What The Hell Is Dos All About?

[Vince]

Hey,

I can't seem to be able to play any games. When I try to download a DOSBox, or whatever you call it, there are so many I don't know which one to get. I'm also not completely sure what a friggin' DosBox or mirror is anyway. Help me out, please.

[A. J. Raffles]

I'm not really the best person to explain what DOSBox does exactly, but basically it creates an emulated DOS environment that tricks your computer into believing it's running DOS. So old games which require DOS can be run in this artificial DOS environment.
About which version to choose, just get the latest version for Windows. Mirrors are just different places to download it from so the servers don't get too busy, so you needn't worry about those too much.
Did that help you at all?

[Guest]

Hey,

yeah, that helps out quite a bit I suppose. Thanks man.

[Sebatianos]

Well I guess you haven't heard of MS-DOS yet (probably one of the younger users), otherwise DOSBox would seem rather self explanatory.

Once you download DOSBox and install it you might have some questions on how to use it. Don't be afraid to ask, but you'll need some patience to get it to work the first time!

[punch999]

You would have to be 3 and live under a rock and not know what dos is.

[Vince]

You're a real funny man punch999. Cut out the bull comments, I just needed some help.

[punch999]

I know i am cant you just see me im a funny person. almost as funny as your moms face! :w00t: :w00t:


Not flaming anymore

[Vince]

Look, I came to this forum looking for help on DOS. I got what I needed from the first two people who replied, therefore your first comment wasn't necessary and just plain stupid. Just to let you know, I got the link for this website yesterday... I've yet to hear of anybody who's managed to work out everything about freeware within 24 hours.

As for the mum jokes, they're old and crap. It's not even insulting. Judging by your display picture, you might want to hit puberty before you try starting and argument with someone.

As for not flaming anymore, I'll either take that as gesture of not wanting to deepen this conversation, or you chickening out. I'm betting on the latter because I can see who's looking at this post. And guess what? It's you! You're just sitting there, eagerly awaiting a reply from me, and yet you don't want to be a part of this anymore. Usually funny men (or in your case, 'spot stricken teens') tell the jokes as opposed to being the behind of them. Isn't that ironic?

[Kon-Tiki]

If you have any more questions 'bout DosBox, we have a DosBox FAQ (http://www.abandonia.com/main.php?nav=index&FAQ=1), which's made especially for people who want to learn how to work with it ;) It's a bit hidden away inside the main FAQ, though.

[punch999]

Which involves using the search button.

Even my "pre-pubesent" self knows about that

Oh and this isnt freeware its called....ABANDONWARE!

[Blood-Pigggy]

You are one of the most unhelpful people I have ever met.

:D

[Kon-Tiki]

Punch, you could try being a bit less offensive and actually help when somebody asks a fair question <_<

[punch999]

sorry its in my short temperment and love for your mom jokes.

will try to be better next time. :(

[Tom Henrik]

Pay no attention to Punch.

[The Fifth Horseman]

A suggestion for Vince: Get a really old, old machine. Shouldn't cost more then 20-50 bucks, depending on how powerful it is. Then you can install DOS on it and play these games like they were meant to.

[Kon-Tiki]

Heehee, I reassembled one 'bout a year ago, from scrap parts my kid bro kept. Didn't run at all, so had to create a heatsink. Sisalrope and a standard 80x80 fan did the trick... but some IDE controllers must've been busted, as I couldn't get both HD and CD-rom to work at the same time. Still, we called it Bob, and put some games on it through diskettes. 't Is a cool way to play the old games, if you can get a comp in top shape for it. I wasn't so lucky, as the parts were kept by my kid bro, who proves how strong electronics are, by sitting on 286 mobos and combing his hair with 66MHz CPUs (and trust me... his hair's greasy before he does that, which can't do much good to it)

[The Fifth Horseman]

I'm on a lookout for a proper 486 motherboard right now. See, it's about the only part of my old PC that needs replacement - maybe also the CPU - but the rest is still in place.
Dang. To fry such an awesome 486 motherboard as the one I had is a mortal sin - and no one else is responsible my myself...

