freedos-user — FreeDOS general questions and other non-technical discussion

[Freedos-user] The List

[<je...@sh...>]

Hi All,

Today, another milestone in “The List” project was reached. 

For those who were not yet aware, for quite a while I have been asked to take up the task of making improvements to RBIL which received its last release in July of 2000. Ralf did a wonderful job maintaining his Interrupt List. But, there is still a lot of additional data and improvements to be made. You can even see pages of general topics that where in “Pending” status for that final Release 61.  I think it is safe to assume that since it has been over 2.5 decades, it is time for “The List” Project.

The first milestone for “The List” was to break-down RBIL entries into separate files. While editing those large text files was fine for a single person, updates to The List is going to be community driven using git. Trying to manage multiple contributions to those big files would be a nightmare. The first task was to break it all down into something much easier to manage and administer through a VCS without having to constantly fight merge conflicts. That milestone was reached a little while back.

The milestone reached today was the completion of the utility that can glue all that stuff into a set of Release files very similar to the original RBIL. 

There are a couple things from the original files I would like to clean up before we issue our first release of “The List”. That include some minor things like a couple different data tables having the same ID. But, a first release “could” be done right now. I just want to do a little of those Quality-Control adjustments to the text.

There is still a lot of stuff out there that can be added to The List. Your help and contributions are welcome. 

While I personally have only made a couple minor corrections and additions, others have submitted updates as well and much more than I have. 

So, stay tuned for our first Release. 

And please head on over to https://github.com/LoopZ/TheList <https://github.com/LoopZ/TheList> if you would like to contribute that stockpile of additions you may have been hoarding. 

:-)

Jerome

Re: [Freedos-user] Print spooler suggestions.

[Eric A. <e....@jp...>]

Hi!

Are you saying that Super-PCKWIK has a year 2000 bug?

https://archive.org/details/superpckwikdiskaccelerator111

says it would be a disk cache, does it also buffer print data?

Regards, Eric

PS: Version 1.11 of 1986 might not be the right version, I guess.



> Hi there,
> 
> Does anyone have any recommendations or suggestions for print spoolers?
> 
> I'm looking for something that can replace the venerable "Super-PCKWIK"
> which according to my notes hasn't worked for me since January 2000.  I
> guess that's about the time I upgraded the box to 64MBytes of RAM. :(
> 
> Ideally, the spooler would sit between whatever application DOS is
> running and the printer, cache all the output to the printer in EMS
> memory (which is plentiful) and let the application carry on doing
> stuff whilc it feed the cached data to the printer as fast as the
> printer can swallow it.  This is more-or-less what PCKWIK did when
> it was working.  Now it just crashes at boot.  In case it matters,
> the printer in this case is the parallel port printer (LPT1:).
> 
> AFAICT the PRINT.COM which comes with MS-DOS only uses the base 640K
> of RAM so it's no use to me.  On a bad day, I'll be needing to cache
> about 5 MBytes of print data.
> 

Re: [Freedos-user] Print spooler suggestions.

[Ben C. <ben...@ri...>]

> Date: Wed, 1 Apr 2026 16:34:36 +0100 (BST)
> From: "G.W. Haywood" <fr...@ju...>
> 
> Thanks again for this pointer.  I installed DMP this afternoon.
>
> The TSR is about 22.5k
> 
> So far it has exceeded all expectations.

Greetings,

You are welcome.  Thanks for your detailed follow-up.  I am glad it
is working for you.  I agree it would be nice to have the source
code.  At 22.5k i suppose someone could disassemble it.

-Ben

Re: [Freedos-user] Print spooler suggestions.

[G.W. H. <fr...@ju...>]

Hello again,

On Wed, 1 Apr 2026, G.W. Haywood via Freedos-user wrote:
> On Tue, 31 Mar 2026, Ben Collver via Freedos-user wrote:
>> From: "G.W. Haywood" ...
>>> 
>>> Does anyone have any recommendations or suggestions for print spoolers?
>>> ...
>> 
>> DMP can use EMS memory.  This isn't a recommendation because i
>> haven't actually used DMP.  Here's a download link:
>> 
>> ftp://ftp.oldskool.org/pub/simtelnet/msdos/printer/dmp205.zip
>
> That looks very promising indeed, thank you!
>
> I'll give it a whirl and report.

