Joerg wrote:

>So far I have never had a DOS app that would refuse to run on the XP 
>machine. Some won't do a DOS windows and the whole PC switches to 
>low-res DOS fulls screen. You can hear the relay clicks in the monitor.

If you ever do run into a a DOS app that won't run on XP, or 
you want to run the app in a window instead of full screen, 
or you want to run your DOS apps on OS X, Linux, BSD, PalmOS, 
PlayStation Portable, OS/2, BeOS or Risc OS, just run DOSBox: 

[ http://www.dosbox.com/ ]
[ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DOSBox ]
[ http://wiki.gp2x.org/wiki/DosBox ]
[ http://sourceforge.net/projects/dosbox ]

-- 
Guy Macon
<http://www.guymacon.com/>;

Guy Macon wrote:
> Boudewijn Dijkstra wrote:
> 
>> If you need more expensive and power-hungry hardware to be able
>> to perform mostly the same tasks, then I cannot possibly consider
>> it an "upgrade". And if you really need eye-candy to prevent you
>> from becoming depressed, then there are IMHO better ways to spend
>> your money.
> 
> So you are saying it's *not* a good plan to replace a two dollar
> deck of playing cards with a multi-thousand dollar PC running
> Solitaire?  What a concept! :)

Are you trying to destroy the economy?  The PC requires men working
extensive hours preparing the solitaire software.  In turn, they
require other PCs, and much compilation and linking software, which
provide employment to system programmers, who also require PCs. 
Then there is the whole replacement market, handling such things as
memory, disk drives, etc.  The whole system is feeding people all
over the world.  Not to mention the MicroSnerdians.

By contrast, the deck of cards requires little more than a man with
an axe in the woods.

-- 
 [mail]: Chuck F (cbfalconer at maineline dot net) 
 [page]: <http://cbfalconer.home.att.net>;
            Try the download section.


** Posted from http://www.teranews.com **

Jonathan Kirwan wrote:
>
>On Fri, 20 Jun 2008 18:55:24 +0000, Guy Macon
><http://www.guymacon.com/>; wrote:
>
>>Jonathan Kirwan wrote:
>>
>>>My business model has me using a separate hard disk for each client
>>>and just racking it in when I work.  This absolutely guarantees that a
>>>system crash or hard disk failure will not impact any other client's
>>>work.  Microsoft's operating systems, up through perhaps Win2000,
>>>supported this -- I don't need to call Microsoft to get a new ID every
>>>time I set up a new hard disk for a new client -- but the rest do not,
>>>so I use them... sparingly.  But I do have a few purchased machines
>>>where I do keep WinXP loaded, where I'm forced to use tools that will
>>>no longer run on the older OS.  (Though I also keep a large number of
>>>older tools from Microchip and so on, as well.)
>>
>>If you set up a standard starting disk with, say, XP (and of course
>>all your favorite apps) on it, register your cpy of XP, get all the
>>updates, run "Windows Genuine Advantage" and then use XXCOPY (XXCOPY, 
>>not XCOPY) to clone it multiple times, all the cloned disks will boot
>>and run just fine.
>
>Hmm.  Didn't know about that.  Keep in mind that I do NOT run with any
>other disk in the system, so there is no single "boot disk" that is
>kept in the machine.  There is only the one disk, itself.

That's the configuration I have been using, and it works fine.

One thing to keep in mind is that, while the resulting cloned disks
work fine as the only disk in the system, you need a different
setup to *make* the clones.  Firstly, obviously you have to have 
two hard drives to clone one to another.  With XXCopy, they can 
be on the same machine or on two machines connected with ethernet. 
Secondly, you can't boot from the target hard drive, because it 
will be competely erased and all data replaced with a clone of the
source drive.  Thirdly, you can't boot from the target hard drive,
because Windos won't let XXCopy access some system files.  My 
solution was to partition my hard drives into two partitions 
-- Data and OS -- and to install a copy of XP on each.  Thus 
I boot to C: on my two computers to clone D: over the network,
then I boot to D: on my two computers to clone C: over the 
network.   

(typo corrected)

Jonathan Kirwan wrote:
>
>On Fri, 20 Jun 2008 18:55:24 +0000, Guy Macon
><http://www.guymacon.com/>; wrote:
>
>>Jonathan Kirwan wrote:
>>
>>>My business model has me using a separate hard disk for each client
>>>and just racking it in when I work.  This absolutely guarantees that a
>>>system crash or hard disk failure will not impact any other client's
>>>work.  Microsoft's operating systems, up through perhaps Win2000,
>>>supported this -- I don't need to call Microsoft to get a new ID every
>>>time I set up a new hard disk for a new client -- but the rest do not,
>>>so I use them... sparingly.  But I do have a few purchased machines
>>>where I do keep WinXP loaded, where I'm forced to use tools that will
>>>no longer run on the older OS.  (Though I also keep a large number of
>>>older tools from Microchip and so on, as well.)
>>
>>If you set up a standard starting disk with, say, XP (and of course
>>all your favorite apps) on it, register your cpy of XP, get all the
>>updates, run "Windows Genuine Advantage" and then use XXCOPY (XXCOPY, 
>>not XCOPY) to clone it multiple times, all the cloned disks will boot
>>and run just fine.
>
>Hmm.  Didn't know about that.  Keep in mind that I do NOT run with any
>other disk in the system, so there is no single "boot disk" that is
>kept in the machine.  There is only the one disk, itself.

