Actually, it is likely, especially where some DOS games are concerned.
There are all sorts of timing loops that break either because of
absolute speed, or because of variance between speeds of certain
instructions - e.g. a game might run a test loop of instructions A,
derive a timescaling constant from this, and apply it to instructions
B. If the ratio of execution times of A to B changes, as is often the
case when processor cores are optimised, all bets are off.
Examples: Tyrian (won't run), Descent (timing issues)
As it is, Win98 has a timing issue beyond 2GHz or so, and Win95 had an
issue starting from 350MHz or so (AMD). Several commonly-used code
libraries have speed limits too, e.g. some Turbo Pascal runtimes fail
well before the 1GHz range.
Old DOS games will not always run correctly under XP because the DOS
compatibility mode provided is only an emulation. XP builds a "fortress" of
sorts that protects the hardware from direct access by applications. Many
older DOS programs under XP simply won't run since it's not uncommon for
them to access the hardware directly (e.g., video card).
That is absolutely true, and applies irrespective of processor speed
or RAM scalability issues (some DOS apps may fail with big RAM if
their address fields wrap round at 16M, 64M etc.).
For this reason, I'd advise dual-booting either a full Win9x with XP
(requires two partitions) or a DOS mode (can share a partition, as
long as XP is set to ignore Config.sys and Autoexec.bat).
In both cases, C: must not be NTFS and the older OS should be
installed before XP is installed.
You don't have these same problems w/ Win95 and Win98 because
they're based on the old *true* MS-DOS 6.22 or MS-DOS 7.0/71
False. DOS apps may work better in Win9x than NT because the
emulation allows more of the direct hardware access that DOS apps
(especially games) require, but in some cases you will find games that
require DOS mode. Examples: Indy 500, Lemmings (mouse and graphics
issues), the Jill of the Jungle series. Oddly, sometimes you will
find DOS games that run better in Win9x GUI than DOS mode, where VESA
and sound enulation works better than the modern raw hardware.
Anyway, if you intend to install XP, I recommend dual booting MS-DOS and XP,
in separate partitions. Play your games in MS-DOS, do everything else in
XP. You then have complete, normal, unabridged access to all the DOS games,
yet access to all that Windows XP has to offer w/o the hassle of DOS games
that either won't run, or run incorrectly. Again, the DOS in XP isn't DOS
at all, it's an emulation, which means it is, to some degree, incomplete.
Yep. I might suggest the DOS mode from Win9x rather than MS-DOS 6.22,
as it's a better DOS and can "see" FAT32. Or you could go FAT16 for
C:, install DOS 6.22, then install Win98, so that you have a choice
between "DOS 7.1" from Win98 or DOS 6.22 as "Previous MS-DOS".
If you install a boot manager like BootIt NG (
http://www.bootitng.com ),
you can dual boot MS-DOS and XP rather easily.
You can also use XPs built-in dual-boot support do the same thing, tho
the method varies. The BootIt NG approach requires dual primary
partitions, whereas the XP approach requires everything to share the
same C: as the starting point before optionally shifting to other
logical volumes for the bulk of the OS.
Yes, it certainly does - and because of XP's brain-dead formatter, you
will find BootIt NG useful here even if you use it only as a partition
setup tool, without installing it as boot manager.
They are totally different file systems in the same way that FAT16 and
FAT32 are not, and the differences are profound...
NTFS strengths:
- faster access for large numbers of files in a single directory
- more space-efficient cluster size on large volumes
- supports >4G for single files
- supports HDs over 137G
- stores small files entirely within directory, thus faster
- allows per-user access security at the individual file level
- smaller memory footprint for large volumes
- automatically reverses interrupted file system transactions
- "fixes" bad clusters on the fly (not such a good idea IMO)
NTFS weaknesses:
- cannot be read from Win9x or DOS mode
- thus cannot use DOS-based repair, recovery or av tools
- thus cannot host Win9x or DOS mode boot files or code
- has only the non-interactive ChkDsk for maintenance
- extra overhead of per-user access security etc.
- automatically discards data from interrupted file transactions
- "fixes" bad clusters on the fly (you'd rather know about those)
- poor choice of available data recovery tools (none free)
- poor choice of formal malware management options (none free)
Personally, until I can match the repairability/recovery of FATxx and
perform formal malware management, I avoid NTFS. In your context I'd
suggest avoiding "one big C:" and would suggest maintaining the
ability to dual-boot between XP and at least a DOS mode.
XP can't format FAT32 > 32G, but will use these volumes if they are
created and formatted by a compitent partitioning tool. But FAT32
can't go beyond the 137G barrier, no matter what formats it.
-------------------- ----- ---- --- -- - - - -
Running Windows-based av to kill active malware is like striking
a match to see if what you are standing in is water or petrol.
