DOS ain't dead

Sun Microsystems has released VirtualBox (now also known as "Sun xVM VirtualBox") version 1.6.0 on 02 May 2008.

Home page: http://www.virtualbox.org/
Download: http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads

Major changes from 1.5.6 to 1.6.0:
* Solaris and Mac OS X host support
* Seamless windowing for Linux and Solaris guests
* Guest Additions for Solaris
* A webservice API
* SATA hard disk (AHCI) controller
* Experimental Physical Address Extension (PAE) support

A complete Changelog is at: http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Changelog

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Forum admin

> A complete Changelog is at: http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Changelog

Interesting as far as DOS is concerned is that a SB 16 emulation has been implemented. A brief test show that it "works", at least the DSP part (Midi wasn't recognized).

OTOH, there's no longer a "raw" SDL version, which was good for fullscreen text modes.

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MS-DOS forever!

> Interesting as far as DOS is concerned is that a SB 16 emulation has been
> implemented. A brief test show that it "works", at least the DSP part
> (Midi wasn't recognized).

I don't know VirtualBox, is it a vmware, msvpc, etc clone with SB emulation? What drivers did you used? Old sb16 ones?

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

Well, I tried VirtualBox 1.6.0 but it seems to me little bit crappy. It sometimes crashes. Some basic things like keyboard emulation don't work well - e.g. in DN/NDN I cannot walk directories with arrow keys because it types numbers instead cursor moves. To check sound emu. I 1st tried mpxplay without drivers. It successfully detected SB16 and play but sometimes it hangs keeping a block of samples play in endless loop. Then I installed SB16 drivers. 1st it hanged on soundacrd detection but after reboot VM it installed OK. I tried to run few demos but only Boost by Doomsday worked. But it was significantly slow in some scenes and it was played in very small window, even on fullscreen it was not resized. 2nd Reality didn't find this soundcards. Other demos hanged... Doom plays only sfx, no midi/adlib and hanged after few second of play.

So simply said, this emulator is a big crap for running DOS things. DOSBOX or DOSEMU do the job much better.

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

> So simply said, this emulator is a big crap for running DOS things. DOSBOX
> or DOSEMU do the job much better.

I agree. My post - and possibly rr's as well - wasn't meant to be an recommendation . As far as I understand VirtualBox is some fork of Qemu, and it also has inherited at least some of Qemu's problems (bad keyboard emulation, no v86-mode virtualization, slow, ...). It has one advantage: USB support is pretty good - or at least it was in previous versions, didn't have a chance to test this topic in the new version.

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MS-DOS forever!

> simply said, this emulator is a big crap for running DOS things.

Maybe not only this ?

> DOSBOX or DOSEMU do the job much better.

Why not DOS ?

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This is a LOGITECH mouse driver, but some software expect here
the following string:*** This is Copyright 1983 Microsoft ***

> > simply said, this emulator is a big crap for running DOS
> things.
>
> Maybe not only this ?

Can you tell something with more "meat" next time?

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Forum admin

> Well, I tried VirtualBox 1.6.0 but it seems to me little bit crappy. It
> sometimes crashes.

And BOCHS and QEMU don't? (They do fairly often for me, but that may be Vista incompatibility.)

> Some
> basic things like keyboard emulation don't work well - e.g. in DN/NDN I
> cannot walk directories with arrow keys because it types numbers instead
> cursor moves.

Turn numlock off?

> Other demos hanged... Doom plays only sfx, no midi/adlib and
> hanged after few second of play.

Ick. I bet if you reported that, they'd try fixing it. (Doom is very popular.) Maybe a different Doom engine would be more stable? (Doom Legacy? Boom?)

rr wrote:

> Can you tell something with more "meat" next time?

Sorry I'm a vegetarian

> > sometimes crashes
> And BOCHS and QEMU don't? They do often for me - Vista incompatibility

They don't for me in DOS (but nevertheless there is some space for improvements of course)

---
This is a LOGITECH mouse driver, but some software expect here
the following string:*** This is Copyright 1983 Microsoft ***

> > > sometimes crashes
> > And BOCHS and QEMU don't? They do often for me - Vista incompatibility
>
> They don't for me in DOS (but nevertheless there is some space for
> improvements of course)

AFAIK QEMU introduced a text-only output device via (n)curses recently. Feel free to make a DOS port using DJGPP or OW. It's probably easier than SDL or whatever.

