DOS ain't dead

VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) (DOSX)

posted by Rugxulo , Usono, 25.07.2007, 01:16

> > Someone (Jose) posted here recently about having trouble getting
> VGAPaint
>
> Let's hope, he finds a way back to this forum.

He's probably just busy or (less likely) it worked perfectly in FreeDOS, and he's too busy having fun to respond.

> > http://www.geocities.com/snoopimeanie/vp_486.bmp (captured via
> > Snarf)
>
> Why not use GIF or PNG?

Snarf outputted to .BMP, and it was only 64k, so I didn't bother converting it. I actually debated whether mentioning the screenshot at all since it's unlikely that I'd lie about such (muahahaha, tricked a DOS user, my work is done!).

> > So, I can't see any major reason (besides OS) for it not to work. I
> > suggested at the time (and still suggest) he try a FreeDOS bootdisk
> (see
> > my homepage).
>
> ACK. I never used DR-DOS 5, but IIRC only DR-DOS 6.x is fully compatible
> to MS-DOS 5.0. Maybe VP386 uses some undocumented call...

DR-DOS 7.03 says it's "100% compatible with MS-DOS 6.22" and reports 6.0 via int 21h,3306h. However, I've never used older versions, so I dunno about them. But yeah, I think DR-DOS 5.0 came out before MS-DOS 5.

> (quoting Wikipedia)
>
> The most significant was DR-DOS 5.0 in May 1990. (The company
> skipped version 4, avoiding comparison with the relatively unpopular MS-DOS
> 4.0.) This introduced ViewMAX, a GEM based GUI file management shell,
> and bundled disk-caching software, but more significantly, it also
> offered vastly improved memory management over MS-DOS.
>
> MS-DOS 5.0 was released June 1991.

Just FYI.

> > Oh, and VGAPaint 386 is freely available for download with sources
> > here.
>
> This is not new. Jose grabbed VP386 from my pages.

I was just filling in people who may not have been previously aware of it.

> > N.B. rr, it doesn't even need DOS/4GW available for download
> > because VPLZ (included) can make it use PMODE/W instead. (Or maybe it's
> > good since DOS/4GW, despite bloat, can support swapping in low-mem
> > situations unlike PMODE/W?? I dunno.)
>
> I don't remember exactly, but I had a discussion with Eric Auer once. I
> try to remember soon.

You can also maybe(??) use CWSTUB.EXE (Causeway, 47k) instead if you want to have HD swapping enabled (doesn't work in DOSBox 0.70, though, and I haven't tried "real" DOS).

---
Know your limits.h

Complete thread:

• VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) - Rugxulo, 22.07.2007, 00:50 (DOSX)
  • VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) - rr, 22.07.2007, 21:27
    • VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) - DOS386, 23.07.2007, 02:38
      • VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) - rr, 23.07.2007, 09:21
    • VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) - Rugxulo, 25.07.2007, 01:16
      • VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) - jassenna, 27.08.2007, 01:27
        • VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) - Rugxulo, 27.08.2007, 01:39
          • VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) - roberto, 27.08.2007, 13:40
            • VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) - rr, 27.08.2007, 17:47
        • VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) BUG hunting - DOS386, 29.08.2007, 15:34
          • VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) BUG hunting - rr, 29.08.2007, 21:42
            • VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) BUG hunting - Rugxulo, 30.08.2007, 03:28
          • VGAPaint 386 -- works on my old 486 (at least) BUG hunting - jassenna, 06.09.2007, 06:14