Thanks again for this pointer.  I installed DMP this afternoon.

So far it has exceeded all expectations.  If it continues to live up
to its claims then without any doubt it will be by far the best print
spooling utility for DOS that I've ever seen.  I wish I'd known about
it three decades ago.  The current (if that's the right word) version
is 2.05, dated February 10th 1991.

The main (English only) documentation file notes that it was updated
January 15th 1991 and is for version 2.03, but there's an addendum of
the same date as the DMP.COM TSR utility, February 10th 1991.

The documentation is excellent, clear and thorough.  From scratch it
took me ten minutes to get DMP working, no false starts

The TSR is about 22.5k.  AFAICT DMP can use *any* available memory for
its cache *including* mass storage (although it cautions against the
use of floppies for caching :) and it can use them all simultaneously.

So far because the system I'm working on handles financial information
I've been cautious with the configuration.  When I get the chance I'll
pull out all the stops to see what happens when I throw the kitchen
sink at it.

The docs talk about "MS-DOS and PC-DOS versions 2.0 thru 4.1" but for
my first attempt today I was running MS-DOS 6.22.  There were AFAICT
no issues on that front.

The source code would be a tremendous addition to the hive knowledge
if it could be found.  I've searched for the original supplier/author,
so far without success.

It's not often I'm as over the moon as this about a piece of software.
Perhaps there should be a pointer to this thread somewhere in the docs
about spoolers for FreeDOS?

Well, thanks once again.  Made my day.

-- 

73,
Ged.

Re: [Freedos-user] Print spooler suggestions.

[G.W. H. <fr...@ju...>]

Hi there,

On Tue, 31 Mar 2026, Ben Collver via Freedos-user wrote:
> From: "G.W. Haywood" ...
>>
>> Does anyone have any recommendations or suggestions for print spoolers?
>> ...
>
> DMP can use EMS memory.  This isn't a recommendation because i
> haven't actually used DMP.  Here's a download link:
>
> ftp://ftp.oldskool.org/pub/simtelnet/msdos/printer/dmp205.zip

That looks very promising indeed, thank you!

I'll give it a whirl and report.

-- 

73,
Ged.

Re: [Freedos-user] Print spooler suggestions.

[G.W. H. <fr...@ju...>]

Hi Jim,

On Tue, 31 Mar 2026, Jim Hall via Freedos-user wrote:
> On Tue, Mar 31, 2026, 6:51 PM G.W. Haywood via Freedos-user wrote:
>
>> Does anyone have any recommendations or suggestions for print spoolers?
>>
>> I'm looking for something that can replace the venerable "Super-PCKWIK"
>> ... I'll be needing to cache about 5 MBytes of print data.
> 
> I haven't tried it in years, but you might try the Spool program. ...

Thanks, I saw that but it's only good for 64 kBytes which won't help me.

-- 

73,
Ged.

Re: [Freedos-user] Print spooler suggestions.

[Jim H. <jh...@fr...>]

I haven't tried it in years, but you might try the Spool program. We
include it in FreeDOS, under Drivers:
https://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/repositories/1.4/html/en/drivers/spool/20250410.1/index.html


I used this all the time back when I had a dot matrix printer. It sends
data to the printer when the computer is less busy. At the time, I could
write a document and print at the same time-- the more I typed, the slower
it printed, and vice versa.

Very handy program at the time. I don't know if it will cache 5MB of data
though.



On Tue, Mar 31, 2026, 6:51 PM G.W. Haywood via Freedos-user <
fre...@li...> wrote:

> Hi there,
>
> Does anyone have any recommendations or suggestions for print spoolers?
>
> I'm looking for something that can replace the venerable "Super-PCKWIK"
> which according to my notes hasn't worked for me since January 2000.  I
> guess that's about the time I upgraded the box to 64MBytes of RAM. :(
>
> Ideally, the spooler would sit between whatever application DOS is
> running and the printer, cache all the output to the printer in EMS
> memory (which is plentiful) and let the application carry on doing
> stuff whilc it feed the cached data to the printer as fast as the
> printer can swallow it.  This is more-or-less what PCKWIK did when
> it was working.  Now it just crashes at boot.  In case it matters,
> the printer in this case is the parallel port printer (LPT1:).
>
> AFAICT the PRINT.COM which comes with MS-DOS only uses the base 640K
> of RAM so it's no use to me.  On a bad day, I'll be needing to cache
> about 5 MBytes of print data.
>
> --
>
> 73,
> Ged.
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Freedos-user mailing list
> Fre...@li...
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
>

Re: [Freedos-user] Print spooler suggestions.

