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This text contains some informations and tips regarding dos problems/
sessions. Some might find this really boring, so if you suspect you already
know all this, skip this message right away.... If you DON'T know so much
about dos and it's hazzles, you might want to read this. I found out that
several I know, haven't figured these tips out already! The tips explained
here ranges from VERY elementary to a bit technical, so if it's top obvious to
you, don't say that you haven't been warned!
The purpose of this text is to inform. Most of this information is documented,
but a few tricks are not. Even the tricks that are documented are often
hard to find and understand. This guide might help you to get the most
valuable information, without reading and "decoding" all your manuals.. =*)
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Don't blame me for typing-errors. I have NOT put so much resources into
removing spelling-error, so don't expect the text to be errorfree!
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HISTORY:
[blahblah] - The contents between []'s are to be replaced with
something suitable, like a program name...
%a - Internal variable used by dos, replace if already
in use by dos.
%%a - Also an internal variable, except for the fact that
%%a is required within a batch file, by lame
command.com ofcourse. Stick with 4dos.
; - Comments. Not to by typed.
() - In the text, this contains comments.
In the syntax'es, it means that the parameter
is optional.
{} - Only the contents is to be concidered as the
command line.
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I RESERVE MY RIGHT TO [ANYTHING] WITH THIS TEXT.
ALL NAMES MENTIONED WITHIN THIS TEXT ARE PRODUCTS AND/OR NAMES OF THEIR
RESPECTIVE OWNERS/COMPANIES. BUT, THEY MIGHT ALSO NOT BE...
You might not sell this or blablabla, etc, etc..... =*) You know how it is!
(If you don't, or are uncertain, delete this package right away...)
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Anyway here goes... Scorpio's Universal Tips Guide v1.23! .....................
(Hope you don't mind the spelling errors... I Hope you can live with it...)
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If you can't afford hd-floppy disks, and still use floppies, buy
dd ones, and drill a hole in the upper left corner where the hole for hd
disks usually is. (old trick)
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pressing ctrl+p has a devastating effect on those people that don't own a
printer. Nothing will happen until you press another key. You might want
to avoid this.
This is actually turning printer echo on and off. Press ctrl+p, and
what you type, will appear on the printer. If printer connection is not
made, some os'es will refuse to turn back to dos!
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If your computer uses really long time to check your disks when booting, and
then i mean REALLY long time, create a program in the boot sector which jumps
to your hd of your choice. A slight modification allows you to boot from
different harddisks! If you can't code that, do this:
put a disk in drive a: which you won't need for dos sessions anymore.
(though you CAN use the rest of the disk as raw storage - tricky, not
recommended........)
a:
c:\dos\debug
l100 2 0 1
w100 0 0 1
q
Of course, this won't have any real impact on machines other than most
286, 186 and 808[6/8], plus the v30 and other slow machines....
This trick only copies the boot sector of your hd to a fd! Replace the number
"2" with any number, but not bigger than the number that corresponds with Z
a=0 b=1 c=2 d=3. (You get the idea?)
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a ctrl+[the C button] and a ctrl+[the BREAK button (really the pause)]
is sometimes treated different. But it's really a general rule,
if you want normal break of a program, and you want to let it end and clean
up normal, you press ctrl+c. If you want INSTANT break, press ctrl+[break]
rapidly, which sometimes is more powerful than the normal ctrl+c...
Some programs even let you break the break process! This is a tricky bug,
that usually appears in dos programs that exploit DPMI. Remember to press
ctrl+c ONCE, and wait. If you press ctrl+c (or break) rapidly, you might
hang the program, and dos itself...
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Write a INT28 handler to allow processing while dos is IDLE. Remember to
write your code 100% in conjunction with what microsoft says, or else something
that works fine with you might not work on another machine, or may not work
at all with Chicago... When dos is finished with it's core work, it's just
sitting IDLE and checking for keypresses. You don't need so quick key-response,
so do something useful in the background instead....
{kinda technical, or what?}
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use 4dos! use 4dos! use 4dos! or AT LEAST any CLI program to replace
command.com, Virtually EVERYTHING is better than command.com.
You can find 4dos on selected of BBS'es... If you can't afford the money you
would have to spend on 4dos, use ndos if you own it. It's a souped-up version
of 4dos, but as always... The original is better. NDOS is a part of the
newer norton utilities packages.
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If you use UMB's, AND own a 24-bit coloured-card (or 16bit), you might find
out that you can run into trouble in some of your videocards exotic modes...
Checking out your manual isn't always going to help you, since it usually
tells you to exclude out the entire C0000-F0000 area, or does not say anything
at all. Send your video-card through ALL the modes it's got, and write down
every 4k block of memory it has been accessing. You might loose some
UMB-memory, but you will at least (Let's hope so) loose your memory conflict
problems too.
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Format your fd's with sector sliding...
If you can't do it yourself, let a program do it for you, (like fdformat).
If you can't guess the best sector/track values, run test benchmarks
and measure the time used to format disks.
You can do this in a batch file. REALLY!!! I did it!
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Pkzip files or directories directly to a ram drive. Now that's performance!
You can create a batch file to pkzip all files in a directory and below
+hidden/system +extra compression +automatically testing of zip file
fits destination +automatically moving. All in a batch file! (It works....!)
The packing speed usually rises from about 20-30k a second to 100-150k!
I recommend a real 32bit ramdrive.
(This applies of course only if your PC has 32-bit capabilities)
Don't use the lame ramdrive supplied with msdos.....
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You can improve your PC's performace by several hundred percent!
(According to benchmark programs, that is....)
Start Windows, and open a full-scale dos window, or shell to dos
from a time-slicing product, then run Norton SI, or another benchmark product.
I got 260 on norton SI, and according to landmark I have a 522 Mhz
machine! According to CoreTest, a hard-drive benchmarking program, my hd
delivers 16 megz per second and have a -0.1 track to track seek time!
How's that! The controller delivers information even before any program
requested it! WOOOW! That's intelligent!
hehehe........, talk about dream machine, or what!
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Ok, I guess i have said enough already....
Most of the above mentioned programs are usually located in several bbs'es.
Call the biggest one near you, and ask someone for it! I think I only have
mentioned shareware programs here...., so they should all be available to
the public... You will definitely find it on the internet. There is a great
deal of utilityprograms for msdos at SIMTEL20. Can't remember the address,
though..... =(
If you want to contact me for comments or questions, do so and leave a
message to me on a bbs. Preferably soundserver, Don't send any comments that
are really not neccesary, or obvious. I get enough mail by modem already.....
Soundserver has numbers of +47-22-57-16-XX, where XX applies to 00 and 04.
Ok, I guess this have come to an end.
My handle is Scorpio of Nocturnal, and our world head quarters is
Dream of perfection. Se the tagline at the bottom for how to contact me.
If you REALLY need to call me home. Call one of the above mentioned bbs'es
and look up my name with "q info kristian skyberg". You can also find my
address next to the lines where it says "send a postcard....."
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Here goes the everchanging tagline:
<${?rP??> of <?????R?/??>
{/??? ?Dr??m ?f P?r???????? * ?????R?/?? ?Q At:
64-94-46-83 * We Are Arranging The Odyssey'95 Party!
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