Running games in DOS

[nightcrawler]

Hey, I've been on a bit of an abandonware downloading spree. Most of these games run in dos, and I'm having some great troubles with this. For most of the games I try and load, I get an error before any sort of game screen appears.

 

I'm running on windows XP, if you need more information , I'd be happy to oblige.

[Edwards]

You may need to be running in a real DOS environment for some games, not just XP's DOS emulator. Alternately, try DOSBox, which is a better DOS emulator than XP has.

[nightcrawler]

How do I utilize dosbox? I have it open etc, it's at it's DOSsy menu, I have the zip file open that contains my .exe . Where do I go from here?

[Edwards]

I have absolutely no idea, sorry.

[facugaich]

In DOSbox you have to first mount your HDD, I don't remember how though, probably something like "mount <DRIVELETTER>". It should be in the manual.

 

Once that's done you can browse the folders in that drive and execute programs like the real DOS. You should unzip the exe file to some folder and then run it with DOSBox.

 

EDIT: Here you go

 

(I can't believe I knew something Edward didn't )

Edited February 6, 2006 by facugaich

[Edwards]

(I can't believe I knew something Edward didn't )

I'm reminded of the quote:

 

 

My area of expertise is limited to what you can't put in the can, plus the certain knowledge that a phone number exists.

 

from the TV episode where Dilbert wants to get rid of some obselete equipment, and the PHB stops him, knowing only that you can't throw old hardware into the garbage can, and that there's some sort of phone number to call.