On 17 November 2017 at 19:02, Tomasz Rola <rto...@ceti.pl> wrote: > > Please excuse me if my remark is unnecessary, but if I read you right, > you have: > > 1. Downloaded "empty" disk image - which apparently boots enough to > display two dots
No. The original DR-DOS Enhancement Project website -- http://www.drdosprojects.de/ -- is no longer there. The download I found for 7.01-8 was here: https://archiveos.org/drdos/ This download includes what it claims is a bootable diskette. It is not a bootable diskette. It is an empty diskette image. What I've done is make it bootable. > 2. Copied system (DOS) files on it (say, from backup) No, from within the same download archive. > 3. You have not erased the boot-sector-from-the-i-net? So it is there > and still boots the (now fully functional) DOS? Yes. > If so, perhaps you should start over from totally new, empty image? I can do, but I need some more tools in my VM first. Unfortunately my Mac with the more complete disk image is currently out of action. > Not copy from your currently working image, but from your backup. Just > in case. I can try it. > Or at least try to disassemble the boot sector to see what it > is doing (I have no idea how, but somehow it must be possible). > "Things" can escape from VMs. I have plenty of Xen warnings and bug > descriptions in my old mailboxes, chances are there will be more. It's possible. I'm not working on Windows systems, so I don't have virus scanners in place. >> All I need to do now is work out how to make the hard disk bootable, >> and I'm in business. > > Boot some other OS, (I am partial to GRML Linux, well packed with > rescue stuff and more - https://grml.org/ ); + fdisk, mark bootable? Er, yes. Thanks. I _do_ know about managing DOS hard disks, thanks. :-) The problem is that the DR-DOS 7.01 tools cannot use the 7.01-8 files to make a bootable volume in the normal ways (wither ``FORMAT /S'' or format then ''SYS [drive letter]:''. So I need to try other things, which are not on the current system. >> The DR-DOS 7 SYS command won't do it, as the files aren't named >> IBMBIOS.COM and IBMSYS.COM -- they're DRBIO.SYS and DRSYS.SYS. >> >> I copied them to the expected names. SYS completes but the disk won't boot. > > Perhaps you should try again, copying one file each time, in the right > sequence (I do not recall, which one, but only two files, similarly to > how sys would do it). I did such "manual sys" once on MSDOS 6 (5???) > floppy and it worked (booted). It can sometimes work but it's not guaranteed. I have tried all the obvious methods. Now I am going to need 3rd party tools. The same problems are preventing me from making a PC DOS 7.1 hard disk image bootable: the older DOS commands won't use the newer "kernel" files. > Watcom C? > DJGPP? Er, no. I am not compiling anything here. I am merely trying to make some already-available parts into a working system. > I keep promising myself to do such stuff one day, only with FreeDOS, > plus some utils to refresh my long forgotten i386 assembler. So, it is > probably FASM nowadays. And some editor which is at least minimally > usable... Or some really cheap alternative, with the same under > DOSBOX. FreeDOS is fine if you like it. For me, it is just a little too unlike the "real thing" for comfort. And as I'm interested in playing with some fairly extreme DOS stuff -- multitaskers (DESQview, etc.) and so on -- I want the highest level of compatibility I can achieve. -- Liam Proven • Profile: https://about.me/liamproven Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk • Google Mail/Talk/Plus: lpro...@gmail.com Twitter/Facebook/Flickr: lproven • Skype/LinkedIn/AIM/Yahoo: liamproven UK: +44 7939-087884 • ČR/WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal: +420 702 829 053
