VOGONS


First post, by Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman

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I think it's quite conventional wisdom that when building a pure DOS gaming platform, the DOS to be used is DOS 6.22.

What I'm talking here is MS-DOS 7.10; the DOS that comes with Windows 98. See, it is possible to boot Win98 in "pure DOS mode", which is DOS 7.10. The question is why not using it for pure DOS games?

Well based on my own experience, the reason for sticking with DOS 6.22 instead of DOS 7.10 is because the latter is a memory hog. See, DOS 7.10 eats up a lot of conventional memory; a lot more than DOS 6.22, so booting with DOS 7.10 to play DOS games is a no-no.

However, I found something really weird on the internet. Yup, this guy claimed to squeeze out 629 Kilobytes of conventional memory with DOS 7.10 😳 😳

Now I haven't tried it out myself, but from his page, it is said that such feats is possible through the combination of HIMEM.SYS, UMBPCI v3.66, and HIRAM.EXE v1.9. The config.sys can be found here, while the autoexec.bat is here.

If this is true, then I think DOS 7.10 could provide a nice alternative to play pure DOS games, especially those that need a lot of conventional RAM (Dark Sun: Wake of the Ravager comes to mind...). I assume that the reason to not using DOS 7 is the amount of conventional RAM it consumes, so if the solution works, there's no more reasons to not using DOS 7 anymore. Furthermore, DOS 7 support FAT32, which would be ideal for old games that have a lot of small files (FAT32 is better for small files, isn't it?).

However, I could be wrong; there could be any other reasons to not using DOS 7 for DOS gaming purpose, such as compatibility issues, etc. Probably there are DOS games that just won't work on DOS 7 no matter what? Probably there are ISA sound cards that just don't work with DOS 7?

Thus, if anyone has better experience on MS-DOS 7.10 compatibility (or the lack thereof) with DOS games, please share here.

Reply 1 of 19, by 5u3

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On both of my "oldschool rigs" I use MS-DOS 7.10. No big compatibility problems encountered yet.
Some old programs cannot get along with FAT32, in these cases putting them onto a ramdisk or a FAT16 partition helps.

The only program that refused to work with MS-DOS 7.10 was Creative's DOS/Win3.11 installer for their SB16/AWE32 card. It assumes you are running it in a Win95 shell and quits with an error message. However, there also is a DOS driver package for Win9x users on their support server, which contains all all the stuff needed for the cards.

In rare cases programs rely on DOS utilities that are not installed by default, Microsoft has included them in a supplemental disk.

Like the guy on the webpage you mentioned, I use chipset UMB drivers instead of EMM386.EXE, which gives me 628K of free base memory. But the biggest advantage is that these drivers keep the CPU in real mode.
UMBPCI does not work on all systems due to chipset restrictions, read the docs before installing. Here is a link to the author's website. You can also find links to other chipset UMB drivers there (for 486 chipsets).

Reply 2 of 19, by Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman

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5u3 wrote:

The only program that refused to work with MS-DOS 7.10 was Creative's DOS/Win3.11 installer for their SB16/AWE32 card. It assumes you are running it in a Win95 shell and quits with an error message.

But in order to install SB16/AWE32 in DOS, we don't really need the Creative installer, do we? I mean, we can still do it manually by editing the CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT, isn't that the case?

5u3 wrote:

Like the guy on the webpage you mentioned, I use chipset UMB drivers instead of EMM386.EXE, which gives me 628K of free base memory. But the biggest advantage is that these drivers keep the CPU in real mode.

Wait, this is new to me. So if we use the DOS 7.10 version of EMM386.EXE, it will put the CPU in protected mode? Thus preventing real-mode DOS games to run? (which is basically most of the DOS games)

5u3 wrote:

UMBPCI does not work on all systems due to chipset restrictions, read the docs before installing. Here is a link to the author's website. You can also find links to other chipset UMB drivers there (for 486 chipsets).

Well, then I'm glad that my mobo (for the legacy system I'm planning to build) is Soyo SY-845PE ISA, because Intel 845 is included in the chipset supported by UMBPCI.

By the way, the Soyo 845PE ISA is the only Pentium 4 mobo with ISA slots. In fact, it has THREE ISA slots 😎 . I indeed plan to use Pentium 4 processor for my DOS-bootable system, because I also plan to dual boot with Windows 98 to play Win98-only games (won't run on WinXP) like Jane's USAF and Jane's F/A-18.

