• Thin client PC to run MS-

    From Rob Mccart@VERT/CAPCITY2 to DENN on Wednesday, November 26, 2025 08:05:00
    MSDOS 6.22 is limited to 2 gb hard drive partition. Better to create this
    >partition first, if you plan to have multiple partitions on your Hard Drive.

    Yes I realize that :) not sure if I'm going to install MS-DOS 6.22 or windows
    >95.

    The other issue is that DOS partitioning wastes a huge amount of space
    if the patitions are (to it) quite large. I often found myself breaking
    up a drive that the OS could probably handle as-is into 4 or 5 partitions
    to cut back on wasted space.

    I ran a suped up Win 98SE system for way too long (2020) using native
    DOS programs on it as well as Windows software.

    FAT can handle 2 gigabyte partitions as stated, but FAT 32 can handle
    2 Terrabytes. Win 98 comes with DOS 7.1 usually but you can use
    DOS 6.22 with it if you prefer by installing 6.22 first and then
    installing Win 98 and telling it which version of DOS to boot with.

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  • From Dumas Walker@VERT/CAPCITY2 to Rob Mccart on Wednesday, November 26, 2025 08:36:30
    Re: Thin client PC to run MS-
    By: Rob Mccart to DENN on Wed Nov 26 2025 08:05:00

    The other issue is that DOS partitioning wastes a huge amount of space
    if the patitions are (to it) quite large. I often found myself breaking
    up a drive that the OS could probably handle as-is into 4 or 5 partitions
    to cut back on wasted space.

    I can remember back in the days taking a large drive and partitioning it into several "drives" of ~120MB. ;)

    Mike
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  • From Denn@VERT/OUTWEST to Rob Mccart on Wednesday, November 26, 2025 15:15:53
    Re: Thin client PC to run MS-
    By: Rob Mccart to DENN on Wed Nov 26 2025 08:05 am

    FAT can handle 2 gigabyte partitions as stated, but FAT 32 can handle
    2 Terrabytes. Win 98 comes with DOS 7.1 usually but you can use
    DOS 6.22 with it if you prefer by installing 6.22 first and then installing Win 98 and telling it which version of DOS to boot with.

    That's actually a great idea, I am going to install MSDOS 6.22 soon, I think I still have a windows 98 CD, I think I'll give that a try.

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  • From Rob Mccart@VERT/CAPCITY2 to DUMAS WALKER on Friday, November 28, 2025 11:43:10
    The other issue is that DOS partitioning wastes a huge amount of space
    > > if the patitions are (to it) quite large. I often found myself breaking
    > > up a drive that the OS could probably handle as-is into 4 or 5 partitions
    > > to cut back on wasted space.

    I can remember back in the days taking a large drive and partitioning it
    >into several "drives" of ~120MB. ;)

    Maybe I'm thinking of earlier systems but if I recall there was a
    huge storage waste reduction if you went to partitions of less than
    about 32 gig. I recall dividing a 160 gig drive into 5 drives.

    My Suped up Win 98 system had stuff they never considered in 1998
    such as 128 meg of Ram to go with the 160 gig hard drive.
    All software was updated to the max. Most of the Windows programs
    were replaced with Win ME versions and the Drive Explorer, Browser,
    Antivirus system, Notepad, Write, and MS Office programs were all
    replaced with other better, non-Microsoft options, etc..

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  • From Rob Mccart@VERT/CAPCITY2 to DENN on Friday, November 28, 2025 11:43:10
    FAT can handle 2 gigabyte partitions as stated, but FAT 32 can handle
    2 Terrabytes. Win 98 comes with DOS 7.1 usually but you can use
    DOS 6.22 with it if you prefer by installing 6.22 first and then
    installing Win 98 and telling it which version of DOS to boot with.

    That's actually a great idea, I am going to install MSDOS 6.22 soon,
    > I think I still have a windows 98 CD, I think I'll give that a try.

    I saw that online when I was looking up some of the old compatabilities
    but I've never tried that myself so, maybe do a search online for that
    to get exact instructions if it's not obvious.

    I never worried too much about the DOS version since everything I was
    using at the time worked in v7.1, v6.22 and probably earlier ones as
    well, although I seem to recall some issues with DOS 5.

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  • From poindexter FORTRAN@VERT/REALITY to Rob Mccart on Friday, November 28, 2025 15:18:56
    Re: Thin client PC to run MS-
    By: Rob Mccart to DUMAS WALKER on Fri Nov 28 2025 11:43 am

    Maybe I'm thinking of earlier systems but if I recall there was a huge storage waste reduction if you went to partitions of less than about 32 gig. I recall dividing a 160 gig drive into 5 drives.

    It all depended on the size of the files you stored - with 4k clusters, if you had a ton of files smaller than 4K, each one would occupy 1 4k cluster on the hard disk. If you had hundreds of small files, the wasted space would add up.

