There is a reason. Windows 3.1

1. Will Himem make it XMS? - yes
2. a 286 CPU cannot use utilities such as EMM386, you cannot use UMB - actually, it depends on the chipset.
For many 286 chipsets there is driver for "hardware" EMS and/or UMB.
So you can use memory above 1MB as EMS

zyga64 wrote on 2023-10-03, 08:42:

There is a reason. Windows 3.1 […]
Show full quote

There is a reason. Windows 3.1

1. Will Himem make it XMS? - yes
2. a 286 CPU cannot use utilities such as EMM386, you cannot use UMB - actually, it depends on the chipset.
For many 286 chipsets there is driver for "hardware" EMS.
So you can use memory above 1MB as EMS

Interesting... thanks!

I wouldn't spend too much money on upgrading a 286 over 1 MB. That's what I had back then and for games that was totally fine. Things might look different if you are into productivity software like AutoCAD.
A convenient and inexpensive alternative to SD cards are Disk-On-Modules. Larger sizes are sold for obscene prices but for a 286 100MB is good.

16MB is the limit for a 286, but in practice many boards are limited to less. The cheapest boards to add memory to are those with 30 pin SIMM sockets, SIMMs are taken in pairs, 30 pin are 8 bit wide so you need two for the 16bit bus width (Same for 386SX). Minimal RAM config is then 2x256 for 512KB... if there's base memory onboard, this may either give you 128kB above 1MB if the base is 640kB or 512kB above if the base is 1MB. SIPPs are the next most easy, as they are basically SIMMs with pins, you can either add pins to SIMMs, replace SIPP sockets with SIMM sockets, or what has worked for me before, just plug SIMM sockets into the SIPP headers, but in some situations this may be unreliable. Or you can buy SIPPs, but they are both hard to find and usually overpriced. Then the type you don't want, unless you come across it already stuffed with 4MB is the board that is socketed or soldered DIP RAM IC packages only. Half the board will be covered, typically 4 rows of 9 chips, where 1MB DRAMs are used, but some early ones might have only 256kb sockets, so filling the lot only gets you 1MB. (Extra bit is for parity, some let you leave it out)

Physical EMS can also be on an ISA card, but the right driver can be a pain to find, and when found may not be 100% compatible with everything that can use physical EMS. EMS accessed through ISA will be slower than onboard.

Edit: forgot to mention why boards might not take 16MB... often, early SIMM boards only have the address lines connected to make use of 1MB SIMMs maximum, so with 4 or 8 SIMM slots you max out at 4MB or 8MB plus any onboard. Although also, some onboard RAM is either/or, bank 0 assigned to onboard or first SIMM bank, so both cannot be used at the same time. Late 286 boards, likely to be the ones that take 20 or 25Mhz CPUs, may take 4MB SIMMs, but unless you have any already to test, it's expensive to be wrong. Expense is why the all DRAM boards are less desirable, prices can be $5-$10 per DRAM and you need 36, or only 32 if you can avoid using parity, and it's hard to find anywhere with more than a handful at once at less eyewatering prices.

who needs EMM386 when you have EMM286 Re: old 286, what to do with it? 😀
286 was EGA territory, nothing requiring VGA and more than 1MB would be playable with one exception being Windows.

You'd be wrong assuming so.

I had 286-16 with 1MB and VGA in 1991-1993. Played many games of that era on it.

That's what he's saying, 1MB and under is fine... anything needing a larger amount than 1MB is likely to be too slow on a 286. Some games use EMS for sample caching though so run sliiiightly nicer with a bit more available.

When using Windows 3.x you can definitely make use of more than 640k ram. And yes there are some windows only games that will play nicely on your 286. Ems out xms are both fine there. Also if you're playing with larger lotus 123 files or similar you're gonna love the extra ram.
As for the majority of games: you'll just waste the effort/money on more than 1MB. It's just"because reasons".

(@waterbeesje has 4 286 computers, all running 2 or 4 or 5MB ram)

You can use more than 1MB of on a 286 system.

For example, I have a Tandy TL (XT/286 hybrid) with a 2MB EMS card. I can use it either to emulate UMB (via an EMS-to-UMB utility) or for EMS directly. See this post for specific details.

