And accessing the Control Panel even caused Windows Explorer to crash!

Oh no! Use bochs or some virtualizer.

wd wrote:

And accessing the Control Panel even caused Windows Explorer to crash!

Oh no! Use bochs or some virtualizer.

Bochs and Qemu can be used to set up Windows 95 prior to mounting the hard disk to DOSBox. I should try that. By the way, I already have a hard disk image set up on Bochs anyways.

(It seems that if we're refusing to help users install Windows 95 on DOSBox, they're on their own. 😀)

what is your dosbox version and where have you got it from?
what is your Operating System?
what are your PC specifications?

post content of "DOSBox Status Window" (in Windows: right click on its title bar -> edit)
enclose your dosbox's config file

It seems that if we're refusing to help users install Windows 95 on DOSBox, they're on their own

Correct.

robertmo wrote:

what is your dosbox version and where have you got it from? what is your Operating System? what are your PC specifications? […]
Show full quote

what is your dosbox version and where have you got it from?
what is your Operating System?
what are your PC specifications?

post content of "DOSBox Status Window" (in Windows: right click on its title bar -> edit)
enclose your dosbox's config file

The current version of DOSBox that I'm using to install Windows 95 OSR 2 is 0.74. I couldn't install Windows 95 under 0.73MB5, because it caused DOSBox to crash upon detecting Plug and Play devices.

The operating system that I'm using is Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 since DOSBox 0.74 is the earliest supported version. I even attempted to install Windows 95 under DOSBox 0.73MB5 on Windows XP host and it too crashed.

The product is a Toshiba P15-S420, Pentium IV HT 3.06 MHz w/512 MB RAM and 32 MB VRAM. The desktop PC has three times more memory with 64 MB VRAM, but it's broken right now.

Do you mind if I send you a e-mail with the contents of what the Windows 95 configuration file looks like so far?

I'll provide an update if I get Windows 95 successfully working under DOSBox. 😀

so Windows 95 OSR 2 works in 0.74 fine?
anyway repair your computer first

robertmo wrote:

so Windows 95 OSR 2 works in 0.74 fine?
anyway repair your computer first

So...here's how I solved this. To do a successful installation of Windows 95, I had to use Qemu 0.9.0 to setup the operating system and DOSBox 0.74 and not DOSBox 0.73MB5, although I can attempt to try that version later on.

Secondly, I had to set a minimal installation with the standard VGA driver and no sound card and then when I finished installing Windows 95. I ran the OS under DOSBox, then I went to the Control Panel and redetect all of the hardware devices installed on the OS.

However, installing the S3 Trio graphics driver, did not fix the illegal operation error associated with KERNEL32.DLL. Are there any other graphics drivers to use that will correct this error, robertmo...or is there no fix to this issue? 🙁

As for the desktop PC, I will need to get a technician to inspect the motherboard before I can use it again and keep in mind that I already blown $1,200+ on a new laptop that I wouldn't even use.

where do they sell "new" Pentium IV 3.06 MHz w/512 MB RAM for $1,200+ 🤣
you should be able to install win98 fine on it
maybe even winme will run 🤣

you have to turn off all windows' sounds, all visual effects, and don't use My computer (use total commander) but its best to use desktop shortcuts, do only one action at a time, after doing anything give windows some time to "rest", reboot after every single installation, don't do anything else don't even move your mouse when windows is working, make sure no other programs are working on your host when you run dosbox (check task manager on your host), keep desktop 640x480x256

robertmo wrote:

you have to turn off all windows' sounds, all visual effects, and don't use My computer (use total commander) but its best to use desktop shortcuts, do only one action at a time, after doing anything give windows some time to "rest", reboot after every single installation, don't do anything else don't even move your mouse when windows is working, make sure no other programs are working on your host when you run dosbox (check task manager on your host), keep desktop 640x480x256

Okay, here's how I solved all of this!

I was able to use My Computer. I right clicked on the mouse and selected Properties, which brings up the System Properties. In the Advanced Settings, I clicked on File System and since it selected the role of a Desktop Computer by default, I minimised the read head optimisation.

Then going to the CD-ROM tab, in the Optimize access pattern for drop down menu, I selected No read-ahead and lowered the Supplemental cache size slider to the bare minimum of 64 KB since DOSBox has no native CD-ROM support.

Next, in the Troubleshooting tab, I disabled the following:

1. New file sharing and locking semantics.
2. Protect mode hard disk interrupt handling.
3. Synchronous buffer commands.
4. 32-bit protect mode disk drives.
5. Write-behind caching for disk drives.

When I clicked on the Graphics tab I set the Hardware Acceleration to none, meaning no hardware acceleration. This setting can be used if the virtual machine frequent stops responding or has other severe problems.

When I was finished, I restarted the VM. I was able to access the Control Panel.

This process worked when running DOSBox 0.74, but I'll give it a go under DOSBox 0.73MB5 to see if it works okay or not. 😀

I will now need to make a backup of the two hard disk images, incase I screw something up in the Windows 95 VM.

