotoWorks files -- .sfw, .pwp, or .#nn -- that are in the following file formats:
The detailed list of steps to install PhotoWorks on Win7 64-bit were:
* Follow the Summary of steps section's steps 1-4 above to: - download pwx95.exe, - unzip it into a new directory, - optionally rename that expanded directory to help you remember what is in it [I renamed mine to \pwx95_expanded], - login to an Administrator account, and - copy that directory of files expanded from pwx95.exe to the target Win7 64-bit system. * Force WinXP SP3 Compatibility mode on the SETUP.EXE file in that \pwx95_expanded subdirectory -- regardless where you unzipped or copied that directory -- to the Desktop, or the Downloads folder, or whereever. The detailed steps to force SETUP.EXE to run in WinXP SP3 Compatibility mode are: - Open Windows Explorer. - Open the \pwx95_expanded subdirectory. - Right-click SETUP.EXE. - Click the Compatibility tab. - Click "Run this program in compatibility mode for: Windows XP (Service Pack 3)". - Click Apply. - Do *not* click "Run this program as an administrator", since jonesrh discovered that was unnecessary. - Do *not* click "Change settings for all users", since that was not suggested in Del Fuller's https://web.archive.org/web/20200521201903/http://forum.oldversion.com/showthread.php?3200-MGI-PhotoSuite post. - Click OK. * Double-click the SETUP.EXE: - Answer Yes to the UAC prompt. - Click Setup in the "WinZip Self-Extractor [pwx95.exe]" dialog box. - The PhotoWorks Setup program takes over the screen. - Click Next. - Select Next to install PhotoWorks in the folder "C:\Program Files (x86)\PhotoWorks". * It seems to have installed successfully and displayed a Windows Explorer window containing 5 PhotoWorks oriented shortcuts. - Minimize that Windows Explorer window of shortcuts. * The PhotoWorks "Setup Complete" dialog box is displayed. - Unclick both the items in the "Setup Complete" dialog box, if they are set. In other words, * Do **not** launch PhotoWorks yet. * Do **not** view the ReadMe file yet. - Click Finish. * Click on the Start / All Programs / PhotoWorks v2.41 / PhotoWorks Help. - It says: "The Help for this program was created in Windows Help format, which depends on a feature that isn't included in this version of Windows. However, you can download a program that will allow you to view Help created in the Windows Help format. For more information, go to the Microsoft Help and Support website." - Decided to deal with that later, since I already know how to run PhotoWorks. * Do **NOT** force podw.exe to run in WinXP SP3 Compatibility mode. REPEAT: Do *not* force podw.exe to run in WinXP SP3 Compatibility mode. Apparently, only the SETUP.EXE that was unzipped from pwx95.exe needs to be forced to run in WinXP SP3 Compatibility mode. * The remainder was also run from an Administrator account. I actually switched to a second Administrator account at one point. I suspect it could also be run from a standard non-Admin user account, but I haven't tried that yet. The first Administrator account, the one that ran SETUP.EXE, is the one whose Album Directory appeared as "C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\PHOTOWORKS\ALBUMS" (see below). The second Administrator account, the one that most of the steps below were executed under, is the one whose Album Directory appeared as "C:\USERS\MYLOGINNAME\DESKTOP". I suspect that the first Admin account's Album directory appearing like they do in WinXP was due to the fact that I had originally run PhotoWorks (podw.exe) in WinXP SP3 Compatibility mode, and I suspect that the second Admin account's Album directory appearing as "C:\USERS\MYLOGINNAME\DESKTOP" was due to the fact that I had run PhotoWorks (podw.exe) from that second Admin account after ensuring that podw.exe was **NOT** forced to run in Compatibility mode. * Repeat: I suspect the following could be run from a standard user account, but I haven't tried that yet. * At one point in all the below actions, I had to temporarily autohide the Taskbar so I could resize the PhotoWorks window to a smaller size which didn't underlap the Taskbar: - Right-click in empty area of Taskbar. - Click Properties. - Click Taskbar tab. - Click "Auto-hide the taskbar". - Click OK to close the "Taskbar and Start Menu Properties" dialog box. - (now back in the PhotoWorks windows)... - Resize the PhotoWorks window so it doesn't underlap the Taskbar. - Right-click