Pentiums, W95 and DOS Headaches!

       A conversation between Kjell Robertsen and Sue

@~This article is a compilation of some e-mails which went between
@~Kjell and myself since last issue. I found his comments very
@~useful (once I understood them - I was getting confused whether
@~it was the processor or DOS/Windows version making a
@~difference!) and I hope you will find them useful too.

KR: I've just received SynTax issue 54 - and you've given me a
headache with this sentence:-)" I recently found two library disks
that aren't Pentium compatible."

Well. How is that possible given the fact that the Pentium is 286,
386, 486 program compatible in every way? Could you please find
someone who could explain that to me as my brain obviously isn't
good enough .....  Unless you meant that it isn't compatible with
the newest DOS or Windows versions or that the Pentium is too fast
for them which is no real problem as there are plenty of ways to
slow down the Pentium, one of the easiest ones is to switch off
the internal cache and you have a very slow 386.

@~SM: Funnily enough, someone else recently said they'd found a
@~program that wouldn't work on the Pentium. The ones I've had
@~problems with give some error message (divide by zero or some
@~such) when you try to run them on a P166, but had run fine on my
@~old 386.

KR: You didn't use DOS 6 or higher or Windows 95? Divide by zero is
something you often see when you try to run old programs on new
DOS-versions.

@~SM: If you want to check them out, I'd happily e-mail them to you.

KR: Yes, please do!

@~SM: Hmm, can't remember how I tried to run them now. Here is one of
@~them anyway - you'll probably get it running without problems!

KR: Well, yes ... and no ......

I tried DOS 7 and DOS 6 and got run time error R6003 - integer
divide by 0 which is probably the same you got.

Then I tried DOS 5 - and it worked fine. I tried it on a Cyrix
6*86/200 but it should work on an Intel CPU as well. The error
message you got has nothing to do with the Pentium, it simply
means that you tried to run it under a wrong DOS version. Of
course the game is unplayable on a Pentium unless you slow it
down, and even then the game is fast - but it works:-).

@~SM: If you have a new Pentium with W95 installed straight onto it,
@~don't you automatically have the later DOS though? Or am I being
@~dense ...

KR:Yes, Windows 95 automatically installs DOS 7 - but there is
nothing to prevent you from installing another DOS version or
another OS in addition, is there? I have Dos 6, 7, OS/2 and

Windows 95 installed on the same computer and I only had problems
with it when I tried to install Windows 98 :-)

To run a program in DOS 6 or earlier you don't even have to
install it, simply find the DOS 6/5 floppy disks and boot the
computer from disk 1, after bootup just press ESC and it's
done ...

@~SM: Sigh, it's no wonder I get confused.

@~If I can find all of them, can I make those emails into a small 
@~help file as I am sure other people will have given up with error 
@~messages like that, like I did.

KR: Yes. And of course Windows 98 comes with a new DOS version and it 
also slows down the computer by 40% (if MS internet Explorer is 
installed) :-)


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