Hi, you have to handle things like with the real hardware of the time.
You can either a) select an MFM/RLL controller in PCem and run the low-level formatting routine of the fixed-disk controller.
DEBUG can be used for this (https://retrocmp.de/ctrl/llf/llf.htm).
After that, FDISK can be run normally.
Or try route b) and select XT IDE. It has an auto-detect feature and you just have to run FDISK.

Please keep in mind though that PC-DOS 3.3 has a 32MB partition limit, because it does merely support the original FAT16 (+FAT12), not FAT16B.

So you have to use several partitions in order to use all the capacity.
Or you have to resort to one of those ancient utilities that make DOS 3 format bigger fixed-disks. I'm just a layman here, though. 😅

Compaq DOS 3.31 supports normal FAT16B, as we know it.

Alternatively, use DOS 4.x. It's bigger, but from the late 80s still.
MS-DOS 5 or 6.x should work fine on an XT, too. It's just less retro.

Good luck! 😃

PS: Windows 1.x and 2.x need SETVER if run on MS-DOS 5 or higher.
It should be installed by default, though.

PS/2: PC-DOS 3.x used SELECT utility as a kind of setup program, I think.
Anyway, manual installation isn't hard.
Just run FDISK and then FORMAT C: /S
The /S switch is same as SYS C:
Then copy the filey to C: or a sub directory (DOS).

Jo22 wrote on 2024-01-31, 20:44:

Hi, you have to handle things like with the real hardware of the time. You can either a) select an MFM/RLL controller in PCem an […]
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Hi, you have to handle things like with the real hardware of the time.
You can either a) select an MFM/RLL controller in PCem and run the low-level formatting routine of the fixed-disk controller.
DEBUG can be used for this (https://retrocmp.de/ctrl/llf/llf.htm).
After that, FDISK can be run normally.
Or try route b) and select XT IDE. It has an auto-detect feature and you just have to run FDISK.

Please keep in mind though that PC-DOS 3.3 has a 32MB partition limit, because it does merely support the original FAT16 (+FAT12), not FAT16B.

So you have to use several partitions in order to use all the capacity.
Or you have to resort to one of those ancient utilities that make DOS 3 format bigger fixed-disks. I'm just a layman here, though. 😅

Compaq DOS 3.31 supports normal FAT16B, as we know it.

Alternatively, use DOS 4.x. It's bigger, but from the late 80s still.
MS-DOS 5 or 6.x should work fine on an XT, too. It's just less retro.

Good luck! 😃

PS: Windows 1.x and 2.x need SETVER if run on MS-DOS 5 or higher.
It should be installed by default, though.

PS/2: PC-DOS 3.x used SELECT utility as a kind of setup program, I think.
Anyway, manual installation isn't hard.
Just run FDISK and then FORMAT C: /S
The /S switch is same as SYS C:
Then copy the filey to C: or a sub directory (DOS).

also how i move a file on ms-dos 3.30 to another directory?

FIN_K89i wrote on 2024-01-31, 21:48:

also how i move a file on ms-dos 3.30 to another directory?

Hi, the command is called MOVE, but it wasn't available in older versions of DOS.
Instead, files must be copied/deleted.

However, file managers like Norton Commander had a move feature (F6 key).
XTree was also popular at the time.

The easiest thing is to use WinImage and and inject Norton Commander or a clone into the DOS floppy image (or a fresh, blank floppy that you can then use in the other emulated floppy drive).
Versions 1 and 2 were quite small, for example.

Alternatively, you can open the HDD image with WinImage directly (WinImage 6 worked for me, the current version seems a bit buggy).
If its in IMG or VHD format, WinImage should be able to open it (if it's FAT formatted).