awkduck

Looks like you had fun. Reminds me of CalmiraXP for Win3x. I haven't gotten around to it, but eventually I'd like to mess around with BlackBox4Win and LiteStep.

If you mean the links for VBEMP, try the middle [?] link. The first ones are dead. Try these command line arguments first. For audio you can try "sod4gw.exe nopro", "sod4gw.exe nosb", "sod4gw.exe nopro nosb", and "sod4gw.exe noal". For your original Wolf/Sod video issue, you can try "wolf3d.exe comp", "wolf3d nocomp", and "wolf3d hiddencard". If any of these fix the video issue, you can try the audio arguments with it. Example:"wolf3d.exe nopro comp"

What fixed the Video?

You are welcome. I hope it/they might be useful to other users, as well. For the sake of clarity, on the "Other Forum" they are suggesting that you "Throttle" the CPU down. I'm sure you understood what they meant. But since people here may not have read your thread "over there", I though it would help to clear things up "here". Most people "here" would assume you mean the Windows 9x CPU patch. Which is completely different than slowing your CPU down "Temporarily" to troubleshoot/play a game. Some "Older" Dos games "do" need a speed tweak, of some kind. I do "not" think Wolf/Sod should require it. If you can run the games in "pure" Dos, even if without sound, then likely speed should not be an issue; in Windows either. But, likely some unique situation(s) exist. Windows adds another layer of complexity, to the situation. Perhaps certain video drivers suddenly support Windows Dos environments better, when the CPU is limited. I apologize for not being more familiar with the "Black Screen" issue you are having. It is highly likely some other user would know more than I. But I have some ideas you could try. It probably won't help, but it has long been suggested to reduce video acceleration, then test if video problems persists. Who am I to argue with many years of trouble-shooters? Just remember to re-enable full acceleration, if it doesn't work. It might not be a bad idea to keep different versions of your video card driver. I seem to remember countless times people needed to upgrade/downgrade their video drivers, to fix various applications, features, and games. It may seem silly, but you could try temporarily installing the VBEMP driver. I've had good luck with the 2010.06.01 version (\VBE9X\UNI\vbemp.inf). On some of my video cards, the newer versions have caused garbled fullsceen Dos windows. But they may work fine in your system. If the black screen issue goes away, then you have "mostly" narrowed the issue down to the video card driver. You could reinstall the correct video driver, and start directing your attention on tweaking that specific device.

Joaquim, you can find instructions here. But the version offered on that page may not be the newest. The link under the title word **ALPHA** may provide a newer version. The file VDMS.INI contains settings. Many games work without changing anything. But it may help to remember to use mpu-401 midi, at port 330. What Video Card do you have? What driver are you using? It seems some Video Cards cause a black screen. I've attached the open source fork(s) for GW. You can try them. But I haven't taken the time to get figure out how to get music working with them. I think they are hard coded to a specific port. I can't remember which one. But there are only so many it could be. You could also try wolfdosmpu. It is for both Wolf and Sod. Wolfmidi is also suggested, as it converts music to general midi. But more importantly, it might cure the black screen issue. 4gw.zip

It seems like you are talking about running Dos games, in Windows. Is that the case? If so, is your ac97 driver VxD or WDM? VxD drivers often support better Soundblaster emulation. The ones I have list Soundblaster emulation in Device Manager. This in addition to the ac97 driver itself. WDM drivers tend to provide, mostly, sound effects. If you take your time to figure out how to use it, VDMSound for Win9x "Beta3" "Alpha3" adds better support. In Windows, I've had a black screen issue running Wolf/Sod. I think it was the version of Wolf/Sod that I was using. Maybe try downloading different versions of the demo, then see it the issue goes away. Otherwise, you can try wolf4sdl and sod4sdl. Even though you may be using Windows, conventional memory can also be an issue. Wolf/Sod usually display a memory message. You can try wolf4gw and sod4gw. In Windows, I have not gotten music to work with them. But I haven't tried setting VDMSound with different Soundblaster settings.