[Ben C. <ben...@ri...>]

> Date: Wed, 1 Apr 2026 00:50:09 +0100 (BST)
> From: "G.W. Haywood" <fr...@ju...>
> 
> Does anyone have any recommendations or suggestions for print spoolers?
> 
> Ideally, the spooler would sit between whatever application DOS is
> running and the printer, cache all the output to the printer in EMS
> memory (which is plentiful) and let the application carry on doing
> stuff whilc it feed the cached data to the printer as fast as the
> printer can swallow it.

DMP can use EMS memory.  This isn't a recommendation because i
haven't actually used DMP.  Here's a download link:

ftp://ftp.oldskool.org/pub/simtelnet/msdos/printer/dmp205.zip

-Ben

[Freedos-user] Print spooler suggestions.

[G.W. H. <fr...@ju...>]

Hi there,

Does anyone have any recommendations or suggestions for print spoolers?

I'm looking for something that can replace the venerable "Super-PCKWIK"
which according to my notes hasn't worked for me since January 2000.  I
guess that's about the time I upgraded the box to 64MBytes of RAM. :(

Ideally, the spooler would sit between whatever application DOS is
running and the printer, cache all the output to the printer in EMS
memory (which is plentiful) and let the application carry on doing
stuff whilc it feed the cached data to the printer as fast as the
printer can swallow it.  This is more-or-less what PCKWIK did when
it was working.  Now it just crashes at boot.  In case it matters,
the printer in this case is the parallel port printer (LPT1:).

AFAICT the PRINT.COM which comes with MS-DOS only uses the base 640K
of RAM so it's no use to me.  On a bad day, I'll be needing to cache
about 5 MBytes of print data.

-- 

73,
Ged.

Re: [Freedos-user] DOs, or open source boot loaders?

[Karen L. <kle...@sh...>]

Hi,
I am going to simply find a way to use the boot loader Rockbox recommends 
for  installing the program on my IPod.
Even if not in my operating system, that will likely be less frustrating.
Kare



On Wed, 1 Apr 2026, tom ehlert via Freedos-user wrote:

> Unfortunately I misspoke ithis - a bit.
>
>>> Boot sequence of legacy BIOS with MBR formated storage media (eg. hard
>>> drive with formated MBR partition structures); 1) BIOS looks for MBR
>>> activate partition, 2) BIOS then looks for executable boot code, for
>>> example DOS IO.SYS/MSDOS.SYS, FreeDOS FDCONFIG.SYS/CONFIG.SYS, are then
>>> loaded into memory and executed.
>
>> Unfortunately this is complete nonsense.
>
>> 1) BIOS reads the first sector (512 Byte) on the disk and executes it.
> THIS *is* the MBR aka Master Boot Record.
>
>> 2) This code scans the partitiontable (part of the 512 Byte) for an active
>> partition, then reads *this* sector and executes it. the MBR.
> This is often called the the PBR or Partition Boot Record.
>
>> 3) This sector - which is probably different for FAT12, FAT16, FAT32, EXTFS filesystems
>>   and OS. E.g. FreeDOS searches for "KERNEL.SYS", MSDOS searches for IO.SYS, loads it
>>   and executes it.
>
>> 4) KERNEL.SYS is then responsible to locate FDCONFIG.SYS and FDAUTO.BAT, COMMAND.COM.
>
>>
> Tom
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Freedos-user mailing list
> Fre...@li...
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
>

Re: [Freedos-user] DOs, or open source boot loaders?

[tom e. <te...@dr...>]

Unfortunately I misspoke ithis - a bit.

