Great Collection. I often use:

- FreeDOS on separate partition if I have enough space in favor to Win9x DOS 7.1
- XOSL for multi boot (not a real DOS tool, but can be installed on DOS primary partition)
- NC/VC for copying files or organizing my file system
- VGACOPY to test floppies and diskettes
- GHOST2003 (last DOS Version) for backup to CDRW or DVDRW
- Phil's Benchmark Pack to test and bench arrived hardware
- UNISOUND on nearly all my ISA soundcards
- VSBHDA on nearly all my PCI soundcards

From DOS itself:
* FDISK, FORMAT, SYS, HIMEM, EMM386, SMARTDRV, MSCDEX, CHKDSK, SCANDISK, EDIT

3rd party:
* Norton Commander for file management
* ImageDisk for archival and restoration
* VGA Copy sometimes
* DOSIDLE for builds that benefit from it to keep CPU cool
* UDVD2.sys as DVD driver, VIDE-CDD.SYS for CD ROMs.
* DOSKEY for less typing of repeated commands
* GMOUSE.COM or MOUSE.COM (I hate ctmouse)
* TrakBlaster 2.0 for Sound Blaster compatibility tests (very touchy so a good test)
* SpeedSys for overall system info
* Norton System Info
* CheckIt for older machines (386 and prior)
* Top Bench

The DOS program I use most is still Xtree Gold version 3.0

I sure wish there was an updated version which, along with doslfn supported long file names. There is of course ZtreeWin which is a clone of XTG for Windows.

Other indispensible DOS programs:

SBEMU and VSBHDA which gives sound (sound blaster emulation) for new Intel HD audio onboard chipsets.
DUGL Player
Mplayer port for DOS
Qview Pro v. 2.61
MPTPlayer, which along with SBEMU, will play all your old .MODule and XM music.

The emulators, such as my port of Colem 5.6 for DOS, Nesticle, SNES, A2600 etc. Work great again with SBEMU / VSBHDA

As already mentioned, 7zip for DOS, version 16.02 which also supports decompressing RAR v. 5 archives in DOS as well as the usual ZIP, TAR, etc.

Bret's DOS utilities which support moniting floppy images, DVD / CD images, and the more recent forks which allow playing games with CD audio directly in DOS with these programs, and again with SBEMU / VSBHDA on modern systems.

MUPDF is a wonderful way to view PDFs directly in DOS on bare metal. A few DOS browsers exist such as Dillo and Arachne, but they're useless with the modern crappy, bloated script-infested web. They were useful back in the days when one could still browse the web with Javascipt turned off.

Personally i like:

VSBHDA
DOS NAVIGATOR 2
CuteMouse
and... i think that is about it

Hi,

DOS Included utilities(Some of them might be called external commands to COMMAND.COM):

Essentials for daily running:

• COMMAND - Yes it is the command shell and automatically started, but it is the primary way to interact with the system I think it deserves a spot 😀.
• EMM386
• HIMEM
• SMARTDRV
• MSCDEX

System maintenance:

• CHKDSK or SCANDISK (Not really liking it but RECOVER can be added to this sublist for older DOS versions)
• ATTRIB
• MEM
• MEMMAKER - When manually you just can't get enough conventional memory it sometimes find something useful

New System Bootstrapping or modifying existing one:

• SYS
• FDISK
• FORMAT
• UNFORMAT - When running FORMAT /Q on the wrong floppy 😁

Very useful for being included but having better 3rd party alternatives:

• UNDELETE
• EDIT
• QBASIC - Yes it is a programming language, but having it bundled it is basically also the scripting language of DOS when BAT files are insufficient.
• XCOPY
• FIND
• DEBUG

Utilitites not included with DOS:

• Norton/Volkov Commander - Best file managers for DOS
• UNIVBE - Making VESA games work on certain adapters
• ADFPro - For debugging programs, on non-real HW partly made obsolete by Dosbox in-built debugger
• F-Prot - For protection against legacy viruses on legacy systems
• QEMM - On some systems works better than EMM386
• DOS4G(W) - Like COMMAND.COM it is mostly invisible for the end user, but quite essential for a lot of games

I must have missed something, but I think this list is already long enough, these are the ones I use regularly 😀

adding to the above:

LIST.COM - I use it to do most of my file viewing/managing

HD-COPY - it's a floppy copier/formatter excellent to make copies or format disks to see if they are good and comes with a text gui (there is a v2.3R here, just the EXE so maybe a bugfix update)

