VOGONS


First post, by Guest

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On another post, someone said he boots Win 3.1 via dos bia DOSBox and you told him to use DOSBox directly, which is understandable.
But say one insists on using Dos through DOSBox, what "external" abilites does he have left in DOS?

1. Memory?
I booted into a DOS image that had this in config.sys
device=himem.sys
device=emm386.exe

Yea, I've made sure xms/ems=false in dosbox.conf
Anyway, the result is that himem (xms) works and emm386 (ems) fails.
Why is that?

2. Mouse?
If I had an old PS2 mouse, I guess I could get a driver for it like in the DOS days.
But what do I do if I have a USB mouse?

3. Sound?
New creative sound cards no longer have DOS drivers. So does it mean sound is not an option?

Reply 1 of 8, by mirekluza

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XMS - I had no problem with using HIMEM.SYS. I used NETHACK, so I think that XMS was ok (or does DPMI uses memory directly?). Anyway: this was originally developed as one possibility to run Windows 3.x, so XMS had to be ok (it is impossible to start Windows without XMS driver).
Booting with just HIMEM.SYS in CONFIG.SYS was ok without any error messages.

EMS - EMM386.EXE complained about something, so there was probably no EMS. I did not expriment.

SoundBlaster: it is normally usable, just BLASTER variable is not defined.

MOUSE: you must load mouse driver. I used the one which I had to my Logitech mouse and it worked ok (although I tested it only in one program - Volkov Commander).

CD ROM: probably not possible

Directories mounted by MOUNT command: not possible

Mirek

Reply 2 of 8, by Guest

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Do you claim the sound blaster would just work natively without drivers?!

And did you talk about a USB mouse?

Reply 3 of 8, by mirekluza

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YES. Remember: you are still in DOSBOX - so you have SoundBlaster and PS/2 mouse. It has nothing to do with you actuall hardware !
Mouse and sound work perfectly. I tried a few games.

EMS works as well, you just must set another frame for EMS. I added FRAME=e000 to EMM386.EXE and it worked (EMM386.exe complained that there is ROM or RAM there, but I ignored it). Maybe a better frame address could be found.
I used succesfully Ultima Underworld 1 and 2 which definitely require working EMS.
Another usefull thing: loading things to high memory works as in normal DOS (when you need to free memory)

Mirek

Reply 5 of 8, by Snover

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I'm curious as to why you'd be trying to use EMM386/HIMEM when capability for EMS/XMS is built-in with no loss on the conventional mem side.

Yes, it’s my fault.

Reply 6 of 8, by mirekluza

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@guest:
device=c:\dos\emm386.exe FRAME=e000

It complains, but it works... I did not try to look for better value.

@snover:
We are talking here about booting another DOS version in DOSBOX:
1. Is the standard XMS/EMS support in DOSBOX usable when booting another DOS version?
I think that I tried one game without using HIMEM.SYS etc. and it complained ... But I will try it again.
2. I wonder: would loading of drivers to upper memory worked without EMM386.EXE?

Mirek

Reply 7 of 8, by Guest

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That line worked, thanks!

Anyway, you don't need to run a game to test your memory.
That's what mem.exe is for...

So without config.sys, you can see that:
1) XMS is 0.
2) EMS is just not listed anywhere.

After having the following config.sys:

device=himem.sys
device=emm386.exe FRAME=e000

Then:
1) XMS is no longer 0, but a positive number in Megas.
2) EMS is mentioned (and with a positive number in Megas).

Reply 8 of 8, by robertmo

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mirekluza wrote:

2. I wonder: would loading of drivers to upper memory worked without EMM386.EXE?

no, you must have at least
device=c:\dos\emm386.exe noems

by the way it is always usefull to use "verbose" to be able to see additional information
device=c:\dos\emm386.exe noems verbose