Best way to run multiple OS's on same machine (1 Viewer)

[Julian Reville]

Well, to answer my own stupid question, a web search revealed DOS drivers for the Teac, Mitsumi, and Ensoniq. Hopefully they will work.

Before trying the removable drive bit, I will once again try the boot disc and/or virtual boot disk using WIN98.

 

[JamesHl]

My post above suggests a way to do this, as does John's.

Yes, but can you do it without writing to some other kind of media, and/or rebooting at least once? I like being able to get from my other os that I wasn't thinking about beforehand.

 

[John_Berger]

Julian, you might even be able to get away with the core operating system just on the floppy disk plus the necessary sound drivers. I would still recommend just going with a straight DOS hard drive. I've done this as well for exactly this purpose. You should see Windows 3.1 fly on newer hardware! (No, I'm not kidding. I even got the TCP/IP drivers from Microsoft and connected it to my home network with DSL!) It's great nostalgia.

Incidentally, if you're using DOS 6.2, your drive should be 2 GB or less because DOS cannot recognize hard drives that are bigger than 2 GB. If you use a drive that has more space, the rest will be unavailable for you to use.

Just be warned that depending on how old the games are, they might not be compatible with newer hardware - in other words, they'll be so fast that you won't be able to play them. You'll need some kind of CPU slowdown utility. There was a SUPERB tool that game with the Ultima 1-8 collection that only stayed resident while you played the game called MoSlow. In fact, you executed the tool which then executed the game. It's was commercial product, but I can't find anything about it anymore except that it came with the Ultima Collection. I'm guessing that the company is long since gone, so the program might be available through alternate means.

 

[Julian Reville]

Just be warned that depending on how old the games are, they might not be compatible with newer hardware - in other words, they'll be so fast that you won't be able to play them

Oh, yeah! I found that out. Wing Commander I & II come to mind; I first played them on a 486/20 and they were great. On a Pentium II/350 (my current "old" computer) the alien craft zipped around like meteors.

Funny, some DOS games play fine under WIN98 with just a full-screen shortcut (Steel Panthers, Steel Panthers WWII & MBT, X-Wing, Tie Fighter); others seem to require a special MS-DOS reboot (US Navy Fighters, Strike Commander). On the PII/350 X-Wing performs superbly. Why couldn't all game designers have used this same type of code? When I think of all the buggy, crappy, non-standardized games that have been released (and many that I bought) over the years, it makes me never want to buy another game.

If all else fails, I have an OLD Pentium 200 that I will set up to run just DOS 6.22 and old games. But do I really need 3 computers on my desk?

 

[John_Berger]

I like being able to get from my other os that I wasn't thinking about beforehand.

This makes absolutely no sense to me. What are you talking about? Even with removable drives, if you boot into the wrong O/S, smack yourself in the forehead, shut down the system, remove, replace, power on. There is no difference between what you're talking about and what we're talking about. You sound like you're talking about using removable data drives, but that's not what we're talking about here.

Need to get your data to be common between the operating systems? Put the data on CD-R/W or on a separate D: drive that is accessible by both. Costs a bit of money? It could depending on whether the drives are lying around the house or whether drives need to be purchased. But there are several benefits that are inherent with multiple physical drives as well, not the least of which are throughput and reduced thrashing of the drives.

By the way, I do own Partition Magic. I've done the multiple-O/S-on-one-drive deal. I been on both sides of this particular fence. I personally converted from the multiple-O/S-on-one-drive to removable boot drives, and I'll never turn back or recommend otherwise. All that you need is that one instance when a hard drive fails (and it will eventually) or you run out of space on a partition and you'll realize that the multiple-O/S-on-one-drive concept is a cheap way out and can be far more of a headache if things go wrong that having removable boot drives.

 

[John_Berger]

If all else fails, I have an OLD Pentium 200 that I will set up to run just DOS 6.22 and old games. But do I really need 3 computers on my desk?

You could use a KVM switch to connect all three to one mouse, keyboard, and monitor. Besides, why do you need three? What's the third one for?

 

[JamesHl]

I'm trying to figure out what your hatred for rebooting is when it will have to be done regardless of what method you use.

This comment had to do with accessing files.

I don't have to reboot to get my files from windows to linux. I just mount the ntfs partition.

I'm not sure why the zealotry. I realize that your method is a perfectly effective and vald way of doing what we're talking about, I just think it's overkill and less convenient.

 

[John_Berger]

I realize that your method is a perfectly effective and vald way of doing what we're talking about, I just think it's overkill and less convenient.

You also didn't realize that I was talking about removable hard drive trays that let you switch operating system hard drives in a matter of seconds.

 

[Julian Reville]

You could use a KVM switch to connect all three to one mouse, keyboard, and monitor. Besides, why do you need three? What's the third one for?

Computer 1: P4/2.4GHz running XP; web, Quicken, TurboTax, audio file creation & CD burning; a few games

Computer 2: P2/350MHz running WIN98; more games

These 2 are already connected with a KVM (and soundcard) switch but I only bought a 2 computer model.

Computer 3: P/200MHz running DOS 6.22; recalcitrant DOS games that refuse to run on anything else.

I will probably just swap computers 2 & 3 around as needed. The desk is only so big.

 

[John_Berger]

Actually, your second computer might be a good candidate for a removable boot drive scenario like what we've been talking about. That way you can use the drive that is in the P/200 in the P2/350 and still have native DOS without the need for another physical system. Just switch hard drives. Again, depending on the game you most likely will still need something like MoSlow.

 

[JamesHl]

Well, I got the part about the trays, but I was unaware that they were also some kind of mechanism that does the plugging/unplugging for you. The backup contention is neither here nor there in this discussion; although your contention of losing two os's is valid, I use them both for the same things... do you have all your mp3s, whatever sort of work you do, etc., on all the drives? Or is that what you would use that FAT32 drive for?

 

[John_Berger]

do you have all your mp3s, whatever sort of work you do, etc., on all the drives? Or is that what you would use that FAT32 drive for?

My primary use for removable drives is on my video capture/edit/DVD authoring system. I have two removable boot drives and two non-removable data drives. The one removable hard drive is for capturing and editing; the other is for DVD authoring because the DVD authoring software that I use installs drivers that do not behave well with the other software. I also have two data drives (D: and E: ) on which I perform the editing and store the master DVD images. Because both boot drives are Windows 2000, all of the drives are NTFS and therefore the data drives are accessible from both boot drives.

The third boot drive that I have is used for experimenting with different software packages. When I'm ready to try something new out, I wipe out the drive and reinstall the O/S to guarantee that there are no incompatibilities from the previous "experiment". Again, the D: and E: drives are still accessible because I'm using Windows 2000.

For my other system, I have one hard drive that is used strictly for Windows 98 and another that is strictly for experimenting, primarily with Linux. As before, if I need to install something else, I just wipe out the Linux drive and install whatever other O/S I want without impacting the Win 98 drive at all. Any data that I need to be accessible from both operating systems (or indeed all of the systems on my network) are stored on my main PC, which is sharing its drives out.

 

[JamesHl]

See, I can understand this system in your case. It's just too much for what I do - schoolwork, programming, and general web browsing/mp3 playing etc.

Also, I don't have a choice in the matter right now as my primary machine is a laptop...

 

[John_Berger]

I don't have a choice in the matter right now as my primary machine is a laptop...

Um ... actually, my Gateway laptop allows me to switch hard drives by opening a door on the side.