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2. Installation
2.1. How to get "Horsepower Lab 2D"
An archive file containing the installation program can be downloaded from the package's supporting Web site: www.horsepowerlab.com Detailed instructions on user registration are placed there too.
In case of any problems with downloading, installation and registration please ask for help by e-mail: hpl2d@horsepowerlab.com.
2.2. System Requirements
To use "Horsepower Lab 2D" package you need a PC with Pentium processor (or compatible) and with M$ Windows 95 (or later) installed.
Minimal hardware requirements are rather modest -- the package will work with merely one Pentium-compatible processor and 16 MB of RAM. However, having in mind extensive computations -- more performance on floating-point operations is better. Enormous amount of RAM is not a requirement, practically 64...128 MB will be enough.
2.3. Installation
"Horsepower Lab 2D" distribution zipped archive file (named like hpl2d.097-20061201.zip) contains four files:
- file_id.diz
- license.txt
- readme.txt
- setup.exe
To install the program, unzip this archive, read LICENSE.TXT carefully, then run the installer -- setup.exe. It will prompt you to choose program components to install, and then to choose the installation directory:
However, merely for this version, all components are required, but creation Desktop and Start Menu shortcuts is optional. Decision to allow shortcuts (icons) makes running "Horsepower Lab 2D" GUI program (hpl2dw.exe) much easier.
The setup.exe installer self-extracts files and directories and places them under the installation directory you choose. No files or DLLs are written outside that directory and no Registry entries are created by the installer.
After successful running the setup.exe the "Horsepower Lab 2D" is installed on your machine.
Running hpl2dw.exe for the first time will create an entry in Registry (found at "HKEY_CURRENT_USER -> SOFTWARE -> HorsepowerLab -> HorsepowerLab2D-1.0"). This will be the place for hpl2d programs to store their preferences and to look for the registration key also. During the registration procedure the Registry entry for the registration key is created but it is recommended for the registered user to have a backup copy of the registration key elsewhere.
For detailed instructions on work with the package please see User Manual.
2.4. Un-installation
Automated un-installation of "Horsepower Lab 2D" is possible by running uninstall.exe. This utility is created and placed to the package's directory by the installation program setup.exe. Utility uninstall.exe can be started either directly or by choosing menu shortcut Programs->Horsepower Lab 2D->uninstall from Windows system menu Start.
Having been run, uninstall.exe brings up a window to get user's confirmation; by pressing Uninstall button the user permits it to remove all directories and files that have been installed. However, if the installation directory (c:\Program Files\hpl2d.097, by default) contain, e. g. some projects created by the user, it will preserve that directories and files -- and the installation directory itself --
from being removed.
To upgrade to the newer version of "Horsepower Lab 2D" (it is still safer to backup project directories first), uninstall the older version, install the newer version -- better to some another directory -- and finally, may be, move or copy those saved project directories to the newer hpl2d release's prj/ directory.
To completely remove the "Horsepower Lab 2D" from the computer, one should (in addition to running uninstall.exe) remove its key in Windows Registry. This is true for the current version in which uninstall.exe takes no care of it. So, to be sure to have every byte of the hpl2d distribution removed, delete also the following Registry entry (key): "HKEY_CURRENT_USER -> SOFTWARE -> HorsepowerLab -> HorsepowerLab2D-1.0", using e. g. regedit.exe utility. But please be forewarned that the registration key, which is stored there, will be deleted as well!
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