That's the configuration I have been using, and it works fine.

One thing to keep in mind is that, while the resulting cloned disks
work fine as the only disk in the system, you need a different
setup to *make* the clones.  Firstly, obviously you have to have 
two hard drives to clone one to another.  With XXCopy, they can 
be on the same machine or on two machines connected with ethernet. 
Secondly, you can't boot from the target hard drive, because it 
will be competely erased and all data replaced with a clone of the
source drive.  Thirdly, you can't boot from the source hard drive,
because Windos won't let XXCopy access some system files.  My 
solution was to partition my hard drives into two partitions 
-- Data and OS -- and to install a copy of XP on each.  Thus 
I boot to C: on my two computers to clone D: over the network,
then I boot to D: on my two computers to clone C: over the 
network.   





-- 
misc.business.product-dev: a Usenet newsgroup 
about the Business of Product Development.
     -- Guy Macon <http://www.guymacon.com/>;

On Jun 19, 12:56=A0pm, JB <jodybaud...@verizon.net> wrote:
> //chop
>
> >> What experiences have people had with Vista?
> //chop
>
> > Vista is OK performance wise but it is incompatible with older
> > programs like Visual C++ 6.0.
>
> I believe Visual C++ 6 WILL work on Vista. =A0Microsoft does not support
> it perhaps, but it works as far as I can tell.
>
> Cheers,
> Jody

The Visual C++ compiler works on Vista. The VC++ 6.0 debugger doesn't
seem to work,

--
http://www.EventHelix.com/EventStudio
Sequence diagram based embedded systems design tool

On Jun 20, 4:04 pm, Joerg <notthisjoerg...@removethispacbell.net>
wrote:
> rickman wrote:
> > On Jun 20, 12:39 pm, Joerg <notthisjoerg...@removethispacbell.net>
> > wrote:
> >> That's why I love DOS. Pretty much all of the DOS routines from the late
> >> 80's I still need run flawlessly on NT4, Win2k and XP. I've heard they
> >> won't on Vista but that wouldn't matter because that's off limits in
> >> this office anyhow. Ok, there is the occasional Borland compiler bug
> >> (runtime error) but that is quite easily fixed.
>
> > If Vista is "off-limits" in your office, how do you buy new
> > hardware?   It is pretty hard to buy a new laptop with anything other
> > than Vista now that Dell has quit selling XP.  I can build my own
> > desktop and run any OS I want, but I can't do much about a laptop.
>
> Easy: Go to the next PC wrench shop. They'll build whatever you like. Or
> order the pieces including something like this:http://store.purplus.net/miwixpprwofa.html
>
> Heck, if you'd like to go totally retro and rock-bottom cost:http://chicagocomputersupply.com/c78-00002.html
> IIUC it's for 20 clients so that would come to about $17 per seat. Can't
> beat that I guess.
>
> I could imagine Dell losing quite a bit of revenue, starting yesterday.
> $50 more for the "privilege' of not wanting Vista can push very savvy
> buyers over to the local markets. Of which there are plenty.
>
> Old American saying: If you don't listen to what your customers want,
> someone else will.

I don't get what you are saying.  Who builds laptops to order???  I
know I can build a desktop and put any OS on it I want.  But laptops
almost always come with an MS OS and now that will be Vista.  I think
Dell has a few laptops with Linux, but they don't seem to be any
cheaper and in fact are their higher priced machines.  Who else sells
good laptops with no OS, but *with* drivers for other OSs?

Jonathan Kirwan wrote:
> On Fri, 20 Jun 2008 09:39:53 -0700, Joerg
> <n...@removethispacbell.net> wrote:
> 
>> <snip>
>> That's why I love DOS. Pretty much all of the DOS routines from the late 
>> 80's I still need run flawlessly on NT4, Win2k and XP. I've heard they 
>> won't on Vista but that wouldn't matter because that's off limits in 
>> this office anyhow. Ok, there is the occasional Borland compiler bug 
>> (runtime error) but that is quite easily fixed.
>>
>> Some of this software does not exist in any flavor other than DOS so 
>> it's got to run. I am not a SW guy so I wouldn't be able to write myself 
>> a Windows version. Now 20 years ain't bad for software, I think.
> 
<snip>
> 
> But Microsoft Vista policies now will probably finally force me into
> much greater use of Linux and FreeBSD.  As much as I'm able, I will
> not use Vista, and I will spend all necessary learning time to move
> further away from anything to do with Microsoft operating system
> environments.  It's one thing to move forward... but it is another
> entirely to force an entire population to purchase hardware and
> software that operates together to fully protect the DRM rights of a
> few large corporate interests and, in the process, move even further
> away from my business needs than they already had.
> 
> At some point the final straw is added.
> 
> Jon

