Hi, you have to handle things like with the real hardware of the time.
You can either a) select an MFM/RLL controller in PCem and run the low-level formatting routine of the fixed-disk controller.
DEBUG can be used for this (https://retrocmp.de/ctrl/llf/llf.htm).
After that, FDISK can be run normally.
Or try route b) and select XT IDE. It has an auto-detect feature and you just have to run FDISK.
Please keep in mind though that PC-DOS 3.3 has a 32MB partition limit, because it does merely support the original FAT16 (+FAT12), not FAT16B.
So you have to use several partitions in order to use all the capacity.
Or you have to resort to one of those ancient utilities that make DOS 3 format bigger fixed-disks. I'm just a layman here, though. 😅
Compaq DOS 3.31 supports normal FAT16B, as we know it.
Alternatively, use DOS 4.x. It's bigger, but from the late 80s still.
MS-DOS 5 or 6.x should work fine on an XT, too. It's just less retro.
Good luck! 😃
PS: Windows 1.x and 2.x need SETVER if run on MS-DOS 5 or higher.
It should be installed by default, though.
PS/2: PC-DOS 3.x used SELECT utility as a kind of setup program, I think.
Anyway, manual installation isn't hard.
Just run FDISK and then FORMAT C: /S
The /S switch is same as SYS C:
Then copy the filey to C: or a sub directory (DOS).
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In what to one race is no time at all, another race can rise and fall..." - The Minstrel
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