>> Boot sequence of legacy BIOS with MBR formated storage media (eg. hard
>> drive with formated MBR partition structures); 1) BIOS looks for MBR
>> activate partition, 2) BIOS then looks for executable boot code, for
>> example DOS IO.SYS/MSDOS.SYS, FreeDOS FDCONFIG.SYS/CONFIG.SYS, are then
>> loaded into memory and executed.

> Unfortunately this is complete nonsense.

> 1) BIOS reads the first sector (512 Byte) on the disk and executes it.
THIS *is* the MBR aka Master Boot Record.

> 2) This code scans the partitiontable (part of the 512 Byte) for an active
> partition, then reads *this* sector and executes it. the MBR.
This is often called the the PBR or Partition Boot Record.

> 3) This sector - which is probably different for FAT12, FAT16, FAT32, EXTFS filesystems
>   and OS. E.g. FreeDOS searches for "KERNEL.SYS", MSDOS searches for IO.SYS, loads it
>   and executes it.

> 4) KERNEL.SYS is then responsible to locate FDCONFIG.SYS and FDAUTO.BAT, COMMAND.COM.

>  
Tom

Re: [Freedos-user] DOs, or open source boot loaders?

[tom e. <te...@dr...>]

Hallo Herr Roger via Freedos-user,

am Dienstag, 31. März 2026 um 17:21 schrieben Sie:

>> On Sun, Mar 29, 2026 at 06:45:37PM -0400, Karen Lewellen via Freedos-user wrote:
>>My question was weather freedos has its own boot loader application.  That is
>>how freedos is related.


> Boot sequence of legacy BIOS with MBR formated storage media (eg. hard
> drive with formated MBR partition structures); 1) BIOS looks for MBR
> activate partition, 2) BIOS then looks for executable boot code, for
> example DOS IO.SYS/MSDOS.SYS, FreeDOS FDCONFIG.SYS/CONFIG.SYS, are then
> loaded into memory and executed.

Unfortunately this is complete nonsense.

1) BIOS reads the first sector (512 Byte) on the disk and executes it.

2) This code scans the partitiontable (part of the 512 Byte) for an active
partition, then reads *this* sector and executes it. the MBR.

3) This sector - which is probably different for FAT12, FAT16, FAT32, EXTFS filesystems
  and OS. E.g. FreeDOS searches for "KERNEL.SYS", MSDOS searches for IO.SYS, loads it
  and executes it.

4) KERNEL.SYS is then responsible to locate FDCONFIG.SYS and FDAUTO.BAT, COMMAND.COM.

 


> A decent DOS start execution process explanation can be found here:

> DOS DAYS, "A Guide to DOS Startup Files"
> https://www.dosdays.co.uk/topics/dos_startup.php

only 50% accurate, unfortunately.

> As for Rockbox, Rockbox hooks into the OEM firmware/bootloader loading
> process.

> Roger






Mit freundlichen Grüßen / with kind regards
Tom Ehlert
+49-15151898538

Re: [Freedos-user] DOs, or open source boot loaders?

[Roger <rog...@gm...>]

> On Sun, Mar 29, 2026 at 06:45:37PM -0400, Karen Lewellen via Freedos-user wrote:
>My question was weather freedos has its own boot loader application.  That is
>how freedos is related.

Boot sequence of legacy BIOS with MBR formated storage media (eg. hard
drive with formated MBR partition structures); 1) BIOS looks for MBR
activate partition, 2) BIOS then looks for executable boot code, for
example DOS IO.SYS/MSDOS.SYS, FreeDOS FDCONFIG.SYS/CONFIG.SYS, are then
loaded into memory and executed.

A decent DOS start execution process explanation can be found here:

DOS DAYS, "A Guide to DOS Startup Files"
https://www.dosdays.co.uk/topics/dos_startup.php

As for Rockbox, Rockbox hooks into the OEM firmware/bootloader loading
process.

Roger

Re: [Freedos-user] DOs, or open source boot loaders?

[Karen L. <kle...@sh...>]

My question was weather freedos has its own boot loader application.  That 
is how freedos is related.



