Someone did this years ago along with using a transputer module for a 5x86 cpu upgrade on the inboard.

They never made a care package of files that were needed to be slipstreamed in to allow the extended memory and XT keyboard controller to work under 3.1 (or 95)

I always had trouble getting dos 7 to be bootable on an mfm hard drive , are you using IDE?

I had 95a running on mfm controller with 2 50mb drives.

Had to use drvspace to compress it before installation, and it barely fit.

It was as painful as you'd imagine. I was a kid, poor, and using discarded parts.

I don’t believe anyone before has got Windows 95 working on an Inboard because there was a lot of challenges in doing so. Certainly getting interposers working and Windows 3.11 but 95 has been a long held challenge which I feel I was the first to overcome.

rmay635703 wrote on 2026-08-05, 13:07:

Someone did this years ago along with using a transputer module for a 5x86 cpu upgrade on the inboard.

They never made a care package of files that were needed to be slipstreamed in to allow the extended memory and XT keyboard controller to work under 3.1 (or 95)

I always had trouble getting dos 7 to be bootable on an mfm hard drive , are you using IDE?

I’m booting from a CF card via an Xtide, many people have upgraded and run faster CPU’s via interposers myself included on the Inboard for sure but before yesterday the latest achievable was Windows 3.11 using files from intel to handle the Keyboard nuances.

Mike1978 wrote on 2026-08-05, 12:40:

https://www.vogons.org/download/file.php?id=246895 […]
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If it's a 386 I wonder, why is it reported as a 486?

I wonder what my SIV32L.exe would report, please will you try it, post the initial screen and ideally the Menu->File->Save Local file.

I know it ran OK on 4MB i386 a while ago so 5MB should be OK, that said more should make things faster. I took 158.183 seconds to start-up on an i386 SX @ 16 MHz with 8MB on 09-Apr-2025 so suspect it will take a while to start.

red-ray wrote on Yesterday, 10:57:

If it's a 386 I wonder, why is it reported as a 486? […]
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Mike1978 wrote on 2026-08-05, 12:40:

https://www.vogons.org/download/file.php?id=246895 […]
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If it's a 386 I wonder, why is it reported as a 486?

I wonder what my SIV32L.exe would report, please will you try it, post the initial screen and ideally the Menu->File->Save Local file.

I know it ran OK on 4MB i386 a while ago so 5MB should be OK, that said more should make things faster. I took 158.183 seconds to start-up on an i386 SX @ 16 MHz with 8MB on 09-Apr-2025 so suspect it will take a while to start.

Yes it will heavily make usage of the swapfile.
If you cannot install more RAM try to move the swapfile to a second HDD if possible. But perhaps your CF card is fast enough to switch from small reads to small writes.
And I have seen that everything is in compatiblity mode. That's really awful on a 386sx. Please have a lot of patience on that run.

red-ray wrote on Yesterday, 10:57:

If it's a 386 I wonder, why is it reported as a 486? […]
Show full quote

Mike1978 wrote on 2026-08-05, 12:40:

https://www.vogons.org/download/file.php?id=246895 […]
Show full quote

If it's a 386 I wonder, why is it reported as a 486?

I wonder what my SIV32L.exe would report, please will you try it, post the initial screen and ideally the Menu->File->Save Local file.

I know it ran OK on 4MB i386 a while ago so 5MB should be OK, that said more should make things faster. I took 158.183 seconds to start-up on an i386 SX @ 16 MHz with 8MB on 09-Apr-2025 so suspect it will take a while to start.

I can explain it the base card is an Intel Inboard 386/pc but I have running in the card a CPU interposer I-O Data PK-A486BL 386/486 Blue Lightning Processor Upgrade CPU BL3 60MHz 486DLC including FPU
Crystal oscillator changed to 40Mhz from 32Mhz

The CPU has 486 instruction set.

At the minute it’s running at 40Mhz if I get the revto486.sys loaded like I could under DOS / Windows 3.11 then I may get it back to the dizzy heights of 83.5mhz that I got it to before.

Disruptor wrote on Yesterday, 12:52:

Yes it will heavily make usage of the swapfile. If you cannot install more RAM try to move the swapfile to a second HDD if possi […]
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red-ray wrote on Yesterday, 10:57:

If it's a 386 I wonder, why is it reported as a 486? […]
Show full quote

Mike1978 wrote on 2026-08-05, 12:40:

https://www.vogons.org/download/file.php?id=246895 […]
Show full quote

If it's a 386 I wonder, why is it reported as a 486?

I wonder what my SIV32L.exe would report, please will you try it, post the initial screen and ideally the Menu->File->Save Local file.

I know it ran OK on 4MB i386 a while ago so 5MB should be OK, that said more should make things faster. I took 158.183 seconds to start-up on an i386 SX @ 16 MHz with 8MB on 09-Apr-2025 so suspect it will take a while to start.

Yes it will heavily make usage of the swapfile.
If you cannot install more RAM try to move the swapfile to a second HDD if possible. But perhaps your CF card is fast enough to switch from small reads to small writes.
And I have seen that everything is in compatiblity mode. That's really awful on a 386sx. Please have a lot of patience on that run.

Performance so far hasn’t been much worse than with windows 3.11 but I expect the ram to be the bottleneck alongside the 4.77mhz bus. But it does run and I’ll be trying to squeeze a lot more out of it when I can.

I may explore a slave CF on xtide perhaps to act purely for a swap file. Though it likely wouldn’t do a lot if sharing the same channel. It may actually make it slower. There are other devices but again running in compatibility mode on the SCSI card. So perhaps marginal gains. The CF is likely faster than the spinning rust of its day even though on the 8bit card.

wierd_w wrote on 2026-08-05, 13:19:

I had 95a running on mfm controller with 2 50mb drives.

Had to use drvspace to compress it before installation, and it barely fit.

It was as painful as you'd imagine. I was a kid, poor, and using discarded parts.

Love this, I saw someone running win95 on MFM it was an old video but love when people do crazy things that was never meant to be done!

Mike1978 wrote on Today, 17:33:

wierd_w wrote on 2026-08-05, 13:19:

I had 95a running on mfm controller with 2 50mb drives.

Had to use drvspace to compress it before installation, and it barely fit.

It was as painful as you'd imagine. I was a kid, poor, and using discarded parts.

Love this, I saw someone running win95 on MFM it was an old video but love when people do crazy things that was never meant to be done!

I had to 'get creative' to install it.

Drvspace *first*, used Fastlynx to copy the install files to the second hard drive.

Custom install with lots of stuff turned off. 90mb was the maximum you could squeeze off that way, and it completely filled the drive.

Hilariously, 95a has mfm controller drivers.

Not that it helped much; it was painfully slow to access and use.