There are various virtualisation solutions that might make your life 
easier.  <http://www.dosbox.com/>; is a DOS emulator that gives a much 
more complete DOS environment than a command prompt in windows.  You 
could also try Virtual Box, which is a good virtualisation environment. 
  If that doesn't work, qemu is a more complete (and slower) x86 emulator.

CBFalconer wrote:
> Guy Macon wrote:
>> Boudewijn Dijkstra wrote:
>>
>>> If you need more expensive and power-hungry hardware to be able
>>> to perform mostly the same tasks, then I cannot possibly consider
>>> it an "upgrade". And if you really need eye-candy to prevent you
>>> from becoming depressed, then there are IMHO better ways to spend
>>> your money.
>> So you are saying it's *not* a good plan to replace a two dollar
>> deck of playing cards with a multi-thousand dollar PC running
>> Solitaire?  What a concept! :)
> 
> Are you trying to destroy the economy?  The PC requires men working
> extensive hours preparing the solitaire software.  In turn, they
> require other PCs, and much compilation and linking software, which
> provide employment to system programmers, who also require PCs. 
> Then there is the whole replacement market, handling such things as
> memory, disk drives, etc.  The whole system is feeding people all
> over the world.  Not to mention the MicroSnerdians.
> 
> By contrast, the deck of cards requires little more than a man with
> an axe in the woods.
> 

With all these jobs being outsourced around the world, Americans should 
be proud to support Vista - no where else could they help so many people 
stay usefully employed doing so little real work!

<http://www.vistaok.com/Vistanews/Vista-shutdown-menu--value--43-year-s-time.html>;

:-)

Joerg wrote:
> 
> Easy: Go to the next PC wrench shop. They'll build whatever you like. Or 
> order the pieces including something like this:
> http://store.purplus.net/miwixpprwofa.html
> 
> Heck, if you'd like to go totally retro and rock-bottom cost:
> http://chicagocomputersupply.com/c78-00002.html
> IIUC it's for 20 clients so that would come to about $17 per seat. Can't 
> beat that I guess.
> 
> I could imagine Dell losing quite a bit of revenue, starting yesterday. 
> $50 more for the "privilege' of not wanting Vista can push very savvy 
> buyers over to the local markets. Of which there are plenty.
> 
> Old American saying: If you don't listen to what your customers want, 
> someone else will.
> 

I've just had a look at the Dell website.  Maybe it's different here in 
Norway, but the upgrade from Vista Business to XP Pro costs exactly 0 
Norwegian kroner.  (It costs a bit more to upgrade Vista Ultimate to XP 
Pro - but that's because you have the media and a license to downgrade 
to Ultimate later if you want.)

I suppose if you are comparing prices from a Vista Home version, it will 
cost more, as the Vista Business license costs more.  But would you want 
the Home version on a business machine in the first place?

CBFalconer <c...@yahoo.com> writes:
> Guy Macon wrote:
> > Boudewijn Dijkstra wrote:
> > 
> >> If you need more expensive and power-hungry hardware to be able
> >> to perform mostly the same tasks, then I cannot possibly consider
> >> it an "upgrade". And if you really need eye-candy to prevent you
> >> from becoming depressed, then there are IMHO better ways to spend
> >> your money.
> > 
> > So you are saying it's *not* a good plan to replace a two dollar
> > deck of playing cards with a multi-thousand dollar PC running
> > Solitaire?  What a concept! :)
> 
> Are you trying to destroy the economy?  The PC requires men working
> extensive hours preparing the solitaire software.  In turn, they
> require other PCs, and much compilation and linking software, which
> provide employment to system programmers, who also require PCs. 
> Then there is the whole replacement market, handling such things as
> memory, disk drives, etc.  The whole system is feeding people all
> over the world.  Not to mention the MicroSnerdians.
> 
> By contrast, the deck of cards requires little more than a man with
> an axe in the woods.

And as someone else remarked, you can replace word processor
Mark I, Mod 0 (wood pencil and paper) with a more expensive
word processor.  Once you get the more expensive computer you
can then hammer all your work to fit a word process and/or
Web browser when all you need is a simple text editor.

Microsoft has even extended their reach for wasting resources
to the Internet by making it difficult to do email in a simple
text form.  You now get email with embedded HTML so that the
messages are at least 4 times larger than necessary.  There
goes the Internet bandwidth...