I'm trying to get to an emulation solution for machines running Windows 8.1 Pro 64-bit, or above. I have software applications that don't play well with it; apparently it's the 64-bit that is the problem, and Hyper-V isn't working. Does the Win32 version of DosBox address this issue?
If this has been discussed elsewhere, please redirect me; my search on the forum was unsuccessful.
Dosbox is meant for dos games. You can try your software and it might work, but limited help is offered for this. And if it is mission critical, meaning your business depends on it, better run it in a VM like VMware or virtualbox. Or install the 32bit version of Windows8.1
At the moment, I've found only one app, which is my personal financial software - a REALLY old version of Quickbooks. I know I had a reason for going with the 64-bit Windows, but I suffer from chemobrain memory issues, so I have to figure it out again. The best I can figure is I was trying to be sure I had the best setup in case I'm ever able to get back into development.
I guess my biggest concern is whether or not I will fubar my system by installing this, and/or whether it will remove completely if I find it doesn't work, or whether it leaves ugly remnants lying around the registry.
There might be MRU references to it in the Registry by Windows, but DOSBox does not write anything to it. The installer will create a Start Menu folder with shortcuts and DOSBox will create a %LocalAppData%\DOSBox folder, but otherwise does not write any files elsewhere.
As Dominus notes DOSBox is intended for games and should not be used for mission critical programs. If using it for any Office type programs note that it does not support certain features that they might rely on, like share. vDos ( https://sourceforge.net/projects/vdos/ ) or a VM will probably be a better choice.
I don't think that's a problem; this app is so old it doesn't do anything glitzy. That's why I like it. I started programming back in the late 80's, and I much preferred working with systems back then. I've been out of the field for a few years, and boy, am I lost now!! I'll give DosBox a whirl, and provide feedback on how it went.
If DOSbox is uncooperative, i.e. no printer ports or no NetBIOS or whatever, there's at least three DOSbox variants available: vDOS, DOS2USB, and dbDOS. All are built on DOSbox, and offer business-type extensions. I'm guessing that DOSbox is open source and can be extended by those that know how. Although DOSbox runs older DOS business apps, the DOSbox developers don't seem to want to help small business people. You can find vDOS, DOS2USB, and dbDOS by Google Searching, but not all are free.
Thanks for that extra information. I'll let you know how it goes.
FWIW, I'm using vDOS to run VP-Info and it seems to work OK, although it's slightly quirky to set up. Like DOSbox, you have to mount the drives with a batch file. vDOS doesn't do game graphics, but it handles any DOS biz-type application like Wordperfect, VisiCalc, dBase, etc, as well as DOSbox-SVN does, but with the added bonus of being able to network and to print from LPT ports. vDOS is a free download from SourceForge and from the developers. vDOS doesn't have the benefit of a forum like VOGONS. Personally, I think VOGONS should start a sub-forum for VMs like vDOS. VOGONS could shunt all the closet DOS-biz-app users over there and get them out of the way of the gamers!
