Dos mode in XP

[bangali]

win xp's dos support is crap, so I can hardly play any old games, even with vdmsound or dosbox.is there any way to have the proper dos mode?perhaps have 2 operating systems, the other being win 95 (which had proper dos support)? Or should I just look for a bog standard PC to run those oldies on?

[Tom Salter]

There's an emulator my flatmate uses to play games such as One Must Fall and other old DOS games on his PC.

http://dosbox.sourceforge.net/news.php?show_news=1

Checkit out. He uses the Linux version though, but it works on XP I hear.

[babs]

I always had more joy with VDMS. There is no proper DOS in XP, it's just emulated cos it's built on the NT core. Your best and easiest bet is to just make a DOS boot disk, and make sure you have a fat32 drive so you don't have to mess around trying to get NTFS working. It'll be like the good old days? with messing about with autoexec.bat and config.sys and trying to free up that magical 600k+

[bangali]

i think i might have tried a dos boot disk before, thing is i dont think the sound was working, and for some reason the C:\ drive wasnt accessible, but maybe i need to initialize the sound somehow,or something. After tweaking dosbox i got this old game death rally to work fine.

[babs]

were you using the old 'SET BLASTER=...' lines on a boot disk. Also is your C: formatted to NTFS, because a plain DOS boot disk won't be able to see, possibly true of a RAID or SATA setup too.

[MartyG]

I would think DOS will struggle to see SATA drives, unless some kind sole has written a retro fit driver.

[bangali]

the bootdisk i only used on my computer which is NTFS which would explain why C:\ wasn't working, so I'll have to use it on my brother's comp, which is FAT. I have no idea about the SET blaster commands thing, what should it be for it to work?

[MartyG]

SET BLASTER=A220 I5 D1

Where:
A220 is the I/O Port address
I5 is the IRQ or Interrupt number
D1 is the DMA IRQ number

Good old DOS days eh?

[bangali]

in which file would would these commands have to be in? command.com, autoexec.bat?

[Super Stu]

SET BLASTER etc goes in the autoexec

[MartyG]

autoexec.bat

[bangali]

ok thanks, that should be it. I assume creating the dos boot disk involves the usual procedure under XP, by formatting a floppy disk and choosing the "create ms-dos startup disk" option.

[goldbricker]

This is like a trip down "memory" lane.

[babs]

You could try making one, or just use a prebuilt image here and customize it to suit.

[bangali]

i downloaded some soundblaster live dos drivers and did the necessary installation of drivers, and also put the files himem.sys and emm386.exe where they are supposed to be, but there comes an error message saying "extended memory management already installed, XMS will not be installed". And so I get no sound. the sblive dos drivers require these lines be included in the autoexec.bat:
SET BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 H5 P330
SET CTSYN=C:\DOSDRV
C:\DOSDRV\SBEINIT.COM
C:\WINDOWS\SMARTDRV.EXE
and these lines in the config.sys
DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\HIMEM.SYS
DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\EMM386.EXE NOEMS NOVCPI
DOS=HIGH,UMB

So my autoexec.bat is:
mode con codepage prepare=((850) ega.cpi)
mode con codepage select=850
keyb uk,,keybrd2.sys
SET BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 H5 P330
SET CTSYN=C:\DOSDRV
C:\DOSDRV\SBEINIT.COM
C:\WINDOWS\SMARTDRV.EXE
LH C:\windows\command\mscdex.exe /D:MSCD0001
LH C:\mouse\mouse.exe


and config.sys is
device=display.sys con=(ega,,1)
DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\HIMEM.SYS
DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\EMM386.EXE NOEMS NOVCPI
DOS=HIGH,UMB

And why is the CDROM drive not being initialized?