On Sun, 29 Mar 2026, Ralf Quint via Freedos-user wrote:

> On 3/29/2026 10:03 AM, Karen Lewellen via Freedos-user wrote:
>>  Hi folks,
>>  Asking because I wish to install rock box.
>>  www.rockbox.org
>>
>>  Onto my sixth generation iPod classic.
>>  While I am asking on their own mailing list, I also wanted to check if
>>  there is a package, say associated with freedos, that will manage this
>>  role.
>>  Unsure if their own bootloader has a DOS, or Linux, option.
>>  Thanks,
>
> Never mind, I overlooked that older iPods are in fact on the list of 
> supported devices (overlooked it at least 3 times :( ), but still unsure how 
> FreeDOS would be involved in this...
>
>
> Ralf
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Freedos-user mailing list
> Fre...@li...
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
>
>

Re: [Freedos-user] DOs, or open source boot loaders?

[Ralf Q. <fre...@gm...>]

On 3/29/2026 10:03 AM, Karen Lewellen via Freedos-user wrote:
> Hi folks,
> Asking because I wish to install rock box.
> www.rockbox.org
>
> Onto my sixth generation iPod classic.
> While I am asking on their own mailing list, I also wanted to check if 
> there is a package, say associated with freedos, that will manage this 
> role.
> Unsure if their own bootloader has a DOS, or Linux, option.
> Thanks,

Never mind, I overlooked that older iPods are in fact on the list of 
supported devices (overlooked it at least 3 times :( ), but still unsure 
how FreeDOS would be involved in this...


Ralf

Re: [Freedos-user] DOs, or open source boot loaders?

[Ralf Q. <fre...@gm...>]

On 3/29/2026 10:03 AM, Karen Lewellen via Freedos-user wrote:
> Hi folks,
> Asking because I wish to install rock box.
> www.rockbox.org
>
> Onto my sixth generation iPod classic.
> While I am asking on their own mailing list, I also wanted to check if 
> there is a package, say associated with freedos, that will manage this 
> role.
> Unsure if their own bootloader has a DOS, or Linux, option.
> Thanks,
> Kare

Not sure what exactly you want to do with your iPod and how FreeDOS 
would be related to this.

The RockBox you linked to is a replacement for the firmware of very 
specific standalone digital music player devices, not an app that would 
run on either an iPod or anything running FreeDOS.
iPod is not one of the supported digital music players...


Ralf

[Freedos-user] DOs, or open source boot loaders?

[Karen L. <kle...@sh...>]

Hi folks,
Asking because I wish to install rock box.
www.rockbox.org

Onto my sixth generation iPod classic.
While I am asking on their own mailing list, I also wanted to check if 
there is a package, say associated with freedos, that will manage this 
role.
Unsure if their own bootloader has a DOS, or Linux, option.
Thanks,
Kare

Re: [Freedos-user] Can FreeDOS install and run on Fat32?

[Stu <stu...@gm...>]

Try FN and Escape, on some laptops that toggled FN lock which toggled
between F keys and their other functions

No idea if that will work on FreeDOS as I don't know what level that
happens on.

On Sat, 21 Mar 2026, 17:53 Ray Davison via Freedos-user, <
fre...@li...> wrote:

> My question is the stated subject of this thread.  I now have the simple
> answer, which is yes.  That is bit incomplete because I have not yet
> made use of *EMM*.EXE.  This is a collection of what I call high memory
> controllers - there may be a better name.
>
> If FreeDOS exists for some as a way to keep old hardware running, to
> maybe do some newer things, then what I am doing is probably irrelevant.
>   But if there is someone who wants to run on modern hardware, yes it
> does work.
>
> My intent is to build a modern laptop, that test installs various Linux,
> and possibly has one or more Win partitions.  Boot must be controlled by
> a boot manager that is not influenced by any of those OSs.
>
> FreeDOS 1.4 is running on the preinstalled, 1Tb HDD.  The HDD shipped as
> GPT, was stripped, and is now MBR.  There is currently a single FAT32,
> 20GB partition.
>
> The file manager is Norton Commander 1993.  It works so well it
> perfectly aligned to the screen, and established that the function key
> primary flip from F1-F12 to the symbols, is not a new computer,
> hardwired change, but a new Windows change. - how to get Win to let go?
>
> The boot manager is Acronis OSS V5.  It is functioning in that it grabs
> the boot process.  It currently has nothing to boot because I cannot
> find the install disk, tried to clone it from another box, and it does
> not know FreeDOS exists.  On other boxes it is booting FreeDOS, two
> OS/2, WinXP, and Win7.
>
> So now, get OSS properly installed, and start adding boot partitions
> which will all be extended.
>
> Any help with EMM would be appreciated.
>
> TY
> Ray
>
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Freedos-user mailing list
> Fre...@li...
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
>