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Forum admin

> > > > sometimes crashes
> > > And BOCHS and QEMU don't? They do often for me - Vista
> incompatibility
> >
> > They don't for me in DOS (but nevertheless there is some space for
> > improvements of course)
>
> AFAIK QEMU introduced a text-only output device via (n)curses recently.
> Feel free to make a DOS port using DJGPP or OW. It's probably easier than
> SDL or whatever.

DOS386 is telling us that Qemu/Bochs DON'T crash for him in DOS. So your hint is pretty off-topic IMO. Don't forget you are the moderator of this board! Possibly it's time to calm down ...

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MS-DOS forever!

> > > > > sometimes crashes
> > > > And BOCHS and QEMU don't? They do often for me - Vista
> > incompatibility
> > >
> > > They don't for me in DOS (but nevertheless there is some space for
> > > improvements of course)
> >
> > AFAIK QEMU introduced a text-only output device via (n)curses recently.
> > Feel free to make a DOS port using DJGPP or OW. It's probably easier
> than
> > SDL or whatever.
>
> DOS386 is telling us that Qemu/Bochs DON'T crash for him in DOS.

Ah, OK. I didn't know, that Bochs also works in DOS/HX.

> So your hint is pretty off-topic IMO.

Not in my opinion, because it's about developing for DOS.

> Don't forget you are the moderator of this board!

Right, but what's the point?

> Possibly it's time to calm down ...

Erm, what made you think, that I'm upset or similar?

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Forum admin

> Erm, what makes you think, that I'm upset or similar?

You're not upset (I guess), but you're biased and unfair, which is a bad thing for a moderator. Dos386 might be snappish sometimes, but he has interest in DOS topics and tries to contribute. OTOH, I see you patiently discussing absurdities with users which have virtually nothing to offer but troll posts.

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MS-DOS forever!

> > Erm, what makes you think, that I'm upset or similar?
>
> You're not upset (I guess), but you're biased and unfair, which is a bad
> thing for a moderator.

Surely it's bad thing, but I'm also human, which is my plea.
To remember: I'm not doing this moderator job, because I like it. I'm doing it, because someone has to do it and nobody else from this fine DOS community (including you) wanted to do. So refusing to become a moderator, but to cry against the moderator, is also a bad thing.

> Dos386 might be snappish sometimes, but he has
> interest in DOS topics and tries to contribute.

I don't have a problem with his snappishness, but with him writing nonsense.

> OTOH, I see you patiently
> discussing absurdities with users which have virtually nothing to
> offer but troll posts.

I must confess that this might be true sometimes.

EOD for me

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Forum admin

> Surely it's bad thing, but I'm also human, which is my plea.
> To remember: I'm not doing this moderator job, because I like it. I'm
> doing it, because someone has to do it and nobody else from this fine DOS
> community (including you) wanted to do.

So why not publicly announce that a moderator is wanted?

> So refusing to become a moderator,
> but to cry against the moderator, is also a bad thing.

No. I know that I'm not suitable for the moderator job, but that doesn't mean that I have to be silent if I see things going wrong.

> EOD for me

Ok, but this wasn't a discussion. I posted my opinion (so it's kind of a monologue), well aware of the fact that people believe what they want to believe.

End of Monologue

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MS-DOS forever!

> > > > sometimes crashes
> > > And BOCHS and QEMU don't? They do often for me - Vista
> incompatibility
> >
> > They don't for me in DOS (but nevertheless there is some space for
> > improvements of course)
>
> AFAIK QEMU introduced a text-only output device via (n)curses recently.
> Feel free to make a DOS port using DJGPP or OW. It's probably easier than
> SDL or whatever.

"SDL: We're portable, just not for DOS." (meh)

http://www.caddit.net/download/ncurses5djgpp.lib.zip (5.4, .A + .H only)

http://gd.tuwien.ac.at/pc/dos/djgpp/beta/v2tk/pdcur33b.zip
http://gd.tuwien.ac.at/pc/dos/djgpp/current/v2tk/pdcur33s.zip

> have a problem with writing nonsense.

While Steve posts none.

> EOD for me

Agree - EOD

---
This is a LOGITECH mouse driver, but some software expect here
the following string:*** This is Copyright 1983 Microsoft ***

> > have a problem with writing nonsense.
>
> While Steve posts none.

What? Are you keeping track of which threads I join in? Sorry, not this one. But if you want some nonsense, let me know and I'll paste in a bit of irrelevant garbage just for you.