[Kon-Tiki]

What 'bout blowing up the last ATE PSU you could find? Makes all the old hardware useless, it does.

[The Fifth Horseman]

Fortunately, such a plight is not possible for me. :) I have access to about half dozen working ones at my workplace, since we had a lot of broken hardware here.

[Bobbin Threadbare]

Anyway, back on the topic of DOSBox. Though I think that Un registered dude's gone here's a thing you really should know (Nyarr, I can use normal DOS unlike you XP users and still know how to use DOSbox). Mounting a drive:

mount c:\path\to\all\of\your\dos\games <
I think that's right. I've not used it in a while. Should mount as Z:\ though.
Z:\ should be the selcevted drive.
cd\monkey1<
monkey.exe

Alt+Enter for fullscreen

Normal DOS is funner.
C:\WINDOWS\> C:\pkzip\pkunzip.exe -d -e C:\Mydocu~1\zipfil~1\monkey.zip
Inflating...
Extracting: disk01.lec...
Extracting: disk02.lec........
Extracting: disk03.lec..
Extracting: monkey.exe........
(4 files sucessfully unzipped)


C:\My Documents\Zip Files\Monkey\> monkey.exe
Welcome to The Secret Of Monkey Island

Fun.

[Vince]

Thanks all for your help.

By the way, i never realised how much bloody jargon could be used in the space of about 4 posts. Haha.

To reply the one who called himself 'Punch' (haha), so much for not flaming again, and also, abandonware is basically just the same as freeware. Oh, and , since i'm an unregistered user i might as well go ahead and say F U C K you.

Thanks everyone else.

[A. J. Raffles]

Originally posted by Vince@Sep 12 2005, 03:10 PM
To reply the one who called himself 'Punch' (haha), so much for not flaming again, and also, abandonware is basically just the same as freeware.
Well, no, it's not, really. "Freeware" is used to describe games that actually ARE free (i.e. they have been officially released into the public domain or were released as freeware to begin with by their makers), whereas "Abandonware" is not a technical term and is strictly speaking a violation of copyright laws. So there is a difference between the two.

And while I do understand that you were annoyed by punch's lame comments, Vince, I don't think you should flame right back at him, even if you're not a registered member and can't be warned for it.:not_ok:

[The Fifth Horseman]

abandonware is basically just the same as freeware Abandonware is illegal, Freeware is not.

since i'm an unregistered user i might as well go ahead and say F U C K you
No flaming, please. Your IP adress is logged with every post you make, and if a guest is found to behave badly, his very IP can be banned.

[Vince]

OK, sorry about the whole swearing thing, but i didn't do anything to get him to act like he did. I don't see what the point is in annoying somebodyfor no good reason.

If abandonware is illegal, why is abandonia not closed down?

[Tulac]

It is illegal but it's not prosecuted ;)

[Kon-Tiki]

That's cause it's in a gray zone, abandonware. Technically, it's illegal, but most companies can't be bothered to put time, money and effort in having their games taken down. We do take note of games being ESA-protected or still giving a revenue for the developers/publishers, and if they explicitely ask to take a game of them down, we will, but overall, they either can't be bothered to put resources in against us, or simply don't mind it.

[Honkers]

If it's illegal in the first place, I would rather that all ESA protected games would not be blocked. If I ever become a lawyer, I'd love to destroy the stupid ESA. (MWA HA HA!) :sniper: :Titan: :twisted: :karate: :whip: I like these emoticons; can you tell?

[Kon-Tiki]

They're just doing their jobs too, really. You wouldn't go after the baker for it too, now would you?

[Blood-Pigggy]

Besides, if we didn't take down the games ESA asked us to, they would close the site down probably, even if the others don't.

[Eagle of Fire]

I leave for a few days and what I get when I come back?

Be happy that I'm in a good mood and that I'll simply close this thread since the question already been answered.