OS Compatibility

[Torchizard]

EDIT: Sorry for the double post, my internet screwed up

Edited September 11, 2013 by Torchizard

[TmEE]

400W is enough for practically anything. I ran my old machine with 7x HDDs, 3.2GHz Prescott and a Ati X850XT PE with a 300W PSU for 2 years.

[M()zart]

400W is enough for practically anything. I ran my old machine with 7x HDDs, 3.2GHz Prescott and a Ati X850XT PE with a 300W PSU for 2 years.

For 9x computer it may be enough. However I recently had to replace my 450W PSU when I bought a new HDD. Didn't expect that it would be so demanding. Even after I disconnected two of my original HDDs, the new one was unstable and it stopped working after intensive read/write operations. I even tried more exotic solution and connected it to a rather old separate 200W PSU, but it didn't work stable enough either. After all I had to buy a new 750W PSU. My graphics card is not too powerful, it is from the medium-class segment, however I had issues with powering my HDDs and DVD with my old PSU.

[jaclaz]

For 9x computer it may be enough. However I recently had to replace my 450W PSU when I bought a new HDD. Didn't expect that it would be so demanding. Even after I disconnected two of my original HDDs, the new one was unstable and it stopped working after intensive read/write operations. I even tried more exotic solution and connected it to a rather old separate 200W PSU, but it didn't work stable enough either. After all I had to buy a new 750W PSU. My graphics card is not too powerful, it is from the medium-class segment, however I had issues with powering my HDDs and DVD with my old PSU.

If I may, what you might be suffering (actually what your PSU might suffering - or both ) is aging.

Seriously all PC PSU's are "switching" power supplies, they are not like good ol'power supplies with huge converters and a bunch of diodes/rectifiers and capacitors to convert to DC and smooth the output, they are - to all effects - a complex electronic circuit that is - generally speaking - subject to some "heavy duty cycles".

It is not at all uncommon that a power supply with a few years of service appears to be working but when some additional load is needed "gets on it's knees".

Though it is usually trivial to find which component is defective, it is normally not a good idea to repair them because new ones are relatively cheap and if you change a component on an old one you have no guarantee that another component is not already aged and going to fail soon.

Also, besides the overall power, different PSU's have different power on each "rail" (a "server" PSU will have as an example, more power on the 12 V rail to power more disks) , so it is possible that - just as an example - your 400 W PSU was OK for everything but - say - the 12 V rail (and that one only) had not enough power for the CD/DVD and hard disk motors.

jaclaz

[98SE]

On Wednesday, September 04, 2013 at 3:14 AM, jaclaz said:

Sure but the "base" DOS 7 will be "shared" or "in common" (actually "same") with the Win9x/Me install.

As a matter of fact, if this is the case you can setup to boot normally to DOS 7 and then run "Win", unless my memory is fading, there are only issues - easily solvable - with CD support.

@dencorso

Maybe you are going a bit further than usual "loving" a tool.

A tool is something useful to do something, if you can manage to get that something, the tool you used is "good enough" or "convenient" or "valid".

As an example our friend LoneCrusader believes that "MSCDEX" is a "better" tool than "SHSUCDX" and related programs, and "loves" it, the fact that he is wrong on this does not mean anything, the tool he chose does effectively what he wishes to do with it and that is more than enough:

http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/157065-cddvd-usb-in-msdos-mode/

It is incorrect to say that grub4dos is not well documented, and also vaguely offending for the work that diddy and - to a much lesser extent - yours truly put into assembling The grub4dos guide:

http://diddy.boot-land.net/grub4dos/Grub4dos.htm

which while being not updated-to-the-latest-development of grub4dos, is IMNSHO very well written/assembled, very clear, and covers WHOLLY the "basic" use of the tool and to a certain extent also "advanced" uses.

Multibooting is anyway part of the "advanced" computing, IMHO besides learning the syntax/commands to setup/use any given tool, one needs to have some more than basic knowledge of how each OS boots, which behaviour (either by "design" or as "bug") it sports, which limitations it may have, etc., etc., in other words in some cases the issue is not with the lack of proper documentation but with the lack of specific knowledge on the procedures (independent from the tool(s) used) to reach the desired goal.

jaclaz

Jaclaz no wonder so much push for Grub4DOS.

Interesting program "SHSUCDX".  The one for the CD image may prove of use.

How do you create the CD images for DOS?  Also can you create the CD image in Windows to use in DOS?

This program would definitely come in handy with Ramdisk testing.

[98SE]

On Tuesday, September 03, 2013 at 0:12 AM, Torchizard said:

There is one more issue that comes to mind. I have read on the MS website that I should install the OSes in the order of DOS, 98, XP but every time that I went through the installation process either on a VM or real PC, I never saw a way to choose the partition like the XP install lets you. So it could possibly decide to install it over the DOS partition that would have been installed earlier. So is there anything such as maybe command line arguments that could let me choose the partition that it would install to?