I also have a 286 with a 6MB RAM card installed and it also functions with that 6MB as XMS.

That said, in most cases there isn't really any practical reason to use above 1MB of RAM on a 286 system.

I am not sure there's much of a case for going past 2MB for any games or edutainment that works in standard mode. On 1MB only, you can basically just "see" windows, run reversi, solitaire, minesweeper for mouse practice, maybe type a recipe on notepad. Not a whole lot, but another MB and standard mode applications run okay. I guess you could say "but I can't multitask!" as far as multitasking actually goes on 286/standard... and therefore should have 4MB... but using this setup for anything serious is a bit masochistic. Possibly you want "the moon" a whole 16MB because there's some early DTP, fax or scanner application that only works with a given printer that only has standard mode drivers, or some other contrived situation, but that's a bit of a razor thin niche. More generally, web browsing just becomes possible with 4MB or more, but given 0.9 beta release browsers and flakey winsocks, you're not really gonna be able to see much apart from reconstructed historical web 1.0 sites.

BitWrangler wrote on 2023-10-03, 15:51:

I am not sure there's much of a case for going past 2MB for any games or edutainment that works in standard mode. On 1MB only, you can basically just "see" windows, run reversi, solitaire, minesweeper for mouse practice, maybe type a recipe on notepad. Not a whole lot, but another MB and standard mode applications run okay. I guess you could say "but I can't multitask!" as far as multitasking actually goes on 286/standard... and therefore should have 4MB... but using this setup for anything serious is a bit masochistic. Possibly you want "the moon" a whole 16MB because there's some early DTP, fax or scanner application that only works with a given printer that only has standard mode drivers, or some other contrived situation, but that's a bit of a razor thin niche. More generally, web browsing just becomes possible with 4MB or more, but given 0.9 beta release browsers and flakey winsocks, you're not really gonna be able to see much apart from reconstructed historical web 1.0 sites.

"Web browsing" on a 286 !!! 😳 That's twilight zone!

Shponglefan wrote on 2023-10-03, 15:35:

You can use more than 1MB of on a 286 system. […]
Show full quote

You can use more than 1MB of on a 286 system.

For example, I have a Tandy TL (XT/286 hybrid) with a 2MB EMS card. I can use it either to emulate UMB (via an EMS-to-UMB utility) or for EMS directly. See this post for specific details.

I also have a 286 with a 6MB RAM card installed and it also functions with that 6MB as XMS.

That said, in most cases there isn't really any practical reason to use above 1MB of RAM on a 286 system.

Whoooooooooaoooouwh!!!!! A UMB emulator!!! Sounds terrific!!!!!! Would it also work using EMS memory produced by EMM286 out of XMS memory? 🤣!

Wow 6 MB RAM for a 286 is like a 286 on anabolic steroids!!!

Well, as I said in one of my answers below here... you can set up a nice RAMDRIVE 😉

waterbeesje wrote on 2023-10-03, 15:12:

When using Windows 3.x you can definitely make use of more than 640k ram. And yes there are some windows only games that will play nicely on your 286. Ems out xms are both fine there. Also if you're playing with larger lotus 123 files or similar you're gonna love the extra ram.
As for the majority of games: you'll just waste the effort/money on more than 1MB. It's just"because reasons".

(@waterbeesje has 4 286 computers, all running 2 or 4 or 5MB ram)

Mmmm.... well still, I should have some old SIMM modules stored somewhere... if I had a 286 (which I might be getting soon), it'd be worth trying (provided it supported SIMM modules...)

BitWrangler wrote on 2023-10-03, 15:07:

That's what he's saying, 1MB and under is fine... anything needing a larger amount than 1MB is likely to be too slow on a 286. Some games use EMS for sample caching though so run sliiiightly nicer with a bit more available.

Well, I do have a reason for 16 MB of RAM on a 286. Setting up (and enjoying) a 12 MB RAMDRIVE, putting sw or games on it and seeing them fly 😀

kixs wrote on 2023-10-03, 14:46:

You'd be wrong assuming so.

I had 286-16 with 1MB and VGA in 1991-1993. Played many games of that era on it.