DRMOUSE.EXE - from DR-DOS 6.x , the best mouse.com replacement I have found so far with ~7kb ram usage and none of the ctmouse weirdness

The Last Byte Memory Manager - UMB driver for a bunch of chipsets without the need to have EMM386 loaded

UMBPCI - same as above but for PCI chipsets , freeware

ICACHE and ICD/ICE - to disable/enable L1 cache

Resizable RAMDisk by Franck Uberto - ramdisk that can be loaded, unloaded, resized... useful to also consume memory above 16MB for the software that has issues with ram above 16mb

PSEDIT - DOS hex editor

FakeCD and FakeDR - cd-rom emulators, can work with simpler games to have them run completely of hdd

KGB - creates a log in the background of what applications do when they run

FDFORMAT, Norton Speed Disk, 4DOS, ...

edit: Fastlynx,

Oh course how could I forget the RAMDISKs. Also, HimemSX for accessing XMS memory above 4gb on modern systems. Japheth, the author of HimemSX, also produced a small ramdisk utility which will create a FAT32 ramdisk and use as much memory as you have in the system (32 GB and above is possible). And RayeR's MTRRLFBE which speeds up video by orders of magnitude in high resolutions.

Thanks for the recommendation of DRMOUSE above. Had never heard of it. CTMOUSE is very finicky.

Hi, @keropi.
I have a couple of questions about the DOS programs you mentioned.

keropi wrote on 2026-06-19, 15:50:

HD-COPY - it's a floppy copier/formatter excellent to make copies or format disks to see if they are good and comes with a text gui (there is a v2.3R here, just the EXE so maybe a bugfix update)

KGB - creates a log in the background of what applications do when they run

Are there any alternatives for the bttr-software ftp links?

keropi wrote on 2026-06-19, 15:50:

DRMOUSE.EXE - from DR-DOS 6.x , the best mouse.com replacement I have found so far with ~7kb ram usage and none of the ctmouse weirdness

Never heard of this. Now tried to find it inside some DR and Novell DOS 6.0 distributions with no success. Are you sure, that it came with DR-DOS 6.x versions?

keropi wrote on 2026-06-19, 15:50:

PSEDIT - DOS hex editor

I found something called "PSEdit" for PowerShell scripts editing, but nothing DOS related.

keropi wrote on 2026-06-19, 15:50:

FakeCD and FakeDR - cd-rom emulators, can work with simpler games to have them run completely of hdd

Unfortunately the download links for "FakeCD" and "FakeDR" do not work for me. Are there alternative links?

And seems like it is time to mention some more DOS programs, tools and utilities, that I like to use:

NFORMAT! - this tool helped me to save a tons of "damaged" floppy diskettes with magnetically "bad sectors".

DOSZip Commander v2.69 for DOS - one of the best modern "orthodox" file commander for DOS supporting zip-archives. Unfortunately this latest DOS version 2.69 is a little buggy (has some problems with config files saving) and outdated.

SANE - a very handy "many in one" DOS tool made by our fellow forum member Ignacio F. Gully (@igully).

K6INIT - a very good AMD K6, K6-2, K6-III and K6-2+/III+ tool from our fellow forum member Eric Voirin (@Oerg866).

Mod Master XT - very light DOS player for tracker music created by our fellow forum member Freddy Vetele (@FreddyV).

ImageDisk (IMD) - the best DOS floppy imaging package crated by our fellow forum member Dave Dunfield (@DaveDDS).

EXMS86 - provides XMS 2.0 memory services 16-bit DOS computers equipped with EMS cards. Made by the crator of SvarDOS and our fellow forum member Mateusz Viste (@mateusz.viste).

Debug/X - a better alternative to m$-DOS DEBUG by our fellow member @Baron-von-Riedesel/Japheth, which is also known for his Jemm free alternative to EMM386.

HIEW v6.50 - a hex-editor/disassembler, DOS version 6.50 is released as freeware.

There are tons of very good DOS tools and utilities, but this is enough for today.

EDIT: Added correct link for ImageDisk version 1.20 package.

I honestly find Microsoft Defrag extremely satisfying in DOS. 😁

aVd wrote on 2026-06-20, 05:31:

Hi, @keropi.
I have a couple of questions about the DOS programs you mentioned.

