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[gregor]

First of all i put this in this section since most comments on this topic are made here. If admins don't see it in that way, please move the thread according to your best judgement.

I see a lot of "it's still being sold" posts. but does anyone also take a look if the software is also supported? Can you get technical support for them?

"Abandonware is computer software which is no longer being sold or supported by its copyright holder."

Just as i suspected - programmes have to be supported (service) just like things that factories make and sell. Personally i can tell you that my factory considers 10 yearold applaince as abandoned. JUst ebcause we choosed to do so. After that time there is no guarantee for getting spare parts or tech support. However within the 10 years time full technical support is available. And i do believe this goes for services as well. Especially programmes.

Which opens another question. These days computers that you buy have preloaded Win XP. There should be support on how to make games (or programmes), made to work only in dos, work in todays systems. That's called technical support. And you have to offer it when you sell your product. Hence it appears if there is no more technical support you really can't sell it anymore. Because without special technical support the programme (game) doesne't work on today's computer systems.

An example would be a game i bought a long time ago called Terra Nova. It's a great game and has very cool movies. However later i bought better computer and uploaded WIN98 with FAT. The game didnt' work anymore because it seems that it only operates in DOS and FAT16. I immediatelly asked for official techsupport. They gave me some advices how to tweak my computer, but none of them worked. After a long while i learned a bit more about DOS, disk systems.... So i thought i would give it another try with some ideas prepared and some more questions (the game was still sold at the time). I tried to contact the support team again but they dind't exists anymore.

In my opinion that game should be abandoned as soon as it didn't work on my new PC. Just as most DOS games don't work on today's PC computer (the kinds you buy in stores) without propper tweaking programmes (Such as DOSBox).

Furthermore i seriously doubt that these games have included detailed instructions (a must in the EU to protect consumer) how to make them work on today's computers. Note that a lot of games have their system requirements specified as 486DX66Mhz or higher which means they MUST work on todays systems. Yet you all know very well that a lot of them don't work nowadays (some need moslo or similar). In fact there is a high chance that this kind of warez (edit: sorry i ment software here) is even illegal to sell because of this fact.