in empty area of Taskbar. - Click Properties. - Click Taskbar tab. - Unclick "Auto-hide the taskbar". - Click OK to close the "Taskbar and Start Menu Properties" dialog box. * Ran the PhotoWorks v2.41 program: - via the desktop icon, - via the item in the Start menu, and - via the item in the Start / All Programs / PhotoWorks v2.41 menu. Results: - All of them did *not* require answering a UAC control (after I did *not* run it in WinXP SP3 compatibility mode). * After running PhotoWorks v2.41, waiting for splash screen, and Cancel-ing out of the Album Wizard- Click, then click Tools / Options: - On the General tab: * Change Undo Buffer from "None" to "Use Memory", if it is not set. * When I first started experimenting, was forcing podw.exe to run in WinXP SP3 Compatibility mode and forcing it to Run as Administrator, after running PhotoWorks v2.41, answering the UAC prompt, waiting for the splash screen, Cancel-ing out of the Album Wizard, then clicking Tools / Options / Directories, these directories were displayed: - Album Directory: C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\PHOTOWORKS\ALBUMS - Image Directory: C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\PHOTOWORKS\IMAGES - PhotoMail Directory: C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\PHOTOWORKS\DOWNLOAD - Internet Directory: C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\PHOTOWORKS\INTERNET However, after discovering that PhotoWorks could be run without forcing WinXP SP3 compatibility and without running it as Administrator, after running PhotoWorks v2.41, waiting for the splash screen, Cancel-ing out of the Album Wizard, then clicking Tools / Options / Directories, these directories were displayed: - Album Directory: C:\USERS\MYLOGINNAME\DESKTOP - Image Directory: C:\USERS\MYLOGINNAME\DESKTOP - PhotoMail Directory: C:\USERS\MYLOGINNAME\DESKTOP - Internet Directory: C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\PHOTOWORKS\INTERNET That's more like it should be. * Since I didn't want to clutter my Desktop with a bunch of PhotoWorks albums and images, and since I wanted a directory structure that looked more similar to what I'm used to (ie, where \Albums and \Images feed from a \PhotoWorks directory), I did these 2 things: - In Windows Explorer, find this directory: C:\Users\myusername\Pictures then create these 3 directories: C:\Users\myusername\Pictures\PhotoWorks\Albums C:\Users\myusername\Pictures\PhotoWorks\Images C:\Users\myusername\Pictures\PhotoWorks\PWP (instead of \Download) Of course, your Windows login username will be different. - In PhotoWorks's Tools / Options / Directories page, customized the album list by changing the "\DESKTOP" to "\Pictures\PhotoWorks\" followed by "Albums", "Images", or "PWP". If I recall correctly, the list then appeared as: - Album Directory: C:\USERS\MYUSERNAME\PICTURES\PHOTOWORKS\ALBUMS - Image Directory: C:\USERS\MYUSERNAME\PICTURES\PHOTOWORKS\IMAGES - PhotoMail Directory: C:\USERS\MYUSERNAME\PICTURES\PHOTOWORKS\PWP - Internet Directory: C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\PHOTOWORKS\INTERNET Using this directory naming scheme, the \PhotoWorks directory appears inside my "Pictures library" and I can use WinXP's paradigm of the \PhotoWorks directory having \Albums and \Images subdirectories. * NOTE: Windows Explorer does *not* show all caps, like PhotoWorks does when PhotoWorks displays the list of default directories. * Copy a directory of test examples to: C:\Users\myusername\Pictures\PhotoWorks\Images\tst_examples * I was able to double-click .sfw files, regardless whether they were in SFW93A, (compressed) SFW94A, Uncompressed SFW94A, or SFW98A formats, and I was able to double-click .pwp files. - If PhotoWorks was already open, double-clicking the .sfw file would display its image. - If PhotoWorks was already open, double-clicking the .pwp file would extract all its internal images into separate .sfw files, then display each one of them. - If PhotoWorks was not already open, then PhotoWorks would begin to run and then the image(s) would display as just described (and as expected). * Double-clicking .#nn (ie, SFW93A format) files did not work (same as it doesn't work in WinXP). The simplest way to solve that problem is to rename the rrrrrrrr.#nn files to rrrrrrrr_nn.sfw. For example, 28048871.#22 was renamed to 28048871_22.sfw. After the rrrrrrrr.