Re: [Freedos-user] Presenting: SUDO for DOS

[E. C. M. <pu...@ul...>]

On at 2026-03-18 10:54 +0100, Sijmen J. Mulder via Freedos-user wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> Thought someone might get a chuckle out of this:
> 
> https://codeberg.org/sjmulder/sudo.com
> 
>> An implementation of sudo for DOS, to run the given command with full privileges.
> 
> Was a good DOS and x86-16 learning experience though!

I have several programs with similar tasks:

* The lMS-DOS "comloader" [1], setting up an embedded (flat-format or 
MZ) executable as if that executable itself was loaded rather than the 
comloader. This involves cutting the command name out of the PSP command 
line tail, then setting up the two default FCBs in the PSP and the "FCB 
drives valid" flags in AL and AH.

* The lRxDOS comloader [2] which is the base for the lMS-DOS one.

* Eric Auer's callver with some patches by me [3], this passes a command 
to a child process running a "%COMSPEC% /C " command.

* The Comspec Load Utility (or Codified Likeness Utility) [4], a command 
shell launcher for the Multiple Command Payload (or Master Control 
Program). The MCP contains a (patched) copy of FreeCOM [5] in its lDOS 
comloader, but this requires the "COMMAND" command name be specified. 
That isn't expected for %COMSPEC% so clu.exe can be used for %COMSPEC%. 
It will find ldosmcp.com and load it, telling it to pass control to the 
FreeCOM executable. CLU can relocate its PSP to the top of the Low 
Memory Area [6], and will then load the MCP application executable using 
int 21h function 4B01h [7] and chain the current process to terminate 
into the loaded MCP [8].

The MCP comloader in turn can relocate the FreeCOM process that it 
builds into the Upper Memory Area [9], where the comloader itself cannot 
fit due to the many commands that it contains.

Regards,
ecm


[1]: https://hg.pushbx.org/ecm/msdos4/file/5d7ba07e2e21/comload.asm
[2]: https://hg.pushbx.org/ecm/ldos/file/4091fac59e21/comload.asm
[3]: https://hg.pushbx.org/ecm/callver/file/fd67af5c53ee/callver.asm
[4]: https://hg.pushbx.org/ecm/mcp/file/f885328d4bdf/clu.asm
[5]: https://github.com/FDOS/freecom/issues/184
[6]: https://hg.pushbx.org/ecm/mcp/file/f885328d4bdf/clu.asm#l118
[7]: https://hg.pushbx.org/ecm/mcp/file/f885328d4bdf/clu.asm#l534
[8]: https://hg.pushbx.org/ecm/mcp/file/f885328d4bdf/clu.asm#l582
[9]: https://hg.pushbx.org/ecm/msdos4/file/5d7ba07e2e21/comload.asm#l483

Re: [Freedos-user] Tried test build T2603

[Jim H. <jh...@fr...>]

[..]
> > Then, on a Dell Inspiron 510m laptop:
> >
> >   - Installation went super smooth
>
> >   - FDIMPLES still very slow, arrowing from one option to the next would
> >     take a second or too. But not unusuable, and in the end I got my
> >     packages installed.
>
> It also was very slow on a real netbook for me. There
> probably should be more caching and less file parsing.
>

I wonder if APM might be an issue? I don't have anything to support
this guess other than a few other DOS apps can be very slooooooow when
reading keyboard input when FDAPM is active.

