Thanks for all the feedback! :-) As I said before, DOSBox is not an option to me as I have already done it before on my PC and my RPi (there is nothing hard/challenging in installing DOSBox on windows or linux)... and don't get me wrong: I have absolutely nothing against emulators. It's just that I work everyday with linux/windows, hypervisors, containers, (java) VMs.
I wanted to try something different in my free time and somehow go back to my roots (DOS). I initially wanted to run rpix86 on a RPi2 for its tiny form factor but it can only emulate a 486@20Mhz which is a bit slow for the last DOS games like Quake, DN3D, Magic Carpet, Hi-Octane... So I thought, why not use a recent x86 as DOS was intended to be run on instead of an ARM one. I knew beforehand that it was going to be a challenge as I had so many questions (how does DOS behave with USB keyboard and mouse, UEFI, SATA, sound chips?) but that's where the fun is. And I chose FreeDOS over MS-DOS because I had better hope it could handle the last x86 evolutions (the last version is only 4 years old while the last MS-DOS came with windows 98). So, that's why I wanted to know if someone already did it: - If yes then what are the difficulties? - If no then why? - Is it because nobody thought about doing that before? (I hardly doubt it) - Is it because it's not possible anymore? - Then, at what point in the x86 evolution have we lost the capability to run DOS (which ruled that platform for years)? Now that I know that current sound chips aren't SB compatible at all, this is a blocking issue. The 2 options I got left are indeed use DOSBox on linux (and launch DOSBox on boot to have something that looks like an old DOS computer) or dig up my old Pentium@166Mhz from the basement (but its size and noise are not so convenient and won't please my wife :-) ). Once again, thank you for the great discussion and information. Regards, Xavier ---------------------------------------- > From: dennis.mccun...@gmail.com > Date: Thu, 7 Jan 2016 19:13:18 -0500 > To: freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net > Subject: Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS on a compute stick > > On Thu, Jan 7, 2016 at 6:49 PM, Rugxulo <rugx...@gmail.com> wrote: >> On Thu, Jan 7, 2016 at 5:43 PM, dmccunney <dennis.mccun...@gmail.com> wrote: >>> On Thu, Jan 7, 2016 at 6:31 PM, Rugxulo <rugx...@gmail.com> wrote: >>>> >>>> Maybe I misunderstood you, but you seem intent to *only* run atop this >>>> new Intel Compute stick thingy. Have you never tried a bootable USB before? >>> >>> His stated intent is to run old DOS games on a cheap HD monitor with >>> the Compute Stick plugged into it. A bootable USB drive requires a >>> computer to plug it into so you can boot from it. The Compute Stick >>> *is* a bootable computer. >> >> Great, but so is the machine he's sending email from (which, more than >> likely, already has a BIOS). > > Yep. But what if that's not what he wants to use that computer for? > He's looking at a cheap, dedicated games device. > >> Besides, he hasn't bought either the stick *or* the monitor yet! >> Surely he must've known that a simple bootable USB jump drive is >> easier to find and get working (and cheaper too). > > I'm certain he does. At the moment, he's exploring whether his notion > is doable. > > The answer seems to be, if he gets one that boots Windows or Linux and > installs DOSBox, he can do it. If he insists on using FreeDOS, he has > a problem because he may not be able to get it to boot due to the > Compute Stick design. > ______ > Dennis > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > _______________________________________________ > Freedos-user mailing list > Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