#nn file is renamed as a rrrrrrrr_nn.sfw file, then double-clicking that (SFW93A format) .sfw file will cause it to be automatically displayed by PhotoWorks. It's true you can open the SFW93A format .#nn files by right-clicking the file and going through a sequence of specific actions, but it's much simpler to go ahead and rename the .#nn files to _nn.sfw beforehand and avoid the right-clicking headaches [which I'm not going to explain here]. * If PhotoWorks was not already open, then right-clicking and using the Open With mechanism (or the special diagnostic box that the .#nn files encounter when being right-clicked) did not work for me like it worked in WinXP. But that's a moot point for the time being, since the primary reason for installing PhotoWorks is to convert .sfw, .#nn, or .pwp files, and the .sfw and .pwp files display immediately when double-clicked. The .#nn files will also display immediately when double-clicked **IF** you first rename those rrrrrrrr.#nn files into the form rrrrrrrr_nn.sfw sometime before double-clicking them. That .#nn renaming to _nn.sfw is a minor one-time inconvenience. * I then opened an entire directory of .sfw images, added them to a PhotoWorks .alb album, closed PhotoWorks, opened the .alb file by double-clicking it, thereby opening PhotoWorks and displaying all the images in the album, then ensured all those images could be converted by Batch Convert to BMP (.bmp) format and to JPEG (.jpg) format. The detailed sequence was something like this... - Run PhotoWorks v2.41 from desktop icon: * Choose "Using images from your computer", press OK, click Next, type a description, type Next, click Tiny, then Next, select the "Spring 97 - March 98 - 031978" directory, select all the *.sfw files in that directory, click Next, click Finish, using the sequence of Album Wizard prompts. * All the .sfw images appeared. * Click the diskette icon to save the album and name it "Spring 97 - March 98 - 031978 - test SFW98A conversions.alb" * Exit PhotoWorks. - Run PhotoWorks by double-clicking on the .alb file just created. * Select all images. * Click Batch / File Format Convert. * Leave format as "Windows Bitmap (*.BMP)". * Choose a destination directory by browsing to the present directory that contains the .sfw files. * Click OK twice. * Wait for the Batch Convert to finish. * Exit PhotoWorks. - Run PhotoWorks by double-clicking on the .alb file just created. * Select all images. * Click Batch / File Format Convert. * Change format to "JPEG (*.JPG)". * Choose a destination directory by browsing to the present directory that contains the .sfw files. * Click OK twice. * Wait for the Batch Convert to finish. * Exit PhotoWorks. - Verify with Windows Explorer that the directory has a bunch of new .bmp and .jpg files (as well as the original .sfw files). * Verified that each of the different SFW .sfw and .#nn file formats can be manually saved to .jpg at 90% quality. SFW98A .sfw SFW94A .sfw (TrID sees: compressed SFW94A w/ Image Id) SFW94A .sfw (TrID sees: compressed SFW94A) SFW94A extracted from .pwp file SFW93A .#18, .#01 (renamed as _01.#01) SFW93A .sfw (renamed from .#nn form) * When viewing the "created by PhotoWorks on Win7" .jpg files using the Win7 "Windows Photo Viewer", some of those .jpg files appear squished inwards horizontally, as if its aspect ratio had gotten clobbered or something. This appears to be a problem with the Win7 "Windows Photo Viewer", since the "Windows Picture and Fax Viewer" on WinXP displays the very same "created by PhotoWorks on Win7" .jpg file(s) as expected. This situation was noticed on some .jpg files created by .sfw files that were extracted from .pwp files. - Again, don't be alarmed. It seems to be a deficiency in the Win7 "Windows Photo Viewer". * Searched for the LEADTOOLS .dll files which on WinXP were installed in: C:\Windows\System32\lf*.