I've used Grub4Dos to control drive designation. It may make for a steep learning curve. However, it is very useful. In your case, it might be like tackling a roach problem with a bazooka. But if you are into really geeking out, I highly recommend it. I once needed Grub4Dos to hide the master drive, after I mapped a drive image as hd0 (map --disable-chs-mode --disable-lba-mode (hd1) (hd1) ), or else the system would not boot; beyond Dos. I needed the master drive to boot Grub4Dos (actually Grub2 > grub4dos, long story), then forget that the master drive existed. The master drive was boot-able, but "statically" disabled in bios, causing havoc for Windows; even when booting from ram. This solved the issue, and provided very useful knowledge for other adventures.

I think its "Inspiron". :) You may need to hunt for drivers one by one. You can search the web for "Dell Inspiron B130" specs. That will give you some info on the hardware you have. There are also programs for Win9x that will provide you with the "Hardware Identification" of the different install devices. But before I go on, you should note that official Win98 drivers for a "Designed for XP/NT" laptop are often non-existent. Dell does off a MSDos driver for the Network device. That might come in handy, as a last resort. The Intel GMA 900 series video card will likely need a universal driver, like from the "Vbemp Project". It will not provide 3d acceleration. You may have to decide if you really need DirectX9 or not, since DX7 is the last to support "software rendering". There are Universal Drivers for USB2. Or you could install one of the unofficial Win98(se) service packs, that include USB drivers. If your audio is not of an AC97 chipset, you may have to try the Win3x(16bit) Driver for the HDAudio chipsets. Otherwise buy a cheap USB audio device, (almost always) supported by the Win98 Generic USB Driver. It might be easier finding out what hardware you have, by making a Bootable LiveUSB stick; with some Linux or KolibriOS. Once booted with Linux, you can usually open a console and type "lspci" without the quotes. With KolibriOS, there is a system panel, from which you can click on the icon for listing PCI hardware. I can't remember the exact name of the icon, but it is trivial to figure out. But then hunting for those drivers, on the net, is getting harder and harder. Especially for a Win9x OS or older. However, I do suspect that you could find a Win9x driver, for the network device. Wifi is a different story. PCMCIA slots can be hit and miss. If you can find out what type of PCMCIA slot you have (chipset), you may be able to use drivers for a different Laptop; having the same chipset. You could maybe search for something like "Operating System Revival", to help ease your hunt. If you get anywhere trying these things, it may be easier to get help for "Individual" driver problems. You will, at that point, be able to list the actual hardware device causing you issues. If you run into a problem with something I,ve suggested, someone may help you with that specific thing or suggest a different option.

I have not tried this program my self, but there is "RedNotebook". I do not know if this will run on Win9x. It does have versions going back to 2008. It mentions export functions, but I do not know if PDF is supported. None the less, is does seem to support images. It is also specifically aimed at Diaries and Journals. If you click on the "Files" tab, you will find versions even up to the current actively developed version. There is also the "Old Versions" folder. You may have to use a version from there. You will be wanting to download the files ending in "exe". Pay attention to the date and descending version number, if you need hunt for an older version. I know this may seem like common sense. But I am attempting to attend to any level of user experience. Update:RedNotebook 0.4.0 is likely the only one to run, on vanilla Win98. It supports export to Html, Latex, and Text. Seems somewhat basic and without image support.

I should add that, PDFCreator wants to install it's own toolbar and set Yahoo as your homepage; or something like that. The Yahoo option can be unchecked. And for me, it seems the toolbar did not install; since the application author no longer hosts if for download (causes the installer to stall for awhile, at the end of installation). So these "should" not be a problem.

Well, I don't know of any specific to diary or journals. Until someone mentions something better, I'll fill in with something that might work for you. It will require Windows 98 or newer. You can first get the AbiWord 2.4.6 installer from here. Abiword supports images and several formatting options. There are two other files for download, on that page. They are extra plugins. You can get them if you want. But they are not required. One of them (abiword-pluggins-impexp-2.4.6.exe) downloads required dependency files (dlls). The files are still available online. But if you want back-ups, in case that changes, you can get them here. In that case you would extract any dlls from the dependency archives to "C:\Program Files\AbiSuite2\AbiWord\bin". Again, you would only need to do that, if you manually downloaded the dependencies. Further more, you would only need the dependencies, if you installed the extra import/export plugins, without an internet connection. Then you would download the PDFCreator 1.2.3 installer from here. It is a print to PDF application. When you run the installed application, it hosts a virtual printer. The printer outputs PDF files when any application selects its virtual printer to print a document. For me, since I tested it with wine, I had to print to a .ps (postscript 2.0) file. Then add that file with the PDFCreator Virtual Printer Controller. Then it printed the file to PDF. If you are using Windows, it believe it should be automatic. Like I said, this is not a diary/journal application. But you could just save your entries to a folder with the date as the filename. Likewise, you could name the PDF files by date.

