Oops... found it.

Hunter... Thanks for the link.

It lead me to the emucr site:
http://www.emucr.com/search/label/DOSBox

And from there I pulled the DOSBox SVN r3663 and will test it.

Does it start in an unmodified SVN build?

Yes... it loaded with DOSBox SVN r3663 (if that is indeed the latest SVN build)

So it's probably something with device attributes or the INT17 function. Would require further investigation.

<< So it's probably something with device attributes or the INT17 function. Would require further investigation. >>

Since we have a workaround we don't have to pursue this... but if you want to investigate further then I'll be happy to provide any info I can.