Use the VDMSound Launchpad.

I have run VDMS Loader successfully, logged off and on, and then run the application with the icon'd version of 'run with VDMS', but either get "C:\DOCUME~\Richard\LOCALS~1\Temp\~VLP52B2.PIF" (with a .bat file) or "D:\PS13\PS.EXE" (with the .exe file) followed by the same error msg saying that the config.nt file is not suitable.
Even if I sequentially 'rem out' each line of config.nt, I get the same error message each time. So I am leaning toward it not being a config problem at the heart.
Any ideas?

Richard wrote:

I have run VDMS Loader successfully, logged off and on, and then run the application with the icon'd version of 'run with VDMS', but either get "C:\DOCUME~\Richard\LOCALS~1\Temp\~VLP52B2.PIF" (with a .bat file) or "D:\PS13\PS.EXE" (with the .exe file) followed by the same error msg saying that the config.nt file is not suitable.
Even if I sequentially 'rem out' each line of config.nt, I get the same error message each time. So I am leaning toward it not being a config problem at the heart.
Any ideas?

So this means that you cannot run *any* DOS game/app (with or without VDMSound) on your system because of the CONFIG.NT error?

V.

I don't think that I have another DOS program! 😎 However, if I insert Microsoft Golf 2001 CD, the install is OK, whereas if I insert Sierra Pro-Pilot (Win95) CD, I get the 'unsuitable config.nt' message. Is this a helpful difference?😕

Richard wrote:

I don't think that I have another DOS program! 😎 However, if I insert Microsoft Golf 2001 CD, the install is OK, whereas if I insert Sierra Pro-Pilot (Win95) CD, I get the 'unsuitable config.nt' message. Is this a helpful difference?😕

Something is busted in your Widnows.

What direcvtory is Windows installed in (e.g. C:\WINNT, C:\WINDOWS), and what do you het if you open a command prompt and type:

echo %WINDIR%

?

Also, in the same command prompt you type:

type %WINDIR%\SYSTEM32\CONFIG.NT

do you get the contents of CONFIG.NT that you expected?

V.

I have now got everything going 😁
The problem arose because I had renamed my original CONFIG.NT to CONFIG.TMP so that I could create a new CONFIG.NT. WinXP My Computer shows these files with these names, but they are recorded, as shown by DOS DIR commands to be named CONFIG.NT.txt and CONFIG.TMP.NT respectively. Renaming them within WinXP changes nothing. Renaming them at a DOS command prompt changes their names exactly as expected, and my PS1 flight simulator then bursts into beautiful life again. 😁
Why does this happen?
Thanks for all of your help and consideration
A very happy Richard!

First thing you must do after installing Winblow$ (do it now!) is go in Explorer, "Tools", "Folder Options", "View" and change those stupid default settings (i.e. do NOT hide file extensions, SHOW hidden files, etc.)

And when you save from Notepad, always put double-quotes around the file-name (otherwise Bill will be "smart" and append .txt unless you select "All files *.*" below, but with the double-quotes you can't go wrong).

V.

Richard wrote:

I have now got everything going :D The problem arose because I had renamed my original CONFIG.NT to CONFIG.TMP so that I could […]
Show full quote

I have now got everything going 😁
The problem arose because I had renamed my original CONFIG.NT to CONFIG.TMP so that I could create a new CONFIG.NT. WinXP My Computer shows these files with these names, but they are recorded, as shown by DOS DIR commands to be named CONFIG.NT.txt and CONFIG.TMP.NT respectively. Renaming them within WinXP changes nothing. Renaming them at a DOS command prompt changes their names exactly as expected, and my PS1 flight simulator then bursts into beautiful life again. 😁
Why does this happen?
Thanks for all of your help and consideration
A very happy Richard!

An even better replacement for notepad is EditPad (Pro, or Lite, your choice.) It's a spectacular text editor, has a great syntax editor (you can create your own syntax hilights, even for languages that aren't hilighted yet), and it just generally rocks. My only gripe is that it can't (yet) edit Unicode documents -- it has to translate them into double-byte [ISO-2022] documents. Oh, well. 😒

Snover wrote:

An even better replacement for notepad is EditPad (Pro, or Lite,...

I use EditPad Lite along with MetaPad. MetaPad has fewer features, but it's small (94k) and works quite well as a unversal "DropIn" replacement for Notepad ( a little more complicated with the NT-based OS's to do this).

When you have a monstrous system like mine, there's no problem with using something as big as EditPad as a replacement. (Now I just need to change my "Open with Notepad" to "Open with Editpad" and I'm all set).

MetaPad is close enough to Notepad that you can simply rename it to Notepad.exe and plop it in your Windows directory. (The NT-based Windows need to be "tricked" for this to work right).