* and found them in here instead: C:\Windows\SysWOW64 * That was the extent of my initial testing of PhotoWorks installation, setup, and use on a Win7 64-bit system using an Administrator account. * Several days later, I successfully used PhotoWorks from a non-Administrator account to perform the basic conversions of Seattle FilmWorks / PhotoWorks files. For the sake of simplicity, I'm not going to list all those actions, since I was purposefully trying to test odd-ball cases as well as the simple conversions listed above. But I am including the most notable highlights that were different from the previously mentioned details... - When PhotoWorks v2.41 was run from the Desktop icon, then clicking PhotoWorks' Tools / Options / Directories showed the following directories (as expected): * Album Directory: C:\USERS\MY_NON-ADMIN_LOGINNAME\DESKTOP * Image Directory: C:\USERS\MY_NON-ADMIN_LOGINNAME\DESKTOP * PhotoMail Directory: C:\USERS\MY_NON-ADMIN_LOGINNAME\DESKTOP * Internet Directory: C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\PHOTOWORKS\INTERNET - When PhotoWorks was started by clicking (or hovering over) Start / All Programs / PhotoWorks v2.41 / PhotoWorks v2.41, then clicking PhotoWorks' Tools / Options / Directories showed the following directories (**very** unexpectedly): * Album Directory: C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32 * Image Directory: C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32 * PhotoMail Directory: C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32 * Internet Directory: C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\PHOTOWORKS\INTERNET That's VERY NOT GOOD!!! So do NOT run PhotoWorks in this way if you're running from a non-Administrator account. Just run it from the Desktop icon. - Close any open PhotoWorks windows, then rerun PhotoWorks v2.41 from the Desktop icon. - Experimented with changing the Image Directory to different values. One of those experiments was the change from: C:\USERS\MY_NON-ADMIN_LOGINNAME\DESKTOP to: C:\Program Files (x86)\PhotoWorks\Images which appeared in PhotoWorks as the Image Directory: C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\PHOTOWORKS\IMAGES - Created a PhotoWorks album that contained at least one image each of the formats: SFW98A SFW94A (w/ Image Id) [like on the CDs] SFW94A SFW93A (as .#nn) SFW93A (as .#nn.sfw) Uncompressed SFW94A saved the album (to the Desktop, ie, to this user's default Album Directory save location), closed PhotoWorks, then double-clicked the .alb file on the desktop to verify PhotoWorks would open and display all the images in the just saved album. Great. - Selected all the images, used PhotoWorks' Batch Convert to convert them all to BMP (.bmp) format and tried to save them to the Image Directory which had previously been set (a couple of steps ago) to: C:\Program Files (x86)\PhotoWorks\Images to see what would happen (but expected it to fail, since it would be writing to a directory which this non-Administrative user should not have write access to). * To my surprise the conversions worked. But I couldn't find the resultant .bmp files in that directory, so I searched the entire C: drive and found the images in the following directory: C:\Users\my_non-admin_loginname\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\Program Files (x86)\PhotoWorks\Images * Now is that cool or what? Win7 has the intelligence to transform the file creation into something that *does* have the privilege to be performed. I am very impressed! - Continued with testing of using PhotoWorks v2.41 from a non-Administrator account, trying all of the .sfw, .#nn, and .pwp conversions previously mentioned to .jpg and .bmp, and also performing conversions to .tif and .psd. That completes my notes of testing PhotoWorks from both an Administrator account and from a non-Administrator account.
Here's my conclusions from this experiment to install PhotoWorks on Win7, along with some final suggestions, speculations, references, etc:
* The pwx95.exe download from the Wayback Machine Internet Archive
needs to be expanded first with 7-Zip, WinZip, ALZip, or some similar
unzipper which can unzip WinZip self-extracting executables.
That was the 1st crucial step (for me) in installing PhotoWorks on Win7.
* The unzipped SETUP.EXE was used to successfully install PhotoWorks
when that SETUP.EXE was forced to run in WinXP SP3 Compatibility mode
and the installation was performed while logged into an Administrator
account.
That was the 2nd crucial step (for me) in installing PhotoWorks on Win7.
* The following worked:
- PhotoWorks on Win7 can read all the Seattle FilmWorks / PhotoWorks
file formats: .sfw, .#nn, and .pwp.
- All the images from a .pwp can be extracted.
- PhotoWorks albums can be written and re-read.
- An entire album of SFW98A format .sfw images (or any .sfw format
for that matter) can be converted all at once using the PhotoWorks
Batch Convert facility. For example:
* 1st Batch Convert was done from SFW98A format .sfw to BMP (.bmp).
