9x system files in xp

  • Thread starter Thread starter Cody
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Cody

Hi im in a technical school and right now we are studying
operating systems. today we noticed that there are windows
9x system files like io.sys, config.sys, and msdos.sys in
the active partition on xp. we think they are there for
backward compatibility but not exactly sure how they are
used in xp. just curious
 
Cody said:
Hi im in a technical school and right now we are studying
operating systems. today we noticed that there are windows
9x system files like io.sys, config.sys, and msdos.sys in
the active partition on xp. we think they are there for
backward compatibility but not exactly sure how they are
used in xp. just curious
Click to expand...

Just FYI - the only likely replies you'll get here is to do your own
homework.

Steve
 
Cody said:
Hi im in a technical school and right now we are studying
operating systems. today we noticed that there are windows
9x system files like io.sys, config.sys, and msdos.sys in
the active partition on xp. we think they are there for
backward compatibility but not exactly sure how they are
used in xp.
Click to expand...

IO.SYS and MSDOS.SYS are the initial boot files for DOS and 9x systems.
In 9x IO.SYS is the code to be loaded and MSDOS.SYS the settings (a
text file). They are not used by XP and will have been left over from
some old 9x system that was upgraded. Config.sys and autoexec.bat are
not used in XP - they related to settings for running DOS and 16 bit
code under the old systems, and XP uses two files config.nt and
autoexec.nt in widnows\system32 to set up the environment for emulation
when these 16 bit type programs get run. Autoexec.bat *may* be 'parsed'
at boot to see if there are any new SET commands to be added to the
Environmental variables, but those files are really there to soothe any
program that thinks they ought to be. Some installations will write
lines into them for their own benefit, which XP will then ignore
 
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