tony359 wrote on 2021-02-28, 19:50:

Hi all, […]
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Hi all,

I have now repaired a 386 and a 486 I purchased on Ebay. I'd love to install Windows, games and utilities I used to use back in the '90. However, I cannot use a USB stick 😀 and I would love NOT to have to invest on a bucket of empty floppies and a USB floppy for my Windows 10 machine.

Are there collections around for this purpose that can be saved on CD-Roms? Even though I guess this may not be straight forward as some software was supposed to be installed from floppies...

Thanks
Tony

Instead of using CDs, I suggest
a) an IDE to CF adapter for each of the retro PCs and and a USB CF card reader for the modern PC . A CF card is both read and writable and re-usable . Up to 512MB ones should work without issue on older machines .
b) a Gotek floppy emulator for games that must be installed from floppies . You install the Gotek in the retro PC and use a USB flash drive to transfer floppy image files from your modern PC .

If you absolutely want to use a CD-ROM , you could always install any games you want to play in a virtual machine on the modern PC, then write the resulting directory/file structure to a CD and then use that CD in your retro machine to copy the directory structure to the hard drive (remember to reset the attribute to read/write after copying or some games will have issues).

Networking is another great option, and easy. I say this as someone who was allergic to the very idea of it, but now can't live without it. Find yourself a network card and its packet driver, then install mTCP:

A new mTCP is available! (version 2020-01-01)

My personal serving suggestion is to use FTPSRV to make your retro machine the FTP Server, then use Filezilla on your modern machine to manage its contents.

To answer your question though. There are no doubt a billion collections on CD if you're to browse ebay or archive.org. Board rules limit what we can link here. But I think darry's suggestion of compiling your own would be the best way to get what you want.

Just make your own CD-RW disc(s). That is what I've done when I need to quickly install applications/drivers on my PCs. Easy to add/delete files if needed on them as they are rewritable.

vetz wrote on 2021-02-28, 23:33:

Just make your own CD-RW disc(s). That is what I've done when I need to quickly install applications/drivers on my PCs. Easy to add/delete files if needed on them as they are rewritable.

If CD-RW are to be used, OP needs to make sure that the CD-ROM drives in the vintage machines support them . Using CD-RW discs is a great way to avoid wasting CD-R discs, but early CD-ROM drives cannot read them . Some older CD-ROM drives have issues even with CD-R discs .

darry wrote on 2021-02-28, 23:38:

If CD-RW are to be used, OP needs to make sure that the CD-ROM drives in the vintage machines support them . Using CD-RW discs is a great way to avoid wasting CD-R discs, but early CD-ROM drives cannot read them . Some older CD-ROM drives have issues even with CD-R discs .

You're right, depends ofc on the drive installed.

Thanks for all the inputs. I'll have a look.

Can you suggest a website where to download old software?

tony359 wrote on 2021-03-01, 22:41:

Can you suggest a website where to download old software?

archive.org

tony359 wrote on 2021-03-01, 22:41:

Thanks for all the inputs. I'll have a look.

Can you suggest a website where to download old software?

gog.com

There are copies of SIMTEL CDROMS on archive.org; I would start from there.

mihai wrote on 2021-03-02, 01:25:

There are copies of SIMTEL CDROMS on archive.org; I would start from there.

Good idea . Lots of shareware and freeware on those . There is also this http://cd.textfiles.com/nightowl/ and pretty much everything else on http://cd.textfiles.com

Also alot on the old Windows95.com site (for Win95 stuff)

Mirror here: http://win95.retropc.se/

I got a load of cover discs by asking on freecycle, but the links above are much better for pre 2K stuff, as very little of what I got is truly free or Win 9x and earlier.

vetz wrote on 2021-03-02, 01:52:

Also alot on the old Windows95.com site (for Win95 stuff)

Mirror here: http://win95.retropc.se/

According to my ISP, that site doesn't exist

darry wrote on 2021-03-02, 01:34:

mihai wrote on 2021-03-02, 01:25:

There are copies of SIMTEL CDROMS on archive.org; I would start from there.

Good idea . Lots of shareware and freeware on those . There is also this http://cd.textfiles.com/nightowl/ and pretty much everything else on http://cd.textfiles.com

For anyone who isn't aware, these - Simtel, plus everything (or just about everything) on cd.textfiles.com - are old CDs containing shareware/freeware/public domain software.

http://cd.textfiles.com is a nicer place to browse the CD contents and download individual files (it could be a lot nicer though, hopefully one day it will be). If you want to download entire CDs, the ones you can browse on cd.textfiles.com are often available on archive.org.

http://cd.textfiles.com is a nicer place to browse the CD contents and download individual files (it could be a lot nicer though, hopefully one day it will be). If you want to download entire CDs, the ones you can browse on cd.textfiles.com are often available on archive.org.

I do like the intro text on that site

in the world of digital there are many incidental and unintentional 'archivists' who do the world a favour quite by accident

debs3759 wrote on 2021-03-02, 10:01:

vetz wrote on 2021-03-02, 01:52:

Also alot on the old Windows95.com site (for Win95 stuff)

Mirror here: http://win95.retropc.se/

According to my ISP, that site doesn't exist

That is really weird, anyway I found another mirror:
http://omolini.steptail.com/mirror/win95/

Yep, that one works. Thanks