Try unloading FDAPM with this command and see if that helps:

FDAPM /apmoff

Re: [Freedos-user] Tried test build T2603

[Eric A. <e....@jp...>]

Hoi Sijmen,

> Hi all,
> 
> Thought I'd share my experience trying T2603:
> 
> First in qemu-system-i386 running on a Raspberry Pi 400 (so, software
> emulation):
> 
>   - Whole experience was sluggish, right from the start...

there is a possibilty that a Raspberry Pi build of dosemu2
will be made available, unless you want to build yourself:

https://github.com/dosemu2/dosemu2/issues/2277

As dosemu2 is optimized for running DOS, it should have
better performance and also better compatibility of the
simulated DOS compatible hardware compared to generic
virtual computers such as QEMU.

> Then, on a Dell Inspiron 510m laptop:
> 
>   - Installation went super smooth

>   - FDIMPLES still very slow, arrowing from one option to the next would
>     take a second or too. But not unusuable, and in the end I got my
>     packages installed.

It also was very slow on a real netbook for me. There
probably should be more caching and less file parsing.

>   - Then installed Windows 3.11. Had to manually copy the lines from
>     AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS, and set PageOverCommit=1 because the
>     machine has 1G of memory (*1). But even after that starting Windows
>     would crash/reboot the machine.

Try using Windows in "safe mode" (in Windows-not-for-workgroups:
Use standard mode instead of 386 enhanced mode). For the normal
386 mode of WfW 3.11, you will need carefully tuned config and
drivers (SHARE, preferably MS HIMEM and/or MS EMM386 in spite of
those being ancient) and our newest kernel. Same for 386enh mode
of Windows 3.0 and 3.1, but the new kernel SHOULD support it now.

>   - No other issues! Perfectly usable. SUDO worked too ;-)

Great :-D

Eric

Re: [Freedos-user] Tried test build T2603

[Jim H. <jh...@fr...>]

On Fri, Mar 20, 2026 at 1:49 PM Sijmen J. Mulder via Freedos-user
<fre...@li...> wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> Thought I'd share my experience trying T2603:
>
> First in qemu-system-i386 running on a Raspberry Pi 400 (so, software
> emulation):
>
>  - Whole experience was sluggish, right from the start. Every screen of
>    the installer would visibly build up top-to-bottom. To be expected
>    perhaps, considering the software emulation?

This is definitely because of software emulation. The Raspberry Pi is
a completely different CPU architecture, so the virtual machine (QEMU)
is emulating every CPU call, that's all being done through software.
If you had run QEMU on an Intel CPU, you could have used -enable-kvm
on the command line to use the Kernel Virtual Machine mode, but this
doesn't exist on a Raspberry Pi.

Another reason it's slow is because I/O on a microSD card is not fast.
For example, my Raspberry Pi has a SanDisk Ultra 64GB microSDXC UHS-I
U1A1 card. The U1 is designed to support 1080p video recording (such
as you might use in a GoPro camera) at minimum serial write speeds of
10MB/s. (By comparison, a V60 is aimed at cameras that do 4K video and
has a minimum sequential write speed of 60MB/s.)


>  - First installation failed while copying FDMINES with an unclear
>    error.

What was the error message?

Note that since you're running QEMU, you could use '-display curses'
and QEMU will run in text mode. That will make it easier to copy error
messages from that terminal window, so you can paste them in an email.


>  - Recreated the virtual disk, manually created and formatted the
>    partition first, and then it went through without problems.

I wonder, did you make the second virtual disk larger than the first?
For example, since you mentioned FDMINES, that means you did a Full
installation. If you made the disk image too small the first time,
this will obviously fail because the virtual disk will fill up. If you
made the second disk image large enough, that would have worked fine.

When I made a very small (10MB) disk image and tries to do a full
install, it happened to fail on HTMLHELP with the message:

:: Unable to install the 'base\htmlhelp' package.
:: A reboot may help.

..and when I exit to DOS, I can see the target drive (the disk image
I'm installing to) has 98,304 bytes free (that is, just 96 kB).


>  - FDIMPLES was unusably slow.
>  - Otherwise, worked great!

Yes, as expected, the slowness is because of CPU emulation via software.


>
> Then, on a Dell Inspiron 510m laptop:
>
>  - Installation went super smooth
>  - FDIMPLES still very slow, arrowing from one option to the next would
>    take a second or too. But not unusuable, and in the end I got my
>    packages installed.
[..]