If your audio device is not supported, you might have another option. This is most useful on laptops, but it isn't always pretty. Many of you will already know about this. But until a couple of years ago, I didn't. Most USB audio devices (cheap ones) are supported by the Windows "Generic USB Audio Device" driver. But its not perfect. Here is a description on USB audio, from Microsoft. It is also a WDM driver. So performance may be chunky, depending on your system. Some systems I have tried, end up with choppy audio. For example, window's sounds will stutter, but synth is fine. Seems to be more a problem on Virtual Machines. Using a ASIO driver may help, if you application supports it. Good luck!

Here is the Roytam1 fork on github.

I'd be interested in the sources for the mod, and maybe which tools are used to compile it. I've also noticed that it cannot play an mkv that has ogg as the audio stream. Sherpya has built many Mplayer binaries for Windows. From the "old" folder on Sourceforge, one of the last builds (maybe the last) from 2010 seems to work pretty well with Win98. I would recommend reviewing the mplayer config file and associating mplayer.exe with the desired file types. It also works with the Hxdos extender on dos. But the forked version (hxdos), with support for ac97 and hda, is probably required; for most people. It does not work on Win95. I have also been able to use Mplayer, from the Freedos distro, inside a windows Dos windows. It needs to be a fullscreen Dos window. Depending on your video card support, for vesa access via a Dos windows, graphics may become crippled; when you leave the Dos window fullscreen mode. I have not tested it with Win3x, but it has worked with Win95. Edit: I suppose you could use newer versions of Sherpya's Mplayer, with Kernelex. And for anyone attempting to use Mplayer for Dos, keep in mind that it "does not" use Window's acceleration and "does" use Window's soundblaster emulation. Not ideal for slower computers. It's really more of a novelty.

I second Bruninho. I ran into something similar back when checking out the Lynx web browser. The homepage had a small graphic icon "Viewable by any browser". After looking around it turned up this Campaign. The link provided by Bruninho is more progressive and Retro targeted. But retro business aside, its an example of people creating the web they want. Rather than just complaining about JS. What would be really cool is a resurgence of Hotline or things like it. There was a small moment when people were integrating homepages into things like gnutella. Fear of exposing your real IP and the explosion of piracy's immediate gratification gave rise to bittorrent/filelockers and server based social networking. Now some really cool networks are gone or held up by dedicated grey beards, aided by a curious few. Modern devices all but put the final nails in the coffin. B.B.S. is dead, long live B.B.S. But back to Web 1.0, it would mostly support even dos webbrowsers. You could likely even use Amiga and a couple of 8bit systems, to view some content.

I've recently had luck with "VDMSound.win9x.bin.alpha3.zip", when using WDM drivers. Probably works with VxD drivers, too. It is just stitched together enough to work. There is some reg addition needed to kill the tip of the day. Once you understand how it is put together, you can fix it up to your needs. I've never tried the original VDMSound. It is for Win2k and up.

I'll be sure to add it to the collection. Is that a recent discovery, or did you pull that from memory? Good find, either way.

Hmmm. But it doesn't do this when you load a non-D3D game? If you are getting different video initiation on the host side, then you might have your answer there. Do you know what I mean? Edit:You could test your WineD3D build on other VM software (or real machine if available). This way you can determine if it works in it's own right (absence of pass-though). Others might even be willing to test, too. It it ran, it would be slow. But it could eliminate one variable in your process. This edited suggestion has nothing to do with the above questions.

So we could distill this down to, compiling newer versions of WinD3D for WinXP and Win98? And you are suggesting that he altered them in no way, for compatibility with his Qemu fork. But obviously they are altered. Unless you are suggesting that no one ever tried to target the newer versions to build for the older versions of windows.? Meaning you believe no one has actually bother compiling the newer versions (WinD3D), to build for (target) the unsupported versions of Windows. But he has tried, and had some success. Is that about it?

