Accessibility for Dual Booting DOS/Win XP

  • Thread starter Dragon MoonShadow
  • Start date
D

Dragon MoonShadow

I'm supporting a blind musician that has a program that has to run in
DOS. But the system also needs to be accessible to the rest of his Win
2K/XP network. I've been trying to make it work using a 98 client but
that is not working at all.

I know it possible to setup a dual boot system for DOS/Win XP but is
there a way to make it blind accessible or to setup scripts to automate
the change so it doesn't sit at the which OS screen forever. Due to
system clock timing issues running in emulation really isn't an option
as far as I understand it.


Any help would be great
Thanx
 
P

Patrick Keenan

Dragon MoonShadow said:
I'm supporting a blind musician that has a program that has to run in
DOS. But the system also needs to be accessible to the rest of his Win
2K/XP network. I've been trying to make it work using a 98 client but
that is not working at all.

I know it possible to setup a dual boot system for DOS/Win XP but is
there a way to make it blind accessible or to setup scripts to automate
the change so it doesn't sit at the which OS screen forever. Due to
system clock timing issues running in emulation really isn't an option
as far as I understand it.


Any help would be great
Thanx


One simple manual way would be to set the BIOS to boot from diskette first,
and use a boot floppy for the DOS boot. All the user needs to know in
order to choose is whether the floppy in or out of the drive.

Don't use the floppy for any sort of data storage, just for the boot.
This will make it easy to create spare floppies.

HTH
-pk
 
D

Dragon MoonShadow

Patrick said:
One simple manual way would be to set the BIOS to boot from diskette first,
and use a boot floppy for the DOS boot. All the user needs to know in
order to choose is whether the floppy in or out of the drive.

Don't use the floppy for any sort of data storage, just for the boot.
This will make it easy to create spare floppies.

HTH
-pk

Thankx... any other ideas... this is a rack mount system that only has
front space for two drives and has a cd and an internal zip in it. if
it weren't for the key press requirement for boot from cd I could just
do that w/ a cd.
 
S

Shenan Stanley

Dragon said:
I'm supporting a blind musician that has a program that has to run
in DOS. But the system also needs to be accessible to the rest of
his Win 2K/XP network. I've been trying to make it work using a 98
client but that is not working at all.

I know it possible to setup a dual boot system for DOS/Win XP but is
there a way to make it blind accessible or to setup scripts to
automate the change so it doesn't sit at the which OS screen
forever. Due to system clock timing issues running in emulation
really isn't an option as far as I understand it.

"has to run in DOS" I suppose means it does not work in Compatibility mode?
Perhaps as a Windows 95?

Won't work in a DOS prompt?

No version of it ever made for Windows?
 
N

Nepatsfan

(e-mail address removed),
Dragon MoonShadow said:
I'm supporting a blind musician that has a program that has
to run in DOS. But the system also needs to be accessible
to the rest of his Win 2K/XP network. I've been trying to
make it work using a 98 client but that is not working at
all.

I know it possible to setup a dual boot system for DOS/Win
XP but is there a way to make it blind accessible or to
setup scripts to automate the change so it doesn't sit at
the which OS screen forever. Due to system clock timing
issues running in emulation really isn't an option as far as
I understand it.


Any help would be great
Thanx

Before you try the dual boot route, you might want to look into
this free program from Microsoft.

Virtual PC 2004 Product Overview
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtualpc/evaluation/overview2004.mspx

Microsoft Virtual PC 2004 Technical Overview
http://download.microsoft.com/downl...64397178b4f/Virtual_PC_Technical_Overview.doc

Download Details Virtual PC 2004 SP1
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...9D-DFA8-40BF-AFAF-20BCB7F01CD1&displaylang=en

Good luck

Nepatsfan
 
J

John Weiss

Dragon MoonShadow said:
Thankx... any other ideas... this is a rack mount system that only has
front space for two drives and has a cd and an internal zip in it.

Will it boot from a USB floppy? My laptop will, and I suspect many modern
desktops will...
 
D

Dragon MoonShadow

Shenan said:
"has to run in DOS" I suppose means it does not work in Compatibility mode?
Perhaps as a Windows 95?

Won't work in a DOS prompt?

No version of it ever made for Windows?

I was running it in Win 98 by shutting down the system to DOS mode. I
can't get Win 98 working on the 2k/XP network... put a hd in and same
system w/ XP works on network....

I haven't been able to try running the software in what passes as
compatibility mode in XP will be trying that the next time I can get a
chance to work on his systems.

And no at the moment there is no Win software as this is a midi
sequencer software and drivers don't exist for the hardware for
anything past 98 as I understand it.
 
D

Dragon MoonShadow

John said:
Will it boot from a USB floppy? My laptop will, and I suspect many modern
desktops will...
No usb support on the mb and no space to add a usb card.
 
C

C.Joseph Drayton

Nepatsfan said:
(e-mail address removed),


Before you try the dual boot route, you might want to look into
this free program from Microsoft.

Virtual PC 2004 Product Overview
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtualpc/evaluation/overview2004.mspx

Microsoft Virtual PC 2004 Technical Overview
http://download.microsoft.com/downl...64397178b4f/Virtual_PC_Technical_Overview.doc

Download Details Virtual PC 2004 SP1
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...9D-DFA8-40BF-AFAF-20BCB7F01CD1&displaylang=en

Good luck

Nepatsfan
Hey Nepatsfan,

Great idea. I was just going to recommend it. The VPC runs very well
and is VERY to easy to install. I am now running 4 different VPCs
on my system for software testing.

Ciao . . . C.Joseph

"When hope is lost . . . the spirit dies."
-- Lao Tzu

http://blog.tlerma.com/
 

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