As for pure DOS, I know I'm gonna' need a good slowdown utility to run DOS games. I think the only problem of running DOS games with Pentium 4 is the speed. However, am I being wrong here? Speed issues aside, are there more problems (compatibility, etc) in running pure DOS in Pentium 4?

Reply 3 of 19, by Freddo

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On my DOS machine I use MS-DOS 7 without any problems. Granted, I play all DOS games released before 1995 in DOSBox, with the exception of System Shock.

Reply 4 of 19, by Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman

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Freddo wrote:

On my DOS machine I use MS-DOS 7 without any problems. Granted, I play all DOS games released before 1995 in DOSBox, with the exception of System Shock.

So you play System Shock with MS-DOS 7, without problem?

By the way, what CPU are you using? Is there any known compatibility problems of using newer processor (Pentium 4, etc) with pure DOS? Speed aside, I mean. But speed issues can be handled by slowdown utils, right?

Reply 5 of 19, by 5u3

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Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

But in order to install SB16/AWE32 in DOS, we don't really need the Creative installer, do we? I mean, we can still do it manually by editing the CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT, isn't that the case?

Exactly. This is also a chance to leave out some of the memory hogging TSRs that are installed by default when using the Creative installer, but are not really needed in games.

Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

Wait, this is new to me. So if we use the DOS 7.10 version of EMM386.EXE, it will put the CPU in protected mode? Thus preventing real-mode DOS games to run? (which is basically most of the DOS games)

EMM386 is basically the same in all DOS versions. Yes, it puts the CPU in protected mode in order to gain access to high memory. To maintain compatibility to real mode programs, it then runs the whole MS-DOS session in a single virtual 8086 mode task (which is the same method Windows uses for executing DOS programs). Everything would be fine, except that some games do not get along with this kind of arrangement, because they are programmed to access hardware directly and often include their own crude memory management. Problems mainly arise because of these two issues:

1) Since direct hardware manipulations are not possible in protected mode, EMM386 has to simulate hardware behaviour when DOS programs try to access it. This leads to timing problems in games (e.g. stuttering in video output, generally slow behavior).
2) Many games use advanced real mode tricks to gain access to more memory, often these methods collide with EMM386 and Vmode86, the game crashes the whole V86 session.

In manuals and README files you often find the hint to remove memory managers like EMM386, QEMM, etc... or using a "clean" boot diskette to get a game running or increase performance.
Now just for a few UMBs, all these issues are a high price to pay. People often resort to setting up multiple DOS configurations -- one with EMM386, one without -- to cope with that, but it's cumbersome to have to reboot every time a game needs the other configuration.
Hence the chipset UMB drivers. They provide UMBs without switching to protected mode. They have their own problems too (because of the peculiarities of some chipsets), but are generally more comfortable to use.

Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

By the way, the Soyo 845PE ISA is the only Pentium 4 mobo with ISA slots. In fact, it has THREE ISA slots 😎

Nice! 😁

Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

As for pure DOS, I know I'm gonna' need a good slowdown utility to run DOS games. I think the only problem of running DOS games with Pentium 4 is the speed. However, am I being wrong here? Speed issues aside, are there more problems (compatibility, etc) in running pure DOS in Pentium 4?

Yes, for some titles turning off the caches will not be enough, so a slowdown utility will certainly come in handy.
In very rare cases DOS games use 486 programming tricks that will crash a Pentium (Comanche was one of these, but there is a patch to fix it). Other than that, there shouldn't be any problems.

Reply 6 of 19, by Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman

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5u3 wrote:

Exactly. This is also a chance to leave out some of the memory hogging TSRs that are installed by default when using the Creative installer, but are not really needed in games.

So the only apps won't run on MS-DOS 7 is a shitty installer by Creative Labs. Good news indeed! 😁

5u3 wrote:

EMM386 is basically the same in all DOS versions. Yes, it puts the CPU in protected mode in order to gain access to high memory. To maintain compatibility to real mode programs, it then runs the whole MS-DOS session in a single virtual 8086 mode task (which is the same method Windows uses for executing DOS programs). Everything would be fine, except that some games do not get along with this kind of arrangement,

I see. So it's more game problems (like Ultima 7 and Serpent Isle) instead of DOS 7.10 problem.