Thanks for looking into it :) They would probably work okay with Win98 and kernelex. But, with some trade offs, other might work better. Bochs works on Win95, but is hardly very useful. After Qemu 0.10.1 accelerated virtualization was moved to KVM. Qemu still works without KVM. But as version numbers increase the evolving compilers build less efficient binary(faster CPUs often more than make for the difference) and non KVM performance is less a focus. So in my tests, Qemu provides less performance beyond 0.9 and 0.10, unless you have a KVM capable CPU. Kqemu provides similar benefits to KVM, but doesn't require a KVM capable CPU. It doesn't compare in performance or features, but it is way better than nothing. Qemu with Kqemu is similar in performance to Virtual box, without KVM (Maybe Virtualbox 3-ish). You're not gonna wanna play heavy games through it. But it could still be very useful. Qemu dropped support for Kqemu after 0.10.1, to focus on KVM. So any version after that has no option for kqemu, without manual patching and rebuild. I am sure Kqemu >=0.10.1 would work with Kernelex and Win98. I am not too sure about Kqemu (maybe). But if you use Win95, you'll need to do some work. Maybe not that much. Kind of like Dosbox for 95/NT. It takes a bit of love. An older version of Qemu (without Kqemu) would perform worlds better than Bochs. As a Win95 user, I'm primed to want an alternative to running Win98/Kernelex or Bochs. Which seems to mean I need to roll up my sleeves. Without Kqemu, I can use Qemu >=0.9 under dos using with HXDos. I can even have sound, with a non-official version of HXdos. But depending of host card's VESA design, SDL can produce hairy results. Also, dos doesn't provide 2d VESA acceleration. On a machine with Windows 2D acceleration, SDL would perform more than well enough. As can be seen with the unofficial Dosbox build. The trade-off with older versions, is occasionally running into unimplemented hardware emulation. If accomplished, Qemu with Kqemu, would likely perform better than newer versions using Kernelex on Win98. And on 95, just about anything would be better than Bochs. Sorry Bochs, but its true.

You might not be interested in trying anymore. So I apologize if this reply bares no interest, as you specifically said you need someone to do it. I understand that, and have been there. But if no one comes along, you could list more details of the method(s) you tried, and the errors you ended up with. If nothing else, this provides someone (that knows what's going on) insight into the situation. I would certainly offer assistance, but I've yet to actually build anything Windows related. I'm nearing that point. I've been able to work out a lot of other compilation issues. I have never written a complex application, but can modify the heck out of one. So I'm not promising I could help much. But I'd for sure give it the time of day. I'm sure there are plenty around like that. Probably more competent than I. On a side note, I myself am looking into building Qemu 0.9-0.10 for Win95. Something before KVM came along. Maybe even get Kqemu for Win95. Although for completely different reasons. If someone else has already done it, feel free to gloat :)

I have this 2003 era laptop, with soldered ram (512Mb). But the initial 640k (and some above) are fine. The laptop includes an additional 512Mb memory stick. With Linux I can use a kernel boot parameter (mmap) and tell the OS to ignore the bad on board memory range. It runs very stable that way, other wise the motherboard heats up and the usual bad memory issue arise. What is the best way to deal with this in Win9x? A himem.sys configuration? Or maybe eat up the bad memory range with a ramdrive, that I never use?

These days, I am surprised someone doesn't sell printer kits. Some 3d printed parts, a couple of servos/motors, and a micro controller or small FPGA. We could be making printers for Dos. Might even be easier. Drivers seem harder to write, the more modern the OS. Well, that is unless you don't have the toolchain, documentation, etc. I suppose it would cost more, than a new printer. But that's pretty common, in the obs"ELITE" world of computing. Seriously, you'd think opensource printers would have been a thing by now. Some silly Slogan, "The FREEdom to print, Richard M. Stallman". I suppose he is more a free software guy. But the firmware could be opensource.

LoneCrusader, long time fan of the 95 work the two of you have done. I fortunately have one legacy port :)

The same driver supports 98 and 95. But either Win95 support is poor, or it doesn't support DirectX8(very well).