Indeed!
The only few details of my childhood's 286 that I remember are:

• STORM Mistral (I guess Storm was the brand and Mistral the model)

• 286 @ 16 MHz

• 1 MB RAM (although, oddly, it somehow got up to 1088 KB of RAM on occasions, for example when scanning the whole RAM with McAfee Viruscan or using other tools, even Microsoft Diagnostics MSD.EXE. Don't ask me where it was getting those extra 24 KB of RAM from!!!

• 40 MB HDD (Although, there was a legend running in the house. The main computer guy at home was my older brother. He always claimed that there were 2 partitions the moment the computer was bought: C: at 40 MB and D: at I don't remember, something between 10 or 12 and 20 MB... But then, he claimed, one day, he run an IT didactic program copied by some friend on floppies, launched this TUTORIAL.EXE file, it was quite nice, teaching IT to people... but then he said he arrived at some part teaching about disks, showing you things on partitions, and from that on the D: partition disappeared. I or maybe we did not have enough education to be able to investigate the matter further, and it always remained the mystery of the disappeared partition and the subsequently decreased-size hard drive)

• OAK VGA Master (512 KB of memory if I am correct)

I guess, given the configuration, VGA, 16 MHz and everything my 286 must have been a kind of a late model... what do you guys think?

rasz_pl wrote on 2023-10-03, 14:11:

who needs EMM386 when you have EMM286 Re: old 286, what to do with it? 😀
286 was EGA territory, nothing requiring VGA and more than 1MB would be playable with one exception being Windows.

Indeed! But I didn't know about EMM286 until today! 😁

BitWrangler wrote on 2023-10-03, 13:07:

16MB is the limit for a 286, but in practice many boards are limited to less. The cheapest boards to add memory to are those with 30 pin SIMM sockets, SIMMs are taken in pairs, 30 pin are 8 bit wide so you need two for the 16bit bus width (Same for 386SX). Minimal RAM config is then 2x256 for 512KB... if there's base memory onboard, this may either give you 128kB above 1MB if the base is 640kB or 512kB above if the base is 1MB. SIPPs are the next most easy, as they are basically SIMMs with pins, you can either add pins to SIMMs, replace SIPP sockets with SIMM sockets, or what has worked for me before, just plug SIMM sockets into the SIPP headers, but in some situations this may be unreliable. Or you can buy SIPPs, but they are both hard to find and usually overpriced. Then the type you don't want, unless you come across it already stuffed with 4MB is the board that is socketed or soldered DIP RAM IC packages only. Half the board will be covered, typically 4 rows of 9 chips, where 1MB DRAMs are used, but some early ones might have only 256kb sockets, so filling the lot only gets you 1MB. (Extra bit is for parity, some let you leave it out)

Physical EMS can also be on an ISA card, but the right driver can be a pain to find, and when found may not be 100% compatible with everything that can use physical EMS. EMS accessed through ISA will be slower than onboard.

Edit: forgot to mention why boards might not take 16MB... often, early SIMM boards only have the address lines connected to make use of 1MB SIMMs maximum, so with 4 or 8 SIMM slots you max out at 4MB or 8MB plus any onboard. Although also, some onboard RAM is either/or, bank 0 assigned to onboard or first SIMM bank, so both cannot be used at the same time. Late 286 boards, likely to be the ones that take 20 or 25Mhz CPUs, may take 4MB SIMMs, but unless you have any already to test, it's expensive to be wrong. Expense is why the all DRAM boards are less desirable, prices can be $5-$10 per DRAM and you need 36, or only 32 if you can avoid using parity, and it's hard to find anywhere with more than a handful at once at less eyewatering prices.

Interesting analysis! Lots of things I didn't know, wow! Things were a lot complicated back then with RAM!
Thanks!!

HanSolo wrote on 2023-10-03, 12:31:

I wouldn't spend too much money on upgrading a 286 over 1 MB. That's what I had back then and for games that was totally fine. Things might look different if you are into productivity software like AutoCAD.
A convenient and inexpensive alternative to SD cards are Disk-On-Modules. Larger sizes are sold for obscene prices but for a 286 100MB is good.

