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FreeDOS needs 386, so it won't work. There might be (unofficial) ports that could run, but I never used them.

I recall running MS-DOS 6.22 on a 286 with 2MB of ram, the only problem was to find correct memory manager drivers, as EMM386 can't be used.

MS-DOS 6.22 also gets my vote!

Windows 3.1 will work on a 286 but only in standard mode.

Windows 3.11 (not workgroups) should work as well but I've never tried it on a 286.

Although with only 1MB you won't be doing much but hey skifree and minesweeper will work. 😀

Suprised Microsoft still has this up http://support.microsoft.com/kb/84388/en-us

Why not running MS-DOS 5.0?

DosFreak wrote:

Windows 3.1 will work on a 286 but only in standard mode. […]
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Windows 3.1 will work on a 286 but only in standard mode.

Windows 3.11 (not workgroups) should work as well but I've never tried it on a 286.

Although with only 1MB you won't be doing much but hey skifree and minesweeper will work. 😀

Suprised Microsoft still has this up http://support.microsoft.com/kb/84388/en-us

I thought 3.0 was the last version that still supported the 286. Even if it's not, WIndows 3.1x supports so many 386 features that to run it on a 286 would be a waste. It was really written with the 386 in mind.

Nah Standard mode is all 16bit. (dosx.exe and krnl286.exe) so should be no issues with it working on a 286.

Supposedly 3.11 for Workgroups can be run on a 286 but only via dosx.exe. Haven't verified it though. (Networking wouldn't work so not much of a point to it). Also as per the first link below the memory requirements are increased so no point in this case.

Not sure if there is a speed diff between 3.0 vs 3.1. I remember 3.1 working (in standard mode) the few times I bothered to use it on my 286 back in the day.

Looks like the Tandy 1000 TX is limited to Windows 3.0 http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/archi … hp/t-14461.html in Real mode not standard (and 3.1+ doesn't have Real mode)

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/89333/en-us
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2 … 8/10392028.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2 … 7/10013609.aspx

Well, I probably wouldn't be able to do much with Win 3.0 and only 1mb of RAM.

At this point, I'm thinking either DOS 5.0 or 6.22 and maybe Gem or Geoworks on top of it. Or, of course, Deskmate.
I know this will sound silly, but there is just something I don't like about the look of the earlier versions of Windows. They are just downright fugly. Which I could maybe live with, if it was going to be technically superior somehow or allow me to do something I otherwise wouldn't be able to do. But I don't think that's the case here.

I have this blog in my rss feed: http://theguiblog.com/author/brandon/

He reviews DOS GUIs

Fun500 (Site says 386 but docs say 16bit...)
http://fun500.brandoncornell.com/
http://theguiblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2013 … 02/f562_000.png

Also
http://qbasicgui.datacomponents.net/

DOS 6.22 and EMM286

DosFreak wrote:

I have this blog in my rss feed: http://theguiblog.com/author/brandon/ […]
Show full quote

I have this blog in my rss feed: http://theguiblog.com/author/brandon/

He reviews DOS GUIs

Fun500 (Site says 386 but docs say 16bit...)
http://fun500.brandoncornell.com/
http://theguiblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2013 … 02/f562_000.png

Also
http://qbasicgui.datacomponents.net/

Cool, thank you.

I always found PC-DOS to be a great dos option for the 1000 line and would highly recommend it. I no longer have any 1000's (the original TL was my personal favorite), and never tried PC-DOS 2000 on it, but I assume it would be the best choice. The last version I used on any 1000 was PC-DOS 7 (and PC-DOS 2000 is PC-DOS 7 with some extras that you might not be able to use on a 286), and that was on an HX. As for a GUI, I would absolutely recommend Geoworks. It's hands down the best GUI for 88/86, 186, and 286's you can find. Not a lot of 3rd party software for it, but the native DTP, and office apps are truly a thing of beauty of for their time and can still get the job done today.

Just for the heck of it back in '92-93 I built up a SL, with Cyrix 8087 math co (back when Cyrix was good), oak VGA, paper white VGA monitor, Apple IIe on a ISA card for PC's, (which would only work with built in video and not the VGA board so that was a bit of a pain to switch back and forth), RLL card with two 40MB MFM drives that I connected up and low level formatted with 1:1 interleave to 60MB each on the RLL board using DR-DOS 5 or 6 (which had some extras for Geoworks), and a few other odds and ends. It really was a very useful little machine and I ended up selling it for about $1000 to a local psychiatrist for her receptionist to use as the office workstation. Getting an LED printer working with it was a bit of a hassle though and she needed reasonable output. The IIe was something else she needed as that's what she was using for 5-6 years before. All in all, it turned out to be a fantastic little rig that was a really good value for a little old 8086 and at a time when most were going to higher end 486's. Those old Tandy's are great little boxes if you know how to work them. Getting HD floppy drives working isn't to hard, but requires a bit of re-wiring the molex's.