5u3 wrote:

Nice! 😁

Thanks. It may be an overkill to play pure dos games with Pentium 4 CPU, but I plan to dual-boot with Windows 98 to play old Windows games. See, games like Jane's USAF was really a CPU hog the first time it came around. It scored about 25 fps with Voodoo5 AGP... while the freaking Quake 3 Arena could score about 80 fps or such, so I guess it's CPU problems instead of video card. I'd really like to try it with P4! 😁

5u3 wrote:

Yes, for some titles turning off the caches will not be enough,

Whoa, you mean turning off the CPU caches? Should I go to BIOS, or are there utilities (small .EXE, etc) for that purpose?

Reply 7 of 19, by Freddo

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Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

So you play System Shock with MS-DOS 7, without problem?

By the way, what CPU are you using? Is there any known compatibility problems of using newer processor (Pentium 4, etc) with pure DOS? Speed aside, I mean. But speed issues can be handled by slowdown utils, right?

Yeah, I play System Shock without problems.

I have a 233mhz Pentium CPU. Which works perfectly for me. There are games that doesn't like it at all, such as Wing Commander 2, but I play those in DOSBox flawlessy.

The only later DOS game I can think of that doesn't like fast CPUs is Daggerfall. But then again, I haven't really tried many DOS games on fast CPUs. Slowdown utils doesn't really work well with Daggerfall either.

Reply 8 of 19, by 5u3

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Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

Whoa, you mean turning off the CPU caches? Should I go to BIOS, or are there utilities (small .EXE, etc) for that purpose?

There are several tools to switch off the L1 cache, however, I'm not so sure about L2. Better use the BIOS settings instead (if that's still possible on a P4 motherboard) 😉

Reply 9 of 19, by Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman

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5u3 wrote:
Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

Whoa, you mean turning off the CPU caches? Should I go to BIOS, or are there utilities (small .EXE, etc) for that purpose?

There are several tools to switch off the L1 cache, however, I'm not so sure about L2. Better use the BIOS settings instead (if that's still possible on a P4 motherboard) 😉

Gotta' see the manual of my mobo then. I just wonder: are there games that require the L2 cache to be disabled too? And if that's the case, if the mobo doesn't support it, then it's a "compatibility problem", I guess.

Reply 10 of 19, by MiniMax

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There are no (to my knowledge) that REQUIRE any caches to be turned off.

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Reply 11 of 19, by Zup

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Disabling caches is like running with a 100lb backpack. You have all the power, but you won't get a great performance.

Some games (Jazz Jackrabbit) won't work with high performance processors (like a 350 Mhz Pentium II... at least it was a fast processor when I bought it). Disabling caches MAY allow you to play that games (by the way, you may get a slow down utility and play without disabling caches).

Disabling caches is not required, but can help. But I prefer moslo.

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Reply 12 of 19, by MiniMax

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If the CPU is too fast, and you intend to go the BIOS route, I would just slow down the CPU clock (FSB - Front Side Bus).

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Reply 13 of 19, by 5u3

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The advantage of hardware slowdown methods (disabling caches or lowering FSB) in contrast to software slowdown programs is that the hardware methods results in much smoother gameplay. Of course doing it the the hardware way is limited, a P3 with lowest possible FSB and without caches may still be too fast for some games. It's recommended to run such old games with DOSBox.

Reply 14 of 19, by keropi

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as for the 629 free conventional memory is not really a big deal. I own PC-DOS 6 and 7 (IBM versions) and from 6 and up, 630kb conventional is no big deal. their HIMEM.SYS can load in UMB without EMM386.
but it lacks fat32 so I don't use it anymore, I use a win98se machine that boots in dos.

Reply 15 of 19, by Jorpho

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I have read at least one account that states that DOS 7.x really is just DOS 6.22 with FAT32 support. This panicking about incompatibility seems unjustified.

It is quite well known that some foreign-language versions of Windows 9x has a bug in HIMEM.SYS that caused it to take up unusual amounts of RAM, but the bug is easily fixable.

