VOGONS


First post, by auron

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on my win95b install, when i boot straight to command line via f8 and run NSSI, it detects things such as IFSHELP ("windows 32-bit disk driver"), SETVER, SMARTDRV w/ double buffering, some "configuration driver" and an XMS memory manager (HIMEM?). this is with stock config.sys/autoexec.bat and they contain none of these things, so i'm curious which config file is reponsible for loading these?

Reply 1 of 8, by STX

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MS-DOS 7.0 (the version of DOS that came with Windows 95) automatically loads some drivers from IO.SYS and MSDOS.SYS, even if CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT do not exist. This was a good thing for normal users back in the day; it usually ensured that Windows 95 would remain bootable if an old DOS program's installer or a "knows just enough to be dangerous" kid (like myself) removed the drivers that Windows 95 depends on from CONFIG.SYS or AUTOEXEC.BAT.

From a Tech Republic article...

The CONFIG.SYS commands embedded in the IO.SYS file DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\HIMEM.SYS DOS=HIGH DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\IFSHLP.SYS FILES=60 L […]
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The CONFIG.SYS commands embedded in the IO.SYS file
DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\HIMEM.SYS
DOS=HIGH
DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\IFSHLP.SYS
FILES=60
LASTDRIVE=Z
STACKS=9,256
BUFFERS=30
SHELL=C:\COMMAND.COM /P
FCBS=4
DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\SETVER.EXE

The AUTOEXEC.BAT commands embedded in the IO.SYS file
@ECHO OFF
PATH=C:\C:\WINDOWS;C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND;
PROMPT $P$G

And see KB118579 or some other backup of the Contents of the MSDOS.SYS File article.

The easiest way to avoid the loading of drivers by IO.SYS and MSDOS.SYS is to create a floppy disk boot disk.

Reply 2 of 8, by dr_st

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DOS=NOAUTO should prevent loading of all these (or is it available in Win98 only?)

But typically there is no harm of having them there.

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Reply 3 of 8, by auron

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interesting, i was somewhat surprised seeing SMARTDRV in there as win95 already comes with VCACHE, but maybe it's loaded with a setting that prevents it from being used under windows? it's still detected by NSSI under win95, regardless.

Reply 6 of 8, by auron

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MEM /C will actually only list DBLBUFF, but this source claims that SMARTDRV is indeed loaded: https://www.brainbell.com/tutors/A+/Hardware/ … _Windows_95.htm

i've also come to realize that DOS=UMB isn't set in this default config which is bad for those conventional memory hungry pre-extender games.

Reply 7 of 8, by dr_st

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That's an interesting claim, but maybe a mistake. DBLBUFF is loaded, that's true; the full-blown SMARTDRV, however, would take much more memory, and I recall that I did notice some speed-up when loading SMARTDRV (from AUTOEXEC) in Win98SE DOS, compared to not loading it.

The default config is not something you are supposed to use. It's there only to ensure that if something critical for Windows gets omitted from the startup files, Windows itself can still load after they are done processing. You should use your own config files, and add DOS=UMB yourself.

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Reply 8 of 8, by derSammler

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auron wrote:

i've also come to realize that DOS=UMB isn't set in this default config which is bad for those conventional memory hungry pre-extender games.

DOS=UMB makes no sense when not loading EMM386, and the default config doesn't load EMM386. With HIMEM.SYS, you can only use DOS=HIGH. So nothing wrong here.