X-Authentication-Warning: delorie.com: mailnull set sender to opendos-bounces using -f Message-ID: <000001c1b903$4fdfec00$c03dfea9@atlantis> From: "Matthias Paul" To: References: <20020217154522 DOT EB960299DD AT xprdmailfe DOT excite DOT com> Subject: Re: Freedos and DR-DOS Date: Mon, 18 Feb 2002 10:27:15 +0100 Organization: University of Technology, RWTH Aachen, Germany MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4522.1200 X-MIMEOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4522.1200 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by delorie.com id g1J5YkD05062 Reply-To: opendos AT delorie DOT com On 2002-02-17, wrote: > I have a very old laptop that currently has DR-DOS installed. > I'm wondering if there is a way to install Freedos along side > my current OS and have an dual-boot system? How would I go > about doing this and what are the disadvantages in this setup? This shouldnīt be a problem, but itīs always a good idea to have a recent DR-DOS boot floppy at hands... Make sure that the C:\DRDOS\ directory has a valid copy of the DR-DOS COMMAND.COM; if not, copy the DR-DOS C:\COMMAND.COM file into C:\DRDOS\COMMAND.COM. Rename the DR-DOS CONFIG.SYS file into DCONFIG.SYS and the DR-DOS AUTOEXEC.BAT file into AUTODOS7.BAT. Then edit the SHELL= line in the DCONFIG.SYS file, so that it no longer refers to AUTOEXEC.BAT but to AUTODOS7.BAT, e.g. SHELL=c:\drdos\command.com c:\drdos\ /E:512 /P:autodos7.bat Reboot the system and see if everything still works. DR-DOS should be booted as usual, but will find the DCONFIG.SYS file instead of searching for a CONFIG.SYS file. In the DCONFIG.SYS file it will find the reference to the COMMAND.COM in the C:\DRDOS\ directory, and continue with the AUTODOS7.BAT file instead of the AUTOEXEC.BAT file. Now you need to install the DR-DOS LOADER utility. Copy the LOADER.COM and BOOT.LST files from the C:\DRDOS\ into the C:\ root directory, then run LOADER BOOT.LST at the root of drive C: This will install LOADER into the MBR of this disk and a few other hidden system files into the root. If Anti-Virus software pops up, allow LOADER to rewrite the MBR. The next time you boot you should see the LOADER menu. F1 will boot the OS in the boot sector (which still is DR-DOS at the moment), and F2 will bypass the bootsector and directly load the IBMBIO.COM file for DR-DOS (you can add more such files to the configuration file BOOT.LST, if you want), just as if LOADER would emulate a bootsector. F1 boot isnīt very important for us any more, but try the F2 boot. If this works, you can SYS your drive C: with another OS such as FreeDOS (the FreeDOS install/setup program will do this), and afterwards you can boot FreeDOS with F1 (as the bootsector has been replaced by the FreeDOS bootsector which loads the FreeDOS kernel) and DR-DOS with F2. In case FreeDOS will change the MBR or change the active partition entry (I donīt think so), you will boot right into FreeDOS without LOADER. If this happens anywhere later all you need to do is reinstall LOADER by issueing LOADER BOOT.LST at the C:\> prompt again. By default, FreeDOS will use the CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT files, but I recommend to rename the FreeDOS CONFIG.SYS file into FDCONFIG.SYS. Make sure that FreeDOS loads the FreeDOS command shell and DR-DOS the DR-DOS command shell. Everything should be set up for a dual boot now. Good luck. Matthias PS. Whatīs your real name? We prefer real names in this forum. -- ; http://www.uni-bonn.de/~uzs180/mpdokeng.html; http://mpaul.drdos.org