Reply 16 of 19, by tikbalang

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in reply to the original post, i believe axel216 is possible, as i have 628kb free after booting msdos 7.10. here are my configs:

MSDOS.SYS
;SYS
[Paths]
WinDir=C:\WIN9X
WinBootDir=C:\WIN9X
HostWinBootDrv=C

[Options]
AutoScan=1
BootGUI=0
BootDelay=0
BootMulti=1
DisableLog=1
DoubleBuffer=0
Logo=0
WinVer=4.10.2222

;
;The following lines are required for compatibility with other programs.
;Do not remove them (MSDOS.SYS needs to be >1024 bytes).
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxa
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxb
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxc
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxd
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxe
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxf
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxg
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxh
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxi
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxj
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxk
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxl
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxm
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxn
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxo
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxp
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxq
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxr
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxs
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxt
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxu
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxv
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxw
;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
CONFIG.SYS
;; MS-DOS 7.10 (WINDOWS 98 SE)
DEVICE=C:\COMMAND\HIMEM.SYS /NUMHANDLES=128 /TESTMEM:OFF /Q
;; DEVICE=C:\COMMAND\EMM386.EXE AUTO HIGHSCAN RAM NOEMS NOTR I=B000-B7FF A=64 H=128 D=256
DEVICEHIGH=C:\DOS\UMBPCI.SYS
;; DEVICEHIGH=C:\COMMAND\RAMDRIVE.SYS 16384 512 1024 /E
DEVICEHIGH=C:\COMMAND\IFSHLP.SYS
DEVICEHIGH=C:\COMMAND\ANSI.SYS
DEVICEHIGH=C:\DOS\VIDE-CDD.SYS /D:CDROM00
;; DEVICEHIGH=C:\DOS\ESSDOS\ES1868.COM /A:0 /I:0
devicehigh=c:\dos\aspi.sys
;; devicehigh=c:\dos\aspicd.sys /D:CDROM00
INSTALLHIGH=c:\dos\killer.exe
;; INSTALLHIGH=C:\COMMAND\MSCDEX.EXE /D:CDROM00 /L:Q
INSTALLHIGH=c:\dos\SHSUCDX.COM /D:CDROM00 /L:Q /V /C
;; INSTALLHIGH=C:\DOS\SHSUCDX.EXE /D:CDROM00,Q
INSTALLHIGH=C:\COMMAND\SMARTDRV.EXE 2048 16
INSTALLHIGH=C:\DOS\XMSDSK.EXE 8192 U: /Y /T /C1
INSTALLHIGH=C:\DOS\CTMOUSE.EXE /R55
INSTALLHIGH=C:\DOS\DOSKEY.COM -I
;; INSTALLHIGH=C:\COMMAND\SUBST.EXE M: D:\CDWIN
SHELL=C:\COMMAND.COM C:\ /E:1024 /P /F /Z
DOS=HIGH,UMB,AUTO
FILESHIGH=128
BUFFERSHIGH=16
FCBSHIGH=1,0
STACKSHIGH=0,0
SWITCHES=/F
LASTDRIVE=Z
NUMLOCK=ON
set distro=MS Windows 98 SE
set author=tikbalang at yahoo dot com
set prompt=$P$G
set dircmd=/4
set TZ=GMT+8
set temp=u:\temp
set tmp=u:\temp
set cache=u:\cache
set APPDATA=c:\win9x\applic~1
;; set BLASTER=A220 I5 D0 H0 REC3 P330 T6
set bcom=c:\bcom
;; set comm=/b115200 /com2 /irq3 /n81 /h2
set path=c:\dos;c:\command;c:\cmd32;c:\bcom;c:\win9x;c:\win9x\command
AUTOEXEC.BAT
:: MS-DOS 7.10 (Windows 98 SE)
@ECHO OFF
BREAK ON
VERIFY ON
if "%OS%"=="Windows_NT" goto NT
if not exist %temp%\nul md %temp% > nul
if not exist %cache%\nul md %cache% > nul
if not exist %cache%\headers\nul md %cache%\headers > nul
echo.
echo %distro%
echo %author%
c:\
:: c:\dos\xmsdsk.exe /y /t /c1 16384
:: LH c:\dos\findramd.exe > nul
:: LH C:\DOS\MFINIT.EXE c:\dos
LH C:\DOS\ESSDOS\ESSCFG.EXE /A:220 /I:5 /D:1 /E:0 /B:330 /J:E
:: LH C:\DOS\ESSDOS\ESSVOL.EXE /V:8 /L:8 /W:8 /M:8 /C:8 /S:8 /A:8
LH c:\dos\mi.com > nul
u:\
c:\dos\greet.com
ver /r
:NT
echo.