You are correct.  You can install it correctly in this manner and the recommended way of older OS to newer OS.  You must have missed something during your tests.

You could boot up in DOS 6.22 on floppy.

Partition the Hard Drive C: with FDISK

2GB FAT16

then Format C:/S

reboot off the C: DOS 6.22

You can precopy the entire 98SE CD files onto the C: into a folder called 98SE

C:

CD\98SE

SETUP/IS

Choose partition or drive letter C: to install can be C: or if you make an 8GB FAT32 partition you can install 98SE there.

Once 98SE is fully installed pop in your XP CD into the optical drive

The XP installation setup screen should pop up.

You just have to choose to setup a New Copy instead of Upgrade.  That will allow you to later choose which partition to install it to.

If in this case you can choose D: so 98SE and XP will be on the same partition but since both like to use WINDOWS as their directory you can choose to rename the directory to XP instead to prevent conflict to where you will install.  Or if you prefer to make a 3rd Partition E: FAT32 8GB or 16GB recommended then you will have the choice of DOS 6.22, 98SE, XP at the boot menu each on different partitions of the same hard drive.

And yes it is better to have only one drive installed.  When you add another hard drive it shifts the drive letters.  This will cause an issue for 98 being on D: making C: 98 installation a better option if you install and remove hard drives later.

[98SE]

On Wednesday, September 04, 2013 at 10:12 PM, dencorso said:

It is possible to install each OS in a partition one of the HDDs with all others disconnected, and it sometimes is the safest way to do it. It is possible to set all up then so that each OS never sees the others, in normal conditions, as described by LoneCrusader above. It also is possible to set all up so tha all see all, like I do (but then it becomes much easier and safer to avoid NTFS entirely, installing all the OSes in FAT partitions). Were I you, I'd assemble the machine, install XP and test the hardware thoroughly. Once I got satisfied all is working OK, then I'd plan how to set the multiboot system and set it up, not forgetting to backup each OS profusely throughout the process.

This is the best way to avoid less confusion especially when partitioning and removing partitions you don't want to accidentally wipe out the wrong drive.  Also I do not hide my partitions either.  Also if you make any NTFS partitions they are hidden in 98SE DOS so sometimes this is a bonus.  NTFS partitions are better made after the 128GB limit after the rest of the FAT16/32 partitions are created so all FAT partitions will be seen in 98SE DOS correctly.  If you try putting NTFS partitions in between FAT16/32 in the first 128GB you could cause some problems of not seeing the rest of the FAT partitions after the NTFS partition.

[98SE]

Quote

  On Sunday, September 01, 2013 at 6:20 AM, jaclaz said:

A full install of DOS 6.x or earlier, including any DOS program of some utility ever written and a considerable amount of data created with those programs would top at - say - 300 Mb.

If you are really clever and manage to actually have *all* programs EVER written for DOS , this will top at around 600/700 Mb

.

On Tuesday, September 10, 2013 at 7:58 AM, M()zart said:

I don't agree. A large number of games that work in DOS (though some of them may work in windows too) was released after 1994. Some of them need tens or even hundreds of megabytes. Some of these games even didn't have the Windows versions.

Sorry for replying to a rather old post

Yes 300 and maybe 600 MB seems rather low even for DOS utilities ever made and are you including every version of that utility?  What's your list for 300MB of DOS utilities you have?  As for games I got so many floppies and 120MB tapes.  One time I did try and back them up and most are zipped to save space.  I think I was able to fit all of them in 3 CDs.  Later I missed some tapes to archive so maybe 4 CDs fit most of my floppy disk based DOS games.  I can't imagine the size for CD based DOS titles.

[jaclaz]

11 hours ago, 98SE said:

Interesting program "SHSUCDX".  The one for the CD image may prove of use.

How do you create the CD images for DOS?  Also can you create the CD image in Windows to use in DOS?

This program would definitely come in handy with Ramdisk testing.

Quite obviously SHDUCDX belongs to the same family as the ramdisk I already gave you a link to, SHSUFDRV:
 

http://adoxa.altervista.org/

http://adoxa.altervista.org/shsufdrv/index.html

http://adoxa.altervista.org/shsucdx/index.html

What do you mean by "how do you create the CD image"?

A CD image is a .iso i.e. a dd-like image of a CD, there is not any connection to the os used in making it, though of course DOS may be limited to a given "iso level" (and surely there may be issues with long names, unicode, etc.).

You mean a DOS tool to make a .iso?

Normally a port of mkisofs is used (but you cannot probably use it without infringing your self imposed ideological limits as it is contaminated by its Linux roots ), just in case:

http://bootcd.narod.ru/index_e.htm

http://bootcd.narod.ru/cdrtools-2.01-msdos-bin.zip

Now, a good question could be "What is the simpler method I can use to convert a 1.44 Mb boot floppy into a bootable CD"?

But the answer may be unusable (as it is contaminated by MenuetOS):

http://reboot.pro/topic/9916-grub4dos-isohybrided/?p=86679

jaclaz

 

Edited June 25, 2017 by jaclaz

[98SE]

7 hours ago, jaclaz said:

You mean a DOS tool to make a .iso?