Someone needs to write a good tutorial on how to properly and successfully set up Windows 95, but be warned, the developers do not offer any help with that operating system! You are on your own! 😏

If you have any further questions, let me know know and I'll be glad to help. 😀

By the way, most hardware vendors stopped selling Pentium IV computers a long time ago. You can find most of the used and refurbished P4 PCs on eBay and Amazon. 😜

ppgrainbow wrote:

Toshiba P15-S420, Pentium IV HT 3.06 MHz w/512 MB RAM and 32 MB VRAM.

robertmo wrote:

you should be able to install win98 fine on it
maybe even winme will run

He probably meant a Pentium IV 3.06 GHz, and yes it'd be more than enough to run WinXP (let alone Win98).

As for no help, even the author of DOSBox has said there will be no working support/debugging for Win95. That's not what DOSBox is for...

If you have a copy of Win95, and VMWare/VirtualBox/ VirtualPC are all too slow, all you have to do is set up a multi-boot system.

With the right boot manager like GRUB, or Grub4Dos, it'd be easy as pie.

That's not recommended as installing old Windows versions before XP on large hard disks will lead to extreme data loss if you're not careful, let alone the driver support necessary for your hardware. At that point, the advantages to running Win9X would be minimized by the modernness of the hardware.

There are all sorts of workarounds for running old OSes on even relatively more modern hardware.

This site is a good place for finding resources: http://www.msfn.org/board/forum/8-windows-959898seme/

Unfortunately, I don't think that the author nor any one else has the time nor the resources to debug nor compile support for Windows 95 or later. Thus supporting Windows 95 under DOSBox would be too much work and a absolute hindrance to development. I suspect that there is no need to go beyond Windows 3.x (Windows 3.2 latest version) in regards to DOSBox.

There are limits in DOS-based versions of Windows and MS-DOS alone:

1. MS-DOS and Windows 3.x do not support hard disks larger than 7.88 GB due to lack of proper support for extended INT13h extensions
2. Windows 95 has a hard disk limit of 32 GB: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/246818
3. By default, Windows 98/98SE/Me have a hard disk limit of 127.5 GB by default due to lack of proper support for 48-bit LBA. There are workarounds to implement 48-bit support under Windows 98 and Me, but it can take quite a bit of work.

All of these limits above are per disk and not per partition. Any attempt to run any of these operating systems mentioned beyond these limits may lead to data corruption or the capacity of the whole hard drive not being properly recognised.

This forum thread was just a not-so-successful attempt at getting Windows 95 or the original release of Windows 98 to run successfully under DOSBox. Unfortunately, developers do not have the resources to attempt to support or even test Windows 9x under DOSBox and compatibility may eventually be removed in future versions of DOSBox.

If you want to run Windows 9x/Me, you can only do it under Qemu, VirtualPC, VirtualBox, Bochs and VMware Player.

some more useful win9x starting/closing optimizations:

remove everything from msconfig->autostart
(you can do that in regedit too ->HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE - SOFTWARE - Microsoft - Windows - CurrentVersion - Run (runonce,runservices etc.)

del logow.sys and logos.sys from windows folder

in c:\msdos.sys under [options] add/change:
Logo=0
DisableLog=1

in c:\windows\scanreg.ini change:
Backup=0

robertmo wrote:

some more useful win9x starting/closing optimizations: […]
Show full quote

some more useful win9x starting/closing optimizations:

remove everything from msconfig->autostart
(you can do that in regedit too ->HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE - SOFTWARE - Microsoft - Windows - CurrentVersion - Run (runonce,runservices etc.)

del logow.sys from windows folder

in c:\msdos.sys under [options] add/change:
Logo=0
DisableLog=1

in c:\windows\scanreg.ini change:
Backup=0

I should try that when I get to edit the msdos.sys file and this is to further optimise Windows 95 under DOSBox. 😀

Anyways, I found a forum thread where you can shrink the size of the existing Windows 95 installation to no smaller than 5.35 MB: http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/28825-how-to- … ws-95-on-535mb/

A Windows 95 installation this small would even fit on a 20 MB hard drive! 😁

It would also be so completely broken that I imagine you wouldn't get very much to run - at least, not well. (You might as well use HX DOS Extender instead.)

Jorpho wrote:

It would also be so completely broken that I imagine you wouldn't get very much to run - at least, not well. (You might as well use HX DOS Extender instead.)

I can use the HX DOS Extender to work under a bare minimum installation of Windows 95. 😀

Speaking of Windows 95, I will have to search for articles on how to get it working properly on my own as I will not get any help from any website.

I know it's not my place, but I hate when the devs abhor the use of Win9x on DOSBox. Win9x (and Win3x, 2x, 1x, as well as lots of other software) are just DOS GUIs. Yes, they implement a more advanced 32-bit layer with 32-bit drivers, etc... but they are still rooted in DOS, and so are still relevant.

If someone tried to install XP in DOSBox I can see where there might be an issue, but I think that software which, when DOSBox is "completed" would ideally run without a hitch without the need for HDD image mounting should be supported.

While it might be true on some technical level, it really is a bit of a stretch to call Win9x a "DOS GUI" in the same sense as Win 3.x.

Anyway, I suppose someone is probably going to suggest that if you want it that badly, you can always code it yourself. 🤣