Ok curious why running 386Max instead of standard Himem.sys + EMM386 ?
What motherboard, what other cards installed ?
IMHO DOS4gw does not like how you have your memory setup but not bad enough to error, so it takes time for it to load and find the usable memory that is not being mapped elsewhere to finally launch the game.
Same when you stop a game and it unloads, it has to reset everything back. More info needed as to why and how you are using 386MAX....

Horun wrote on 2023-05-18, 02:22:

Ok curious why running 386Max instead of standard Himem.sys + EMM386 ?

With 386MAx I can have 629KB of conventional memory, with EMM386, I can manage 599KB (with the same TSRs)

Horun wrote on 2023-05-18, 02:22:

What motherboard, what other cards installed ?

Acer AG1X/2 - M1429G chipset
Onboard VLB Cirrus Logic GD-5430
MediaVision Pro Audio Spectrum 16
3COM 3C509-B

Horun wrote on 2023-05-18, 02:22:

IMHO DOS4gw does not like how you have your memory setup but not bad enough to error, so it takes time for it to load and find the usable memory that is not being mapped elsewhere to finally launch the game.
Same when you stop a game and it unloads, it has to reset everything back. More info needed as to why and how you are using 386MAX....

I did some test, you are right. Somehow on my system, DOS4GW/DOS32A don't really like 386max.

I did try with emm386 with same extra inclusion (I=B000-B7FF), and it work fine.

So now I have to decide, small delay when I load protected mode games but 629KB of conventional memory, or no delay for loading but only 599KB.
I can do more test with different configurations in 386max.pro, more search&reading required.

Switched to QEMM, problem solved
And I have 634KB on conventional memory now.

Note : I did also find way to improve it by switching the extender stub in games.

For example, WDOSX and PMODEW and some old version of DOS4GW did not have the "delay" issue under 386max.

Great ! Interesting and good info.

Hi there, I assume the issue is because these Protected Mode extenders (DOS4GW etc) do use an API (or ABI) to communicate with v86 memory managers.
Since both use Protected Mode/V86, they need to do that. Himem.sys, ny contrast, is a 286 friendly memory manager and doesn't use V86 as such.

And perhaps that's were problem is rooted.
EMM386 and QEMM were very popular, so DOS4GW and other DOS Extender had specific support built-in and/or were tested with both of them.

386Max wasn't bad, but perhaps the revisions of the Extenders used had no complete support for it yet.

Jo22 wrote on 2023-05-19, 05:05:

Hi there, I assume the issue is because these Protected Mode extenders (DOS4GW etc) do use an API (or ABI) to communicate with […]
Show full quote

Hi there, I assume the issue is because these Protected Mode extenders (DOS4GW etc) do use an API (or ABI) to communicate with v86 memory managers.
Since both use Protected Mode/V86, they need to do that. Himem.sys, ny contrast, is a 286 friendly memory manager and doesn't use V86 as such.

And perhaps that's were problem is rooted.
EMM386 and QEMM were very popular, so DOS4GW and other DOS Extender had specific support built-in and/or were tested with both of them.

386Max wasn't bad, but perhaps the revisions of the Extenders used had no complete support for it yet.

Yes, There is DPMI and/or VCPI.
The memory manager (emm386, 386max, qemm etc etc) include DPMI, VCPI or both.
VCPI was first but did not get traction because Microsoft released the DPMI specs and it's what caught on because it's what Windows use.

When you start a game that need a dos extender, the dos extender will first look for a DPMI host (the memory manager) and if found, will send request to it for the memory management stuff and protected mode switch.

If there is no DPMI/VCPI host on the system (let say you just boot with himem), then the DOS expander will launch it's very own DPMI host and use that one for the memory management.

At the end, the memory manager do most the work but if there is no memory manager, the extender do all the work. Because you can't have two competing memory manager doing there things in the same time.