* 2nd Batch Convert was done from SFW98A format .sfw to JPEG (.jpg).
- All the .sfw file formats can be individually saved as .jpg
with a quality of 90%, with no visually detectable loss of quality.
* There's some minor items that didn't work:
- Reading the PhotoWorks Help file requires downloading some
special, free help reader from Microsoft.
- Right-clicking then attempting to open files whose filetype is
not opened by PhotoWorks by default doesn't work as well in Win7
as it did in WinXP.
- Right-clicking then attempting to open SFW94A format .sfw files
via Open With shows two PhotoWorks entries to choose. The
reason for this is unknown -- possibly it's due to my failed original
attempt at installing PhotoWorks. In any case, the top choice
works to run PhotoWorks (if necessary) then display the image.
The bottom choice never displays the image.
- Twice during that process, the actions weren't acted upon immediately,
a warning sound was heard, no popup occurred, then clicking again
on the button which triggered the warning sound caused the action
to be acted upon. This seemed to be a benign behavior that only
required repeating the desired action. The reason seems to be
correlated with when Windows "registry virtualization" occurs.
[See "Future Extrapolation" section below for more info on file
and registry virtualization.]
* There's some things that haven't been tested:
- If you insist on using the exact same naming conventions used
under WinXP -- ie, exact same directory structure and exact same
disk names -- eg, so you can port your WinXP based, PhotoWorks library
of 100 albums and 3000 images to your brand new Win7-Pro system,
then you'll probably need to:
* use a Win7 32-bit system, or
* run some sort of virtual machine program to allow running a
WinXP system inside the virtual machine, or
* write a program which edits all the PhotoWorks .alb and .pwm
files to point to the new disk locations.
I'll leave it to you to figure that one out.
My goal has been to document how to convert the 14-21 year old photos
that are discovered when scrounging around in yours or your relatives'
or friends' attics of digital photo history when you can't find
any freaking program to display and/or convert them.
Your goal can be determining how to maintain it all.
* Suggestions:
- Run PhotoWorks v2.41 from a non-Administrator account,
if all you are doing is conversions.
- Run PhotoWorks v2.41 from its icon on the Desktop whose
Properties / General tab / Location is:
C:\Users\Public\Desktop
- On the first run of PhotoWorks, change its default directories via
Tools / Options / Directories to something that makes sense to you.
* Further Extrapolation:
- PhotoWorks can probably be installed on other existing post-WinXP
systems in order to convert old Seattle FilmWorks / PhotoWorks
.sfw and .pwp files (or to display entire .alb albums of images) --
as long as the Windows "registry virtualization" technology
is included to magically, behind-the-scenes, assist in ensuring
application compatibility.
You might have to alter this page's instructions some. But I'd
guess that it likely could be installed and run successfully on Win8.1,
and it might even be possible to install and run successfully on Win10
(at least during its 1st year after public release).
* A super brief intro to Windows registry virtualization is at
Wikipedia in the "Registry virtualization" section on this page:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Registry#Virtualization
* It is unknown if registry virtualization worked the same way in Vista
such that the instructions on this page can be used.
* I've not yet read anything to indicate that registry virtualization
works differently on Win8.1 than it does on Win7. So unless proven
otherwise, I'll assume the instructions on this page will work with
Win8.1.
* I've read some things -- found when doing a Google search for
"Win10 Windows file and registry virtualization" and drilling
down through several pages of the results --
that say "file and registry virtualization" is still in Win10,
so for the time being, I'll assume the instructions on this page
might be able to be used as is or somehow adapted to get
PhotoWorks software running also on Win10. But that's not been tested.
* A good, relatively brief reference for Windows registry virtualization
comes direct from Microsoft:
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/desktop/SysInfo/registry-virtualization
* Other useful references for Windows registry virtualization include:
- https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/patricka/2009/12/14/tales-of-application-compatibility-weirdness-demystifying-uac-virtualization/
- https://sysadmindev.wordpress.com/2014/08/30/uac-file-and-registry-virtualization/
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/bb756960(v=msdn.10)
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/gg465066(v=msdn.10)
- https://web.archive.org/web/20181226202938/https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/askperf/2011/06/17/demystifying-shims-or-using-the-app-compat-toolkit-to-make-your-old-stuff-work-with-your-new-stuff/