Reply 17 of 19, by tikbalang

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results of MEM.EXE:

Memory Type        Total       Used       Free
---------------- -------- -------- --------
Conventional 640K 12K 628K
Upper 128K 93K 35K
Reserved 384K 384K 0K
Extended (XMS) 64,384K 10,180K 54,204K
---------------- -------- -------- --------
Total memory 65,536K 10,669K 54,867K

Total under 1 MB 768K 105K 663K

Largest executable program size 628K (643,056 bytes)
Largest free upper memory block 32K (33,200 bytes)
MS-DOS is resident in the high memory area.

results of MI.COM (from pctools v9.0):

Memory Info V9.0 (c)1993 Central Point Software, Inc.

Total bytes owned
Addr. Low area High area Program or device driver
----- -------- --------- --------------------------
020Fh 1,024 .. IFS=O.SYS
0250h 1,104 .. Device=HIMEM Attr=A000h Name=XMSXXXX0
0296h 160 .. Device=UMBPCI Attr=E000h Name=UMBPCIXX
02A1h 544 .. IFS=--------
0300h 643,056 .. <largest free area>
---- Begin High (Upper) Memory ----
CC14h .. 3,312 CTMOUSE
CCE4h .. 10,672 COMMAND
D402h .. 2,848 Device=IFSHLP Attr=D000h Name=IFS$HLP$
D4B5h .. 4,304 Device=ANSI Attr=C053h Name=CON
D5C3h .. 5,008 Device=VIDE-CDD Attr=C800h Name=CDROM00
D6FDh .. 18,896 Device=ASPI Attr=C800h Name=SCSIMGR$
DB9Bh .. 608 IFS=
DE1Fh .. 384 KILLER
DE38h .. 5,856 SHSUCDX
DFA7h .. 29,104 SMARTDRV 2048 16
E6C3h .. 672 XMSDSK
E6EEh .. 3,952 DOSKEY

655,360 bytes (640k) total DOS 7.10 conventional memory.
643,056 bytes (628k) largest executable program. 33,184 bytes if loaded high.

High memory is managed by DOS.

0 bytes Extended (AT/286/386) memory, reported by BIOS.
64,448k bytes XMS 3.0 (3.65) memory: 10,244k used + 54,204k free. DOS in HMA.

and YES, msdos v7.10 is very compatible with older versions. just use setver if you have to. i don't.

Reply 18 of 19, by AvalonH

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The only DOS version that is a memory hog is MS-Dos-8 which built himem.sys into io.sys.
MS-DOS 7.1 is the same as Dos 6.22 memory wise, it depends entirely on your config.sys and Autoexec.bat. with the advantage that it supports FAT32 disks and upto 4GB of system RAM with himem.sys.

I have yet to come across a game that would not run under realmode DOS-7.1(out of thousands of games tried over the last 10 years). Along with MS-DOS 6.22 it is still the 'standard' for compatibilty, more compatible than FreeDos and any other Dos version. Hopefully FreeDOS will catch up.

The other problem is new harware, I recently got a new system and Win98/se will not run on the newer Intel 965P boards and PCI express graphic cards but DOS7.1 works fine.

intel 965P board,
SBLIVE! PCI (dos drivers)
2.3ghz core 2 duo
2GB DDR2 ram
GF7900GS card (has a vesa 3 bios)

Relamode DOS7.1 sees the 2GB ram(with himem.sys loaded), sound works with the sblive dos drivers. System shock works fine, Star-trek final unity works with sound. This new hardware won't even boot into win95/98/me.

Reply 19 of 19, by arromdee3

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Looking at my old notes, I had a problem where DOS 7.1 with "DOS=NOAUTO" caused the size of DOS in memory to be much larger than expected. My guess at this late date, without experimenting, is that with DOS=NOAUTO it doesn't automatically load files or buffers high, and ends up having to load something in conventional memory that it otherwise wouldn't need to, and that it wouldn't need to load at all in 6.22. (Maybe the Windows startup screen?)