I'm not sure why keyboard input is causing a delay on real hardware --
unless maybe it's reading from the CD-ROM drive and the CD drive is
slow? Do you hear the CD-ROM drive seeking when you move between
options in FDIMPLES?

Re: [Freedos-user] Can FreeDOS install and run on Fat32?

[Ray D. <ra...@ch...>]

My question is the stated subject of this thread.  I now have the simple 
answer, which is yes.  That is bit incomplete because I have not yet 
made use of *EMM*.EXE.  This is a collection of what I call high memory 
controllers - there may be a better name.

If FreeDOS exists for some as a way to keep old hardware running, to 
maybe do some newer things, then what I am doing is probably irrelevant. 
  But if there is someone who wants to run on modern hardware, yes it 
does work.

My intent is to build a modern laptop, that test installs various Linux, 
and possibly has one or more Win partitions.  Boot must be controlled by 
a boot manager that is not influenced by any of those OSs.

FreeDOS 1.4 is running on the preinstalled, 1Tb HDD.  The HDD shipped as 
GPT, was stripped, and is now MBR.  There is currently a single FAT32, 
20GB partition.

The file manager is Norton Commander 1993.  It works so well it 
perfectly aligned to the screen, and established that the function key 
primary flip from F1-F12 to the symbols, is not a new computer, 
hardwired change, but a new Windows change. - how to get Win to let go?

The boot manager is Acronis OSS V5.  It is functioning in that it grabs 
the boot process.  It currently has nothing to boot because I cannot 
find the install disk, tried to clone it from another box, and it does 
not know FreeDOS exists.  On other boxes it is booting FreeDOS, two 
OS/2, WinXP, and Win7.

So now, get OSS properly installed, and start adding boot partitions 
which will all be extended.

Any help with EMM would be appreciated.

TY
Ray

Re: [Freedos-user] Can FreeDOS install and run on Fat32?

[Ray D. <ra...@ch...>]

Eric Auer via Freedos-user wrote:

> As you mention JemmEx is loaded and command.com is at the
> expected locations:
> 
> It is possible that loading JemmEx broke your disk access,
> because there is a conflict between BIOS, disk controller
> and JemmEx regarding UMB areas. This could be triggered by
> manually telling JemmEx to take more risks in UMB choices.
> 
> Please try booting without JemmEx / EMM386 or similar.
> 
Menu 1, 2, and 3, stop at the same point.

Menu 4 boots to C:\.
Does that load: 34?DEVICE=C:\FreeDOS\BIN\HIMEMX.EXE?

Did you examine the HDD FDCONFIG.SYS I attached?


Ray

Re: [Freedos-user] Tried test build T2603

[victoria c. <sp...@jo...>]

On 3/20/26 1:49 PM, Sijmen J. Mulder via Freedos-user wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> Thought I'd share my experience trying T2603:
>
> First in qemu-system-i386 running on a Raspberry Pi 400 (so, software
> emulation):
>
>   - Whole experience was sluggish, right from the start. Every screen of
>     the installer would visibly build up top-to-bottom. To be expected
>     perhaps, considering the software emulation?
>   - First installation failed while copying FDMINES with an unclear
>     error.
>   - Recreated the virtual disk, manually created and formatted the
>     partition first, and then it went through without problems.
>   - FDIMPLES was unusably slow.
try fdnpkg16! :D it works quite fast and is cli based.
>   - Otherwise, worked great!
>
> Then, on a Dell Inspiron 510m laptop:
>
>   - Installation went super smooth
>   - FDIMPLES still very slow, arrowing from one option to the next would
>     take a second or too. But not unusuable, and in the end I got my
>     packages installed.
FDNPKG16 works well please try it out it is included.
>   - Then installed Windows 3.11. Had to manually copy the lines from
>     AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS, and set PageOverCommit=1 because the
>     machine has 1G of memory (*1). But even after that starting Windows
>     would crash/reboot the machine.
>   - No other issues! Perfectly usable. SUDO worked too ;-)
>
> *1: https://sourceforge.net/p/freedos/mailman/message/10099998/
>
> Regards,
> Sijmen
>
>
> _______________________________________________
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