root42 wrote:Hm. EMS cards can be had easily. Lo Tech, Sergey Malinov and others have designed them.
Yes, I heard positive feedback about these. I *think* the smartness of these new cards relies within the driver.
AST Rampage and others went far beyond to what final EMS 4.0 provided (EEMS).
Advanced EMS features were used excessively by DesqView and Multi-Tasking DOSes.
I'm really curious, how well that LoTech board would perform on them! I'd be cool if someone would do the experiment. 😀
root42 wrote: But I think that Windows 3.0/3.1 do not support EMS, right? IIRC they need raw protected mode access to the extended memory.
That's a complicated matter. In simple words, as far as I understand:
a) Windows 3.1 doesn't use EMS for its own. However, It will emulate EMS for DOS programs (Enhanced Mode) or allow existing EMS drivers to stay (Standard Mode).
b) Windows 3.0 behaves the same except for Real-Mode. In RM, it will use EMS to enlarge physical memory.
It will allow large Windows 2.x and 3.x programs to run as if there was ordinary (XMS) memory available.
On Windows 3 in RM, Windows programs do not have to be EMS-aware to benefit from that.
With EMS beeing available, Windows 3.0 allows the use of wallpapers even in Real-Mode.
So on a PC/XT, an EMS card could make Windows 3.0 kinda usable, because there's enough RAM left for user applications.
c) Windows 2.x can see existing EMS memory. But can't give it to Windows programs.
Some EMS-aware DOS or Windows programs may use the extra memory provided by EMS.
d) Windows /386 can emulate EMS memory. It uses it to enhance DOS multi-tasking support (swap to disk, printer spoolers etc).
Like Windows 2.x, it can't provide that extra memory to normal Windows programs. They still run in a tiny, separate Windows-VM (running WIN86.COM).
Sorry, that's all I know. We had a discussion about this in another thread a while ago.
Windows 3.1 on a 386 with 640K RAM - Possible?
Also loosely related to that:
Is it possible to go over the 640KB barrier on an 8088 using some software ?
What am I doing with a 286?
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