Hey guys

I've been using Phil's classic Win98 dos menu and understand that it uses it's own Autoexec.bat/Config.sys to configure the environment for the options chosen. I managed to set up sound cards, get dosshell working as well as set up S3 VBE drivers in that setup. The other night I wiped it all in favor of an original Win95 install (a '96 release as per file dates). Now I'm a fish out of water, realising I don't understand this stuff at all.

Back in the day, one of the kids near my house had a setup where he could choose between loading into DOS and loading into Win95. I'd like to rebuild this but splice in some of Phil's menu. This is kinda what I'd prefer. Not to reboot into DOS, but to boot into DOS before W95 loads.

Where would I start? I would like to have 4 options: Win95, Dos EMS, Dos XMS, Dos conventional. I would like to load Mouse/CDrom/SB16 on each of them. I'll be using cutemouse (newer version) and the videccd.sys from Phil's pack.

I would also like to understand the difference between booting into DOS 7.1 before loading Win95 versus using the start menu's shutdown option "Restart in MS DOS". Is there a difference? Will restarting into MS DOS use a different config.sys/autoexec.bat?

I've only gotten so far as to install the SB16 using diagnose.exe and the standard setup when using the "restart into MS DOS" shutdown option. I had a go at editing autoexec.bat and config.sys to try to set up the mouse and cd rom. It looks like these changes don't save to anywhere once the PC reboots. Is Windows 95 renaming/swapping/hiding files on boot/rebooting into DOS? I have had a look through the c:\windows directory and can't find dosstart.bat which was going to be my next experiment - is this an addition to W98 or newer Win95 versions?

TLDR: in Win95,

1) where the F do I put my LOADHIGH statements for CD rom drivers ?
2) Where do I put the c:\drivers\ctmouse.exe statement for mouse ?
3) how does one make a menu to load DOS or Win95 on boot?
4) is W95 using different dos files to reboot into DOS vs booting into DOS before loading W95?
5) is it better to reboot into w95's dos mode or load direct into dos 7.1?

Thanks