Now, a good question could be "What is the simpler method I can use to convert a 1.44 Mb boot floppy into a bootable CD"?

That's what I was referring to making the CD ISO in Pure DOS.  I found it later in a reference but those DOS ISOs will only work in DOS.  Making a standard Windows ISO works in both.

If you wanted to make a DOS bootable 98SE CD just use the 98SE as the template and remove all the setup files and put your floppy files onto it.

[jaclaz]

Very few things lack "a" standard as ISO9660 (which is actually a standard), there is no such thing as a "DOS ISO" (as opposed to "standard Windows ISO") the whole point is that each and every extension to the ISO9660 (including the El-Torito emulation) might have been interpreted slightly different by BIOS vendors and OS programmers and by the people that wrote iso making programs.

If I wanted to make a DOS bootable 98SE CD I would already know very well how to make it, in several different ways, thank you, this:

2 hours ago, 98SE said:

If you wanted to make a DOS bootable 98SE CD just use the 98SE as the template and remove all the setup files and put your floppy files onto it.

makes no sense whatsoever.

jaclaz

 

[98SE]

2 hours ago, jaclaz said:

Very few things lack "a" standard as ISO9660 (which is actually a standard), there is no such thing as a "DOS ISO" (as opposed to "standard Windows ISO") the whole point is that each and every extension to the ISO9660 (including the El-Torito emulation) might have been interpreted slightly different by BIOS vendors and OS programmers and by the people that wrote iso making programs.

If I wanted to make a DOS bootable 98SE CD I would already know very well how to make it, in several different ways, thank you, this:

makes no sense whatsoever.

jaclaz

 

DOS ISO means using DOS code to create the CD into an ISO.  Whatever format the ISO has depends on the DOS program.  The actual readme describes that ISOs made with the DOS ISO creator will not function in Windows.  However it said if an ISO was created in Windows it should work for DOS.

Simple the 98SE CD has a bootable DOS element on it.  You could use the 98SE CD as the source and then remove everything in the 98SE setup folders and just leave the Root directory intact.  Copy any other floppy related tools onto the Root drive or in folders and burn the modified ISO.

The DOS ISO using your program would be theoretical to see if you can store it in a Ramdrive and then run it in DOS.  There weren't that many DOS CDs that used the entire disc and most of these DOS CDs were patched or could be directly copied to the Ramdrive anyhow so this test maybe pointless.  Most of the main programs I would use in 9X/ME will use VirtualDrive.

Edited June 25, 2017 by 98SE

[rloew]

A DOS ISO is a Disk designed to run DOS. How it is created is irrelevant. It uses the basic ISO-9660 Format and may not include Joliet or other extensions. It will work in Windows but may not support long file names.

Running a DOS system the way you describe it may not totally free you from the Optical Disk because the default Drive is A: so it may make references back to the Floppy Emulation part of the Disk.

[98SE]

1 hour ago, rloew said:

A DOS ISO is a Disk designed to run DOS. How it is created is irrelevant. It uses the basic ISO-9660 Format and may not include Joliet or other extensions. It will work in Windows but may not support long file names.

Running a DOS system the way you describe it may not totally free you from the Optical Disk because the default Drive is A: so it may make references back to the Floppy Emulation part of the Disk.

I think you are conflating two different discussions.

Jaclaz recommended a CDrom replacement driver program.  Later I noticed it had the ability to create ISOs in DOS.  There was a note from the author that the DOS created ISOs would not work in Windows.  The author stated that any Windows created ISOs will work with the DOS program.  Since I haven't tested that program yet I can't confirm anything regarding its functionality.  Traditionally, I used the MSCDEX program which dates back to around DOS 6.00.  I hardly used the CD-rom since I had a 1X that was donated to me and I think it used its own proprietary driver and was flaky at best if it operated.

Now running a DOS booted off the CDrom using the 98SE disc would use the CD-ROM drive letter default.  I haven't checked the default drive letter when booted off the 98SE CD and using F8.  If it's A: as you stated you could still redirect the Command.Com to your C: or an actual USB floppy which would be accessed as B: if A: is taken by the optical disc and it was removed.

The times I booted off a bootable flash drive it was always C: and not A: and never had the problem you mentioned since the flash drive was always inserted.

Edited June 25, 2017 by 98SE

[rloew]

No. I am replying only to your previous post.

I was not referring to any specific program, just the description "DOS ISO".

An USB will boot as A: or C: depending on how it is configured.

The El-Torito Emulation will map a Floppy Emulation to Drive 0, as in the Windows 9x CD, a Hard Disk Emulation to Drive 0x80, or nothing if in "No Emulation" mode as in Windows NT CDs.
IO.SYS maps Drive 0 to A: and 0x80 to C:.

Only the ISO part is mapped to the CD Driver specified Letter.

Some things default to the Boot Drive, it takes careful handling to avoid Boot Drive references.