It also has some other handy features (and a very cool one on 2000 and XP, variable transparency). I say check'em both out...
http://www.editpadpro.com/
http://www.liquidninja.com/metapad/

(P.S. That transparency option causes a big performance hit on Win2K, but it's effortless on XP.)

What are you running, a P2 266? Transparency taking a hit on W2K? You're nuts. In any case, there's no reason to have two different programs to accomplish the same task. EditPad stays resident in the taskbar so it doesn't take any time to load.

Snover wrote:

What are you running, a P2 266? Transparency taking a hit on W2K? You're nuts.

I was referring to MetaPad on Win2K. I ran it a few times on the PC at work (P3-800, TNT2 Video display). General Desktop performance "tanked" whenever I switched on "Transparency".

In any case, there's no reason to have two different programs to accomplish the same task.

No reason to have only one program unless it covers ever single thing you need it to do... I was advocating he try both so he could pick whatever he preferred. The majority of the time I just want a "display text file" tool. If there's any "real editing", I use EditPad. Maybe I'll settle on one or the other some day...

I can't imagine that a program would use a different Transparency method, but all the programs I've got with transparency support have no problems with desktop slowdown.

All I know is what I saw. Only variable I could think of was that we were also using LCD displays, I don't think that would do it though... *shrug*

Nicht Sehr Gut wrote:

All I know is what I saw. Only variable I could think of was that we were also using LCD displays, I don't think that would do it though... *shrug*

Dunno how Win2k/XP handle alpha-blending at the WM_PAINT level, but I'd imagine either a driver<->app incompatibility on one OS vs. the other, or a corner-case limitation of the app with Windows in general that Micro$oft "patched" in XP. How about colour-depth too (24- vs. 32- vs. 16-bit)?

V.

If you can use alpha in 24-bit colour it's a cheap hack on Microsoft's part.

I have the exact same error as this guy has, except in my case when i select run with VDMS i get the error message cannot find "VDMSRun.pif" so i linked it to the .pif file in the directory where VDMS is installed...

now i get the error that the originator of this post got, or almost...

F:\PROGRA~2\VDMSound\VDMSRun.pif
%VDMSPath%\CONFIG.VDMS. The system file is not suitable for running MS-DOS and Microsoft windows applications. Choose "close" to terminate the application.

-Close- -Ignore-

I hit close and it closes... and i cant run any other application with VDMS for the same reason, what can i do?

Note: The icons for CONFIG.VDMS and AUTOEXEC.VDMS are notepad icons, very strange

Note2:

typing set VDMSPath and dir "%VDMSound%\V*.dll" return the correct values

append %VDMSPath% to your PATH environment variable if it is not already there

Can you explain in detail what the above means?
I am trying to fix this problem 🙁 any help is appreciated

Note:

A DOS box listing (Dir) of my VDMS directory returns:

F:\Program Files 2000\VDMSound>dir "%VDMSPath%"
Volume in drive F is PROGRAMS
Volume Serial Number is XXXX-XXXX <---edited

Directory of F:\Program Files 2000\VDMSound

02/01/2003 04:47a <DIR> .
02/01/2003 04:47a <DIR> ..
08/04/2001 06:00a 2,855 VDMSRun.pif
08/04/2001 06:00a 36,864 TipOfDay.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 294 AUTOEXEC.VDMS
08/04/2001 06:00a 32,768 DiskWriter.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 45,056 DMAController.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 30,612 DOSDRV.EXE
08/04/2001 06:00a 45,056 EmuJoystick.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 53,248 EmuMPU401.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 73,728 EmuSBCompat.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 1,410 VDMSRun.bat
08/04/2001 06:00a 1,078 VDMSound.ico
08/04/2001 06:00a 110 CONFIG.VDMS
08/04/2001 06:00a 5,004 mt2gm.map
08/04/2001 06:00a 45,056 MIDIDevice.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 36,864 MIDIIndicator.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 65,536 MIDIToolkit.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 61,440 VDDLoader.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 1,126 VDMConfig.cnt
08/04/2001 06:00a 90,112 VDMConfig.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 26,673 VDMConfig.hlp
08/04/2001 06:00a 12,172 VDMS.INI
08/04/2001 06:00a 18,349 license.txt
08/04/2001 06:00a 4,319 VDMSound.tips
08/04/2001 06:00a 131 identity.map
08/04/2001 06:00a 5,000 gm2mt.map
08/04/2001 06:00a 45,056 WaveDevice.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 57,344 EmuAdLib.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 49,152 DSoundDevice.dll
08/04/2001 06:00a 28,259 readme.rtf
08/04/2001 06:00a 1,308 Tip of the Day.lnk
30 File(s) 875,980 bytes
2 Dir(s) 44,269,568 bytes free

F:\Program Files 2000\VDMSound>

I did not edit the above (except for changing the serial and adding the <---edited next to it)