    Smaller partitions meant smaller cluster sizes and more efficient storage of small files.

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  • From Dumas Walker@VERT/CAPCITY2 to NIGHTFOX on Saturday, November 29, 2025 17:47:13
    But for real multitasking with real MSDOS, Win 3.1 with a Windowed MSDOS over it is the best for me. My exemple was: you are playing Zork over MSDOS and you want to takes notes with Notepad at the same time. Desqview
    is really a cool thing but eating all the memory.

    For multitasking in DOS, I think QEMM with DeqView was perhaps better than Windows 3.1, as there was no GUI to use resources.

    You are correct, there was no competition really. Only thing Windows 3.x
    was better at was running Windows applications that wouldn't run under DOS.
    OTOH, any DOS programs that wouldn't run with QEMM/DV were very unlikely
    to run under Win 3.x, either.


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  • From Dumas Walker@VERT/CAPCITY2 to NIGHTFOX on Saturday, November 29, 2025 17:47:13
    Maybe. I will check this out. This is interesting for me. I have both installed in some hard drives. DESQView v.1.x version dont have a GUI, bu
    version DESQView X 1.x and DESQView X 2.x have one. If I remember DESQVie
    1.xx have just a system menu wich remains hidden if not used.

    Interesting.. I used a version of DESQView without a GUI; I didn't realize they made one that had a GUI.

    "Normal" DESQView (no "X"), which most people are most familiar with,
    didn't have a GUI.

    DESQView-X (the X standing for, IIRC, "X window") did indeed have a GUI.
    If you knew what you were doing, you could set up an application on a DV-X
    box and be able to run it remotely on a linux box. I never could get the reverse to work, though.

    If you re-read his post, he is talking about DESQView-X.


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  • From Dumas Walker@VERT/CAPCITY2 to ROB MCCART on Saturday, November 29, 2025 17:47:13
    I can remember back in the days taking a large drive and partitioning it
    >into several "drives" of ~120MB. ;)

    Maybe I'm thinking of earlier systems but if I recall there was a
    huge storage waste reduction if you went to partitions of less than
    about 32 gig. I recall dividing a 160 gig drive into 5 drives.

    Yes. This would have been on a DOS machine that didn't run Windows and
    wasn't 32-bit. IIRC, it was when DOS (under Windows) became 32-bit that
    the storate waste was no longer considered a problem.... or maybe
    it was just that HDs got so cheap no one cared! :D

    Mike


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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to Dumas Walker on Saturday, November 29, 2025 17:17:46
    Re: Thin client PC to run MS-
    By: Dumas Walker to NIGHTFOX on Sat Nov 29 2025 05:47 pm

    "Normal" DESQView (no "X"), which most people are most familiar with, didn't have a GUI.

    DESQView-X (the X standing for, IIRC, "X window") did indeed have a GUI. If you knew what you were doing, you could set up an application on a DV-X box and be able to run it remotely on a linux box. I never could get the reverse to work, though.

    If you re-read his post, he is talking about DESQView-X.

    Ah.. Yeah, I wasn't aware of the existence of DESQView-X.

    Nightfox

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  • From poindexter FORTRAN@VERT/REALITY to Dumas Walker on Saturday, November 29, 2025 18:54:28
    Re: Thin client PC to run MS-
    By: Dumas Walker to NIGHTFOX on Sat Nov 29 2025 05:47 pm

    For multitasking in DOS, I think QEMM with DeqView was perhaps better than
    Windows 3.1, as there was no GUI to use resources.

    You are correct, there was no competition really. Only thing Windows 3.x wa better at was running Windows applications that wouldn't run under DOS. OTOH any DOS programs that wouldn't run with QEMM/DV were very unlikely to run under Win 3.x, either.

    Bending the rules a bit, OS/2 rocked at running DOS programs. I ran my BBS on it and ran OS/2 at work to support Windows desktops and Novell servers. I could have multiple DOS windows open, even VDMs with separate versions of DOS...

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  • From Rob Mccart@VERT/CAPCITY2 to POINDEXTER FORTRAN on Sunday, November 30, 2025 10:17:06
    Maybe I'm thinking of earlier systems but if I recall there was a huge
    > > storage waste reduction if you went to partitions of less than about 32 gi
    > > I recall dividing a 160 gig drive into 5 drives.

    It all depended on the size of the files you stored - with 4k clusters, if yo
    >ad a ton of files smaller than 4K, each one would occupy 1 4k cluster on the
    >d disk. If you had hundreds of small files, the wasted space would add up.

    Smaller partitions meant smaller cluster sizes and more efficient storage of
    >ll files.

    I was probably thinking about FAT 16 and on larger drives that used
    a cluster size of up to 64kb on 2 to 4 gig partitions..

    And the file size wasn't the only consideration because the final
    cluser for the file was not filled and so would waste up to that
    much space for every file on the drive.

    Even FAT 32 used 16 kb clusters on partitions/drives over 16 gig.

