Wow so I just had this same question I was asking myself when working on an old Windows 3.1 system.

I did some research and I found out what should be the solution, and I hope this helps!

There's a tool called "Blackout" which you can download from the simtel archive.

https://ftp.zx.net.nz/pub/archive/simtel.net/ … il/blackout.zip

From there, you extract the EXE to your location of choice, then invoke the file twice. Once towards the beginning of CONFIG.SYS as a DEVICE parameter, and again towards the end of your AUTOEXEC.BAT.

What the tool does is it blanks the screen while routines are carried out, then re-enables video output on the second execution of the tool.

Hi,

Thanks for the tip.

Although blacking the screen was not exactly the option I was looking for, beggars can't be choosers 😁

To be honest I have not found any other options, so this will be a huge step in the right direction.

Thanks again.

No worries! Glad I could help.

Out of topic, but :

I for one, love to see the outputs from my Autoexec.bat and Config.sys files. I do try to choose the minimal info switch as the parameter if available, if the output is too messy.

Well, I like both the splash screen and the verbose info. I sometimes used to press ESC during startup to display DOS's output. I also used to use XrX to change the splash screen. I have some C64 game screenshots as splash screens and can post a link if desired. I can also post a link to the XrX logo utilities and included splash screens, but they aren't mine. 😀

NightShadowPT wrote on 2022-10-14, 17:01:

On autoexec.bat I found that if I redirect the output to the console (using the ">nul" command after each line) I can avoid seeing the verbose, but on config sys I am not aware of anything similar I can do.

Let's make something clear: " > nul" doesn't redirects to "console", but to "null device", and thus you don't see the output on the monitor (console output). To redirect output to console (which you don't want) use " > con".

I've never tried " > nul" in "config.sys" and I had no idea that it doesn't work there, but it's the most simple and convenient solution for blackin' out the output from "autoexec.bat" commands.

analog_programmer wrote on 2023-08-22, 03:43:

NightShadowPT wrote on 2022-10-14, 17:01:

On autoexec.bat I found that if I redirect the output to the console (using the ">nul" command after each line) I can avoid seeing the verbose, but on config sys I am not aware of anything similar I can do.

Let's make something clear: " > nul" doesn't redirects to "console", but to "null device", and thus you don't see the output on the monitor (console output). To redirect output to console (which you don't want) use " > con".

I've never tried " > nul" in "config.sys" and I had no idea that it doesn't work there, but it's the most simple and convenient solution for blackin' out the output from "autoexec.bat" commands.

Indeed, you are absolutely correct.
I have updated my original post for accuracy.

Thanks