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[bobinator1992]

Just curious. I have a bunch of regular DOS CDs and a couple of ISOs.

[Scatty]

Slightly wrong forum, it belongs actually into Troubleshooting one.
But anyway, to mount a CD or an ISO (mounted with DaemonTools for example) in DosBox, first you need to know the letter of the CD-drive / mounted ISO virtual drive, then:
mount x x:\ -t cdrom
where first x ist the letter you want to assign to the mounted drive in DosBox, and the second x is the actual letter of the CD-drive / ISO. So if you want to mount CD-ROM drive, which is under the letter D on your computer, in DosBox as drive F, it would look like this:
mount f d:\ -t cdrom

[bobinator1992]

Oh, sorry, I thought this was the Troubleshooting forum.

Thanks for the help!

[_r.u.s.s.]

that is not a good solution since the cd rom will get emulated twice and the game can go really slow. dosbox knows imgmount command that's all the trick

[The Fifth Horseman]

Bobinator, you really should read the readme file that comes with DOSBox. It explains all commands you need.

[humorguy]

To avoid all the DOS commands, just get a front end that allows you to just choose the CDROM drive and then does the work for you. Same with setting the soundcard, memory, the whole ball of wax. Don't know why front ends are not mentioned more often to DOSBox newbies. Heck, I am not a DOSBox newbie any more, but using a front end like D.O.G. just makes the setting up so easy you are concentraing on the game a lot quicker, and after setting the game up in D.O.G. a double click of the mouse on the game title and your in DOSBox playing the game!

[_r.u.s.s.]

Originally Posted by humorguy

Don't know why front ends are not mentioned more often to DOSBox newbies.

cause then they wouldn't get what actually happens and come asking about every little error

[humorguy]

Originally Posted by _r.u.s.s.

cause then they wouldn't get what actually happens and come asking about every little error

The number of DOSBox questions in Game thread are absolutely enormous. Mostly because, in effect, you have to learn DOS type commands to utilize it fully. Some of these commands are less than intuitive. Front Ends in comparison make DOSBox use very easy and you can do quite sophisticated things without much difficulty. I have used front ends for years now, and have had little in the way of problems.

If people knew about front ends, by having them mentioned in the DOSBox help FAQ, for example, we wouldn't have DOSBox setup or tweaking questions literally every 5 posts in every game thread on this site! And may I say, if you do something wrong in DOSBox, or DOSBox gives you an error, isn't that the same person coming here asking how to fix it? For every front end question we would get, we get twenty or more DOSBox questions.

If you spent any time at all in the games threads you would see how DOSBox questions come up very frequently indeed. If we had 'promoted' front end more, I think we would, at the very least, have half the amount of time being taken replying to the same DOSBox questions over and over again, as gamers that have only ever used tabbing and mouse clicking in boxes for every other game/utility they use, rather than DOS commands in the form of mount d d: -t cdrom! (And that's one of the easier commands in DOSBox!) Does it not make more sense to click on the Drives tab, click on the CDRom tab, click on the down arrow and choose the 'X' drive, then a few clicks to do the hard drive, a couple clicks for sound, graphics and cycles and your done! I have 4 pre-set profiles that between them run every DOS Game I have and one that runs 90% of them. Once this profile is set up you can install a new game in a couple clicks, and thereafter just open the front end and double click on the game title to run it.

When I think of what you have to do in DOSbox to set up different soundcards and graphics modes and more sophisticated things for a game, I KNOW it will generate a 100 times more questions - because average gamers don't want to/know how to fiddle with DOSBox commands.

I believe that front ends aren't mentioned because hardcore PC gamers are elitist. They spit on front ends like they spit on casual games like the Sims. They LIKE that it's hard and therefore they keep their special status, and it makes their lives seem more full to be constantly showing others how to mount a hard drive or CDRom , etc in DOSBox. If everybody was told about front ends there would be many fewer questions and the advice givers wouldn't feel so important. They don't care that retro PC gaming could be 5 times bigger if more average gamers knew about front ends, and they don't care how many gamers, trying their first DOS game, are told to get DOSBox, get confused and frustrated with the command structure and give up on retro PC gaming altogether - all the time never having being told of front ends!!

I know I am beating my head against a brick wall, this is just another symptom of hardcore PC gaming: Keep it as hard as you can, that keeps lots of people else out, and that helps them feel 'special' about the skills you have that others don't or can't manage.... Bit like when a hardcore gamer says to a newbie 'why don't you just build your own PC?' I might like retro PC gaming, but I am not sure I like the attitudes of retro gamers on this site.

[_r.u.s.s.]

but when people learn dosbox, they learn how it really works! and then there wouldn't be unsolved simple problems with stuff it they understand the way it works, in case something tiny is wrong

[humorguy]

Originally Posted by _r.u.s.s.

but when people learn dosbox, they learn how it really works! and then there wouldn't be unsolved simple problems with stuff it they understand the way it works, in case something tiny is wrong

That is so elitist it confirms everything I said! You ant to play one or two DOS games and you start trying to understand DOSBox and it's horrendous because you have never dealt with DOS type commands! This frustrates you so you give up, or you immediately come her and ask how to mount a CEDRom, then the sound doesn't work, so you come back, then the graphics, so you come back, and on and on.

All I know is if that person had started with a front end he wouldn't have been so frustrated and would have been able to work out a front end a lot quicker - hence less frustration and less likelihood of giving up! At the same time, our threads would have more comments about the game instead of every third question being about DOSBox! Have the messages in the Games threads are DOSBox help! You can have 10 messages dealing with someone and their DOSBox problems on a certain game, and no one will ever mention trying a front end, instead they are happy to go on and on helping with the DOSBox problem. Well I don't go to the threads to read DOSBox question after DOSBox question, and I find it frustrating how some Game Threads are just 80% DOSBox questions!

Based on the Game Threads, it strikes me lots of people DON'T go on to learn DOSBox, because of it's difficulty they just learn what they need. But this means they regularly have problems with 'non-standard' DOS games.

I don;t know why you and others are so against front ends. You yourself R.U.S.S. have just said that somehow a DOSBox question is a valid question whereas a front end question would not. Why do you and others have this bias toward DOSBox? Why cannot you recommend someone to try a front end if he/she is struggling? I just don;t get it. Even the main DOSBox site puts the front end on the same site - so the DOSBox programmers are quite happy for people to use front ends on their program - so why aren't you?!

I don't get it, and suppose I never will. As I say, I see it as a form of elitism.