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  • From Dumas Walker@VERT/CAPCITY2 to NIGHTFOX on Sunday, November 30, 2025 11:23:51
    "Normal" DESQView (no "X"), which most people are most familiar with, didn't have a GUI.

    DESQView-X (the X standing for, IIRC, "X window") did indeed have a GUI. If you knew what you were doing, you could set up an application on a DV-
    box and be able to run it remotely on a linux box. I never could get the
    reverse to work, though.

    If you re-read his post, he is talking about DESQView-X.

    Ah.. Yeah, I wasn't aware of the existence of DESQView-X.

    It never had much of a footprint, or much marketing that I am aware of. I
    was a long time DV user but never heard of DV-X until long after
    Quarterdeck was no more.


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  • From Dumas Walker@VERT/CAPCITY2 to POINDEXTER FORTRAN on Sunday, November 30, 2025 11:23:51
    For multitasking in DOS, I think QEMM with DeqView was perhaps better than
    Windows 3.1, as there was no GUI to use resources.

    You are correct, there was no competition really. Only thing Windows 3.x w
    better at was running Windows applications that wouldn't run under DOS. OTO
    any DOS programs that wouldn't run with QEMM/DV were very unlikely to run under Win 3.x, either.

    Bending the rules a bit, OS/2 rocked at running DOS programs. I ran my BBS on it and ran OS/2 at work to support Windows desktops and Novell servers. I coul
    have multiple DOS windows open, even VDMs with separate versions of DOS...

    IIRC, I am thinking that the only programs I tried running under DV that wouldn't work also wouldn't work under OS/2 -- or at least I never went to
    the trouble to try.

    I am positive I did try Simcity 2000 and it did *not* work. Another that
    I had trouble with was PC-Write and, for that matter, Wordperfect 5 for
    DOS. I never tried either of those under OS/2 but suspect that one or both might just work.


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  • From Rob Mccart@VERT/CAPCITY2 to DUMAS WALKER on Monday, December 01, 2025 08:17:35
    Maybe I'm thinking of earlier systems but if I recall there was a
    >> huge storage waste reduction if you went to partitions of less than
    >> about 32 gig. I recall dividing a 160 gig drive into 5 drives.

    Yes. This would have been on a DOS machine that didn't run Windows and
    >wasn't 32-bit. IIRC, it was when DOS (under Windows) became 32-bit that
    >the storate waste was no longer considered a problem.... or maybe
    >it was just that HDs got so cheap no one cared! :D

    As I mentioned elsewhere even using DOS 7 with FAT 32 could give you
    quite a bit of space wasted (up to 16kb) for every one of the oftem
    tens of thousands of individual files on the drive.

    I think it was my Suped up Win 98SE system where I was still having
    to divide the drive into 4 or 5 parts.. but as you say, the drives
    had started getting so big that it probably didn't matter that much.
    It was just a leftover habit from older systems.

    My first PC type computer (as opposed to Apple) was an 8088 with
    a 32 meg (MEG!) hard drive (1985 or 86) so optimizing drive space
    was a little more beaten into your head.. B)

    Back then that 'cheap' hard drive could run you $1400, to go
    along with your 5.25" floppy drive at $400..

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  • From phigan@VERT/TACOPRON to Dumas Walker on Tuesday, December 02, 2025 03:21:59
    Re: Thin client PC to run MS-
    By: Dumas Walker to POINDEXTER FORTRAN on Sun Nov 30 2025 11:23 am

    I had trouble with was PC-Write and, for that matter, Wordperfect 5 for

    Odd, I don't remember having an issue with WordPerfect 5.1 and DV, but maybe I just didn't use them together... which is hard to imagine ;). Maybe one day I'll be curious enough to try this.

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  • From poindexter FORTRAN@VERT/REALITY to phigan on Tuesday, December 02, 2025 07:13:44
    phigan wrote to Dumas Walker <=-

    Odd, I don't remember having an issue with WordPerfect 5.1 and DV, but maybe I just didn't use them together... which is hard to imagine ;). Maybe one day I'll be curious enough to try this.

    We were talking about Desqview compatibility, yes?

    I think it had something to do with how programs wrote to the screen,
    games for example, didn't run well (if at all)



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  • From Dumas Walker@VERT/CAPCITY2 to phigan on Tuesday, December 02, 2025 08:24:28
    Re: Thin client PC to run MS-
    By: phigan to Dumas Walker on Tue Dec 02 2025 03:21:59

    I had trouble with was PC-Write and, for that matter, Wordperfect 5 for

    Odd, I don't remember having an issue with WordPerfect 5.1 and DV, but maybe just didn't use them together... which is hard to imagine ;). Maybe one day I'll be curious enough to try this.

    I might be mistaken about that, but I think I had to exit DV in order to fire up WP 5.x. If that was the case, I might have been able to play around with the settings to get it to work but I didn't use WP enough by then to really need to.
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