Thanks. Oh yes, I tried to use DOMs with a 486, I had so many problems with them. The first one, purchased used, was acting. Installing DOS, launching DIR the files would show as ascii codes. Then I run many other attempts and tests (I don't remember anymore), in the end I concluded inevitably that it was malfunctioning. Then I bought a brand new one, but it was still acting. I don't remember exactly... the only detail I remember is that it was impossible to use 2 IDE devices on the same cable on a Compaq Prolinea 4/66 motherboard. The DOM would only work if alone on that cable, and still, I don't remember what exactly but I had problems, to the point that, in the end, I had to take it out and I replaced it with an IDE to SD card.

aries-mu wrote on 2023-10-03, 15:58:

"Web browsing" on a 286 !!! 😳 That's twilight zone!

Yes 286 support was dropped pretty quickly. I think by requiring 386 enhanced mode in Win 3.1 by 1994. But it worked in 1993. Needs highly specific setup though, very early NCSA Mosaic betas, though I think early "Cello" browsers worked too. And getting TCP/IP working smooth is a whole thing in itself on that age of machine.

edit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosaic_(w ... or_Windows cut off at 2.0 alpha 3 I think "application is now 32bit" which means the "full release" 1.0 should work, but some useful features appeared in 2.0 alpha 1 and 2. Probably the easy thing to do, is find some cover CDs from 94 or 95 that put websites on (Commonish thing with slow and limited access some magazines put a few interesting sites on CD for you to save you the connect fees and phone time) and browse those if you wanna get a feel for 286 browsing capabilities.

BitWrangler wrote on 2023-10-03, 15:07:

Some games use EMS for sample caching though so run sliiiightly nicer with a bit more available.

That would be Wind Commander, surprisingly at least one anecdotal case of it running slower with more ram https://virtuallyfun.com/2023/09/29/more-ps-2 … -advanced-scsi/

BitWrangler wrote on 2023-10-03, 16:10:

aries-mu wrote on 2023-10-03, 15:58:

"Web browsing" on a 286 !!! 😳 That's twilight zone!

Yes 286 support was dropped pretty quickly. I think by requiring 386 enhanced mode in Win 3.1 by 1994. But it worked in 1993. Needs highly specific setup though, very early NCSA Mosaic betas, though I think early "Cello" browsers worked too. And getting TCP/IP working smooth is a whole thing in itself on that age of machine.

woooow this is insane!

aries-mu wrote on 2023-10-03, 15:58:

rasz_pl wrote on 2023-10-03, 14:11:

who needs EMM386 when you have EMM286 Re: old 286, what to do with it? 😀
286 was EGA territory, nothing requiring VGA and more than 1MB would be playable with one exception being Windows.

Indeed! But I didn't know about EMM286 until today! 😁

EMM286 is only useful in very specific circumstances: It presents extended memory (managed as XMS) as if it were EMS. While "real" EMS provides hardware mapping, and switching pages is a quick operation (mostly driver overhead, the actual mapping is a single or a couple of I/O instructions), EMM286 had no mapping hardware at hand, so instead EMM286 has to copy 16KB from the page frame to XMS and then copy 16KB from another XMS address to conventional memory. This is dead slow in comparison to hardware EMS. Make sure you use MS-DOS with Microsoft HIMEM.SYS as base, because MS HIMEM pulls off the LOADALL trick on 286 processors, avoiding the mega-dead slow switch from protected mode to real mode after any extended memory copy operation. EMM286 is no fun at all with DR-DOS 5.0 and its HIDOS (the DR equivalent to HIMEM, which uses the official documented BIOS function to transfer data between conventional memory and extended memory).

The page frame of EMM286 is allocated from conventional memory, so after loading EMM286, around 67KB of conventional memory is gone, which is oftentimes a more serious issue than not having EMS at all. There are some PC/XT applications that can use EMS but not XMS for extended data storage, like the database module of Microsoft Works. Using EMM286, you can load bigger databases than without EMM286, which might have been "business critical" at that time, but the performance of accessing database memory will suffer significantly, making load, save and search quite slow operations.

A few of us have the JCS286 router motherboard, which uses a CHIPS SCAT chipset and uses an 8-bit wide BIOS so you really want shadow RAM.
The chipset doesn't appear to support memory relocation and shadowing at the same time, that is, many chipsets of this era can use C000 and F000 as shadow RAM but relocate the remaining 256KB up above the 1MB boundary, but the SCAT cannot (unless it's a BIOS limitation).
So, this means a 1MB system with shadowing enabled has no extended memory at all, which means no DOS=HIGH, no Windows 3.1, etc.
That would be a reason to upgrade it to at least 2MB, or in the case of the JCS286, it has an unpopulated space for a 72-pin SIMM. If you solder on a socket, you can put an 8MB SIMM (no other size) in there after removing the onboard DIPs.