Personally, just loved the TL with a HDD that I would format to Tandy MS-DOS 3.2 or 3.3 (cant remember which version was on ROM), and then boot from ROM. Tandy 1000's with DOS in ROM are still the fastest booting x86's in the world today. Press button, and one second later you were at the prompt MS-DOS prompt. Truly awesome.

Kodai wrote:

I always found PC-DOS to be a great dos option for the 1000 line and would highly recommend it. I no longer have any 1000's (the original TL was my personal favorite), and never tried PC-DOS 2000 on it, but I assume it would be the best choice. The last version I used on any 1000 was PC-DOS 7 (and PC-DOS 2000 is PC-DOS 7 with some extras that you might not be able to use on a 286), and that was on an HX. As for a GUI, I would absolutely recommend Geoworks. It's hands down the best GUI for 88/86, 186, and 286's you can find. Not a lot of 3rd party software for it, but the native DTP, and office apps are truly a thing of beauty of for their time and can still get the job done today.

Just for the heck of it back in '92-93 I built up a SL, with Cyrix 8087 math co (back when Cyrix was good), oak VGA, paper white VGA monitor, Apple IIe on a ISA card for PC's, (which would only work with built in video and not the VGA board so that was a bit of a pain to switch back and forth), RLL card with two 40MB MFM drives that I connected up and low level formatted with 1:1 interleave to 60MB each on the RLL board using DR-DOS 5 or 6 (which had some extras for Geoworks), and a few other odds and ends. It really was a very useful little machine and I ended up selling it for about $1000 to a local psychiatrist for her receptionist to use as the office workstation. Getting an LED printer working with it was a bit of a hassle though and she needed reasonable output. The IIe was something else she needed as that's what she was using for 5-6 years before. All in all, it turned out to be a fantastic little rig that was a really good value for a little old 8086 and at a time when most were going to higher end 486's. Those old Tandy's are great little boxes if you know how to work them. Getting HD floppy drives working isn't to hard, but requires a bit of re-wiring the molex's.

Personally, just loved the TL with a HDD that I would format to Tandy MS-DOS 3.2 or 3.3 (cant remember which version was on ROM), and then boot from ROM. Tandy 1000's with DOS in ROM are still the fastest booting x86's in the world today. Press button, and one second later you were at the prompt MS-DOS prompt. Truly awesome.

Like the look of Geoworks but having a heck of a time finding it. There is a company called Breadbox that owns the code/copyright and distributes it, but I don't see anything for XT/286 on their site, only 386 and up.

There's no reason not to use MS-DOS 6.22. 😁

Dos 6.22 is highly polished and more refined than 5.0.

Stay away from FreeDOS.

DR-DOS or PC-DOS is up to you.

My preference has always been MS-DOS 6.22.

All three later versions are excellent choices. Later versions of DR-DOS had support utils for GEM and Geoworks (cant remember what they were now as its been 20+ years), and PC-DOS just had the best overall extra utility programs plus it came with REXX which used to be very useful. Later versions of PC-DOS also have the best memory manager of all the DOS's if you want to go the automatic route and now pick specific high mem locations by hand. But MS-DOS 6.22 is about the most polished DOS for general game use. The others were really meant for SOHO and small business use, but will work fine as well.

On a side note, consider a good file manager. Most people like X-Tree Gold, but I always found Q-DOS II to be superior as it "cumbersome" as X-Tree. Just the essentials and about the fastest .TXT and simple .WPD viewer out there.

Kodai wrote:

All three later versions are excellent choices. Later versions of DR-DOS had support utils for GEM and Geoworks (cant remember what they were now as its been 20+ years), and PC-DOS just had the best overall extra utility programs plus it came with REXX which used to be very useful. Later versions of PC-DOS also have the best memory manager of all the DOS's if you want to go the automatic route and now pick specific high mem locations by hand. But MS-DOS 6.22 is about the most polished DOS for general game use. The others were really meant for SOHO and small business use, but will work fine as well.

On a side note, consider a good file manager. Most people like X-Tree Gold, but I always found Q-DOS II to be superior as it "cumbersome" as X-Tree. Just the essentials and about the fastest .TXT and simple .WPD viewer out there.

GEM might actually be the way to go for a GUI for a 286 if all you will be using it for is file management and don't plan to run any apps. If GEM runs fine on a 8mhz 68000 Atari ST then it should be plenty speedy on any 286. Windows 3.x apps are pretty much useless now, anyway, so no real reason to use it over GEM.

DOS 3.3 or 5.0 depending on the speed of the 286 and if it has SCSI, IDE or an original MFM drive. DOS 6 is best for 386 systems and above that can use upper memory.

FreeDOS works on 8088 and above. I see no reason why one shouldn't use it.

jwt27 wrote:

FreeDOS works on 8088 and above. I see no reason why one shouldn't use it.

I don't see any reason I can't use it either, but their site seems to only have a CD image, unless I download the individual DOS components separately and make a bootdisk, I don't know how I'm going to get it on that system. I don't have any easy way to connect a CDROM to it, either.

It says on their web page that it really insn't compatible with Windows, but I don't see any sense in running Windows on this machine anyway.