Are there any alternatives for the bttr-software ftp links?

oh I did not realize the links were dead... try these instead:
https://www.sac.sk/download/utildisk/hdcp20ae.zip
https://ftp.zx.net.nz/pub/archive/simtel.net/ … sutl/kgb104.zip

aVd wrote on 2026-06-20, 05:31:

Never heard of this. Now tried to find it inside some DR and Novell DOS 6.0 distributions with no success. Are you sure, that it came with DR-DOS 6.x versions?

you are correct, DRDOS.COM comes with DR-DOS 7.03 and 8x versions

aVd wrote on 2026-06-20, 05:31:

I found something called "PSEdit" for PowerShell scripts editing, but nothing DOS related.

the filename for the latest version (that I know of) is PSEDIT44.ZIP , try this download: https://www.warensemble.com/api/files.ssjs?ca … le=psedit44.zip
it was a also a recent discovery for me as well, probably found about it one or two years ago... and the program is an old 1990~94 one as far as I can see and it was previously called BEDIT

aVd wrote on 2026-06-20, 05:31:

Unfortunately the download links for "FakeCD" and "FakeDR" do not work for me. Are there alternative links?

luckily the site is fully archived on the wayback machine with working downloads: https://web.archive.org/web/20190316051421/ht … 6/fakecddr.html

Thank you very much, @keropi! These new links work fine.

aVd wrote on 2026-06-20, 05:31:

ImageDisk (IMD) - the best DOS imaging package crated by our fellow forum member Dave Dunfield (@DaveDDS). I don't give a link, since I found two slightly different latest versions 1.20 for download.

ImageDisk is unlikely to change again any time soon. It was at 1.18 for years, the only reasons 1.19 then 1.20 came out were:

I lost my domain during an extended hospital stay in 2019 (an have declined to rent it from the people who registeder it) - so I changed the contact information.

Corrected a very subtle bug that no one had experiemced (but I wanted it right)

I may have accidently/briefly posted one under the wrong rev. number (had memory problems for a while - brain injury) but the one on my site now is correct latest.

--

Over the years I've written almost all the many DOS tools that I use most of which are available on my site (too many to list)

DaveDDS wrote on 2026-06-20, 12:01:

ImageDisk is unlikely to change again any time soon. It was at 1.18 for years, the only reasons 1.19 then 1.20 came out were: […]
Show full quote

ImageDisk is unlikely to change again any time soon. It was at 1.18 for years, the only reasons 1.19 then 1.20 came out were:

I lost my domain during an extended hospital stay in 2019 (an have declined to rent it from the people who registeder it) - so I changed the contact information.

Corrected a very subtle bug that no one had experiemced (but I wanted it right)

I may have accidently/briefly posted one under the wrong rev. number (had memory problems for a while - brain injury) but the one on my site now is correct latest.

Hi, Dave,
The two different ImageDisk archives, that contain IMD.COM executable self-identifying as version 1.20 are linked here (link removed, since it is not for the actual latest ImageDisk version 1.20) and here. Seems like the second IMD.COM is the newer one from 9 July 2024, since the first one is from 23 June 2024.

EDIT: Removed link to wrong release of ImageDIsk v.1.20.

Thanks, I hadn't noticed that. The second is correct, "Disks/Software Images" is the main IMD distribution page (and the one I insure is updated correctly).

I must have made a minor correction to a new release, and forgotten to re-upload to both. (I really should fix the site to link to the same file).

I will correct this as soon as I can - which may be a couple weeks - on a ship right now with "spotty" internet, and accessing this site on my phone ... no access to my usual systems/backups with the master copy of the site.

Thanks for confirming my suggestion, Dave! So, the archive from the second link is really the latest ImageDisk version (I'm using it, but also have downloaded the other one too - "just in case"). I will edit my previous posts, so they point to the correct archive with IMD.COM version 1.20.

And believe me, I always know what I'm doing based on the information, that I have 😉

Can you PM me the first link you had posted?

I *thought* it was on my "DOS Widgits", but looking there I see that it already doesn't link directly ... but tells you to see ImageDisk on my "Software/Images" page... which points to the right file.

So I really don't see where the bad link is ... perhaps things have been cached and the page in cach points to an old but undeleter file... If I can find out exactly where the mistake is, I can fix it. - just working with what I can see online at the moment.

Thumbs up for HIEW!!!

ZDir