BitWrangler wrote on 2023-10-03, 15:07:

That's what he's saying, 1MB and under is fine... anything needing a larger amount than 1MB is likely to be too slow on a 286. Some games use EMS for sample caching though so run sliiiightly nicer with a bit more available.

I actually upgraded to 2MB for Autocad R10.

And what were those games in 1991/92 that wouldn't run on a 286? Probably not many... at least that's my memory 🤣

Personally, I didn't treat my 286 any different to a 386 back in the 90s.
Both were AT class PCs, capable of running Windows and GeoWorks Ensemble.

The more text fonts loaded, the more memory was needed.
Painting programs supplied with handy scanners needed memory to run, too.
Development tools like Visual Basic or Delphi wanted to see some memory, also.

Later Sierra titles would support both EMS/XMS, I recall.
Wing Commander wanted to see some EMS, too, to provide full special effects.

My 286, dated 1988, had VGA integrated on the motherboard (ATI VGA Wonder), each SIMM slot got 1 MB module of low latency (70ns).

Back in the 90s, EGA was more of a sub-mode of VGA than an independent standard.
The original IBM EGA did rarely have full EGA video RAM expansion and couldn't do 640x350 16c, thus.
And even if it had, the user maybe didn't own a proper EGA monitor..

By comparison, all VGA cards and Super EGA cards (ATI EGA Wonder etc) did have 256 KB as standard.
Same goes for in between cards, like ATI V.I.P., which are rather EGA but could do emulate VGA mode 12h (VGA 640x480 16c).

My 286 was used to access online services, such as CompuServe (WinCIM) and Datex-J aka BTX (T-Online Software 1.2).
I had a beige Creatix fax/data modem with 14k4 bps, I think.
And that Balloon software, that shipped with it.

The web browsers for the optional internet access didn't work on the 286, of course. Netscape, Mosaic, Internet Explorer 3..
The internet technologies were using 32-Bit and required Win32s.

But anyway, Windows 3.1/95 were barely internet capable to begin with (MS wanted us users to use Microsoft Network instead).
Back in the 90s, the Macintosh provided best internet experience.
Just have a look at 90s movies like "Hackers" or "The Net". 😉

aries-mu wrote on 2023-10-03, 15:58:

HanSolo wrote on 2023-10-03, 12:31:

I wouldn't spend too much money on upgrading a 286 over 1 MB. That's what I had back then and for games that was totally fine. Things might look different if you are into productivity software like AutoCAD.
A convenient and inexpensive alternative to SD cards are Disk-On-Modules. Larger sizes are sold for obscene prices but for a 286 100MB is good.

Thanks. Oh yes, I tried to use DOMs with a 486, I had so many problems with them. The first one, purchased used, was acting. Installing DOS, launching DIR the files would show as ascii codes. Then I run many other attempts and tests (I don't remember anymore), in the end I concluded inevitably that it was malfunctioning. Then I bought a brand new one, but it was still acting. I don't remember exactly... the only detail I remember is that it was impossible to use 2 IDE devices on the same cable on a Compaq Prolinea 4/66 motherboard. The DOM would only work if alone on that cable, and still, I don't remember what exactly but I had problems, to the point that, in the end, I had to take it out and I replaced it with an IDE to SD card.

Sounds like your module was broken. I have a 100MB module with a usable installation of DOS, some games, demos and tools. That one I'm always using when testing new boards. I find it much more comfortable than any other solution and it costed me next to nothing.
I wouldn't use such a thing as a permanent drive for a 386 or better, but for a 286 I think the size is more than enough and I don't really need many drives. But yes, it's not as flexible as other solutions.

rasz_pl wrote on 2023-10-03, 14:11:

286 was EGA territory, nothing requiring VGA and more than 1MB would be playable with one exception being Windows.

I think I played many games on my 286 back then that supported VGA, so for me that was always the beginning of the VGA-era. But the 286 covered a pretty long time span