not 100% sure but, make a menu in config sys where you load the drivespace driver.

I'm asking because DriveSpace loads with DOS. The only way of which I know to enable or disable it once installed is through the MSDOS.SYS file. When in Windows mode, many DOS drivers, such as for drives or the mouse, are not needed, as Windows takes care of them. DriveSpace for DOS is one example. So, I want to be able to use it when running a DOS configuration in a .PIF file but not in Windows mode.

How huge hard drive do you mean for *windows 98SE*? The maximum capacity for windows 98SE is 120GB. No more than that and this is the *actual* hard drive size. You can safely run windows 98SE on hard drive 120GB or less, like 100GB, 80GB. Not partition size. Win 98SE corrupts data if hard drive *is larger* than 120GB capacity.

Drivespace was used on "too small" hard drive that person purchased a computer back then around 91 or 92 or so, with 40MB or 60MB few years ago, now trying to run late DOS stuff now needs the drivespace on. Now there is *NO need* for that enabled anymore now due to plenty of hard drives out theren now. When you are playing with large hard drives, it is no issues using 2GB partitions using DOS. Second, if you need to access it other ways and something breaks down, you have no longer have accessible to the partitions that had drivespace enabled. I prefer off.

When I hear DOS, I assume DOS 6.22, 5.x. Windows 98SE comes with their own DOS that was partial booted during the windows 98SE startup. But DOS games and DOS programs were not designed to handle so much and best placed there on up to 2GB partitions.

I like less complications.

Cheers,

Am with Pentiumspeed, not a good choice. Your best way is to add another HD or re-partition the current HUGE one with a small secondary. I do not suggest using DriveSpace to compress files under your circumstances. On my moms computer have a second partition that I can use for saving files, apps, whatever that do not effect her main drive and OS. Just my opinion.
added: if you want to image floppies use Winimage with compression (.IMZ not .IMA) to help save space if needed (is also transferable to any computer that also has Winimage where a drivespace file is not so easy 🤣)

I'm understanding the question a bit differently, that the OP has DriveSpace-compressed removable media and wants to be able to read it but also not give up the memory that DriveSpace requires.

I'm not sure about the question... Are your floppy/ZIP media the ones compressed by DriveSpace, or partitions on your hard disk? How much is considered HUGE in this context?

I think you can probably just disable DRVSPACE/DBLSPACE via custom menu config, or step-by-step, if it's just your removable media (floppy/ZIP) that are compressed and you don't want it to take up RAM when they're not present...

Some facts about DriveSpace (and probably apply to other compressors also):
- DriveSpace can only be fully utilized if your FAT16 partition is less than 1GB. If over 1GB, it will only compress a portion of the partition, reaching a maximum capacity of 2GB.
- DriveSpace will never make your FAT16 partition go beyond 2GB. If it is already 2GB, you can still compress, but you'll get nearly no space gain.
- DriveSpace can work on removable media, including floppy and ZIP disks.

at first OP question is like, use drivespace without editing msdos.sys
then in second post of OP, it becomes use drivespace in windows command prompt while disabled in msdos.sys.

that last one doesn't seem feasible.
the first one is either by loading the drivespace driver in config sys using a menu, or by booting from a bootable floppy where drivespace is still enabled.

A long time ago when I was still using Windows 95, there was a tool to create a special boot floppy that bypasses any disk compressor enabled on the system so as to get more conventional memory.

Not sure if Win98 had similar tools. I think there are some DOS utilities to alter environment variables loaded from MSDOS.SYS externally (without altering MSDOS.SYS itself)...

The hard drive has 127GB formatted capacity, and I'm only using DriveSpace to compress floppies and Zip disks. I don't want the DOS version of DriveSpace to load by default, as it will only waste DOS memory, and I can get its functionality from Windows. The problem is that I want to enable it when switching to DOS mode and disable it again afterwards.

Harry Potter wrote on 2023-07-05, 10:31:

The hard drive has 127GB formatted capacity, and I'm only using DriveSpace to compress floppies and Zip disks. I don't want the DOS version of DriveSpace to load by default, as it will only waste DOS memory, and I can get its functionality from Windows. The problem is that I want to enable it when switching to DOS mode and disable it again afterwards.

Just make separate CONFIG.SYS startup configurations for DOS and for Windows, and never use "switch to DOS mode" from Windows. A lot of good quality DOS TSRs do not cooperate well with Windows anyway...

"Switch to DOS mode" makes sense only if you're using basic Microsoft stuffs, plus VIDE-CDD (one of the select few drivers that cooperate well with Windows and will not force MS-DOS compatibility mode).

From what I remember DBLSPACE was the main driver that's taking up most of the memory. There's also a DRVSPACE driver, usually loaded with a MOVE parameter as far as I could remember, that do not take as much RAM as DBLSPACE.

The driver simply moves DriveSpace to the HMA. That is good, but the DBLSPACE driver still eats a lot of memory, and I think the Win98SE version of DriveSpace also still eats Upper memory. I can disable just DBLSPACE, as I don't need the backward compatibility with DoubleSpace, but I only want the DriveSpace driver to load from DOS when I switch to DOS mode. BTW, I plan on using a .PIF file for alternate DOS configurations if necessary. I have done that before for the purpose of networking to a DOS laptop to act as simulated hard drives when the laptop had no hard drive. I did this, because I couldn't network Win98 to DOS from Windows mode.