Talk:DOSBox

Different versions for different consoles

Instead of removing platform-specific information (such as the GP2X paragraph removed on April 18), why not start a new section focusing on the differences between DOSBox versions on different platforms?

This article is pretty short anyway, some expansion won't hurt it... Esn (talk) 03:25, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

I guess we could do that. But the main contention I have is that nearly all of these ports are source forks managed by one or more third parties, and they are not official releases from the DOSBox team. Features and design considerations may overlap or contradict each other, so the article must remain clear on the point that these versions are not handled by the DOSBox team. If a particular fork is notable in and of itself, as the GP2X might be, consider creating its own article, such as DOSBox (GP2X). Ham Pastrami (talk) 10:08, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Would there be any sense in creating a separate article when most of the information would be identical, though? Also, since this is an open-source project, why should it matter whether or not a port to another platform is "official"? I thought the whole point of "open-source" is that no particular person or group owns the code.

I'm not saying separation is absolutely necessary, but being open source means, well we've already seen from the article that a lot of forks exist, so inviting discussion about them here has a potential to snowball. I also do not want to see a situation where each field of the infobox has a dozen lines to account for all possible forks. The point of open source is... beyond the scope of this discussion, but in fact the code is owned by the authors and that is how they are able to enforce the license. Ham Pastrami (talk) 00:04, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Anyway, quick question: which ports are "official"? Esn (talk) 22:58, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

The ones that are available from the official site.[1] Ham Pastrami (talk) 00:04, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, it's obvious that I have no idea what I'm talking about... I'm still not even really sure what the difference is between "official" and "unofficial". I'd just like the article to include a bit of more info about the differences between different versions, that's all... Would it be allowed to link to the GP2X DOSBox article here, for example? Maybe use that as the "source" instead of (or in addition to) the link to GP2X.de, since it provides more information? Esn (talk) 08:19, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

It shouldn't replace the gp2x.de article because that article is being used as a reference, and wikis are not reliable references. But you are right that the wiki has a lot of content for the GP2X version, so I'm not opposed to adding your link as a standalone external link. In fact, that seems to be a pretty good solution for redirecting GP2X discussion. I'll make the edit now. Ham Pastrami (talk) 17:50, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Um, this will sound rather impolite I suppose, but ya'll really had this nice little discussion about minor tweaks and nobody took the time to rmv that awful list format and try to make a proper article out of this? Ah well, I shouldn't complain, tis just the sort of thing I enjoy doing anyways. :) Still needs a better format though, with subsection headings and additional detail. Something with a flow, like 'intro, history, advanced features, availability & etc' might make good sections. I dunno, that is not the sort of thing I enjoy (at this moment, anyways). Hope someone else does. Eaglizard (talk) 09:38, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Complaining about the emulator

This is not the place to express your dislike of the emulator, to complain about its interface, speed or any other part of it.

Please take any further comments, complaints and questions on these matters to the official forum: http://vogons.zetafleet.com/index.php?c=7

PS. I've left a note to the same extent as a commented-out block of text at the top of the article, so that any future "commenters" notice it first (and hopefully take their frustrations to the emulators' official forum instead). --The Fifth Horseman (talk) 19:46, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

And, just because I want to put a closure for a few common myths I've seen repeated over and over in here:

• DOSBox was written for single-core CPUs. There is no gain in performance if running it on multicore.
• Your graphics card does not really matter. It will run every jot the same on an 8-MB ATI Rage XL with no hardware acceleration capabilities or integrated graphics chip like those present in some motherboards as it will on a brand new GeForce 9800 or whatever is the newest, fastest card on the market at the time.
• 512 MB of RAM is more than sufficient to run DOSBox in Windows XP.
• DOSBox is not, and will never be as fast as VisualBoy Advance, ePsxe, ZSNES or any other of the dozens of emulators some people have compared against it as examples of "fast emulators" in the past. Whereas all of these emulate very simple machines, DOSBox is emulating an entire x86 PC running a DOS operating system - which was several times faster and more complex than GBA, PSX or SNES and as such requires accordingly greater processing power.
• Despite some newbies being convinced of the contrary, DOSBox can smoothly run resource-demanding games like Doom, Duke Nukem 3D or Quake on systems that are pretty low-end for modern standards. I've got a machine with an AMD Sempron 2500+ CPU clocked at 1,69 gHz running all three just fine after tweaking the config a little.

PS. Anyone who has questions about this emulator or requests for help with using it is welcome to read the information here. I'm a member of that forum, and will gladly answer any further questions you ask - as long as this keeps them off the Wikipedia's article and article talk pages. --The Fifth Horseman (talk) 19:46, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

First, I restored the formatting and section order of this talk page. Also, I removed the HTML comment from the article body, as on Wikipedia it is generally bad form for the first thing someone to see is a message dissuading them from editing the page, and telling them to go to another website. I appreciate your intent but that's just not how we do things here. Yes, the article has had some vandals in the past, but it is a minor nuisance and doesn't require a heavy-handed reaction like this -- every article on Wikipedia experiences its share of vandalism. The message will also do nothing to stop the vandal, as he is obviously quite determined to edit the page when he is possessed to do so. The solution here is the same as it is everywhere else on Wikipedia -- be vigilant in watching changes to the page, undo vandalism when you see it, and otherwise just relax. Ham Pastrami (talk) 23:04, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Then dont make dosbox emulate verything ,ccan you explain to my why alot harder games have been emulated in other emulators smoothly then dosbox such as in playstation 1,some mame roms like area 51 and so on —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.197.238.83 (talk) 22:41, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Check: Talk:DOSBox/Archive_1#slow_program and Talk:DOSBox/Archive_1#Lexi.

* DOSBox does not emulate everything. It emulates what is neccesary to run the games and what is neccesary to achieve good compatibility with them. You can shut down some of the emulated sound devices, disable graphic scalers, force dynamic code recompilation and manually tweak the cycles value (which usually leads to better results than leaving it on autodetection) to improve overall performance. I've described the process in more detail here.

* A 486 PC the DOSBox emulates is a significantly more complex system than the original Playstation or the Area 51 arcade machine evere were. See Playstation#Technical_specifications.

* Smoothly emulating a 2D game (or a pseudo-3D game) from a purpose-built arcade machine or a gaming console (also a purpose-built system) is not comparable with smoothly emulating a PC computer with its graphic and sound hardware. But FYI: DOSBox can run Duke Nukem 3D - hell, even Quake- smoothly if you know how to do it.

Of course, in order for them to operate without slowdowns you need a comparably faster machine than for a PSX emulator.

And the moral of it all? If you don't know anything about things you're trying to compare... don't do it. --The Fifth Horseman (talk) 12:22, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Resolved?

The article said the GPL issue was resolved. The source given was Slashdot, which isn't a reliable source. Slashdot sources a blog, which isn't one either.

There is a thread on the DOSBOX forums at http://vogons.zetafleet.com/viewtopic.php?t=16285 which points out that Valve "resolved" the issue by adding the text files and source, but the source was for an unmodified copy of DOSBOX and the version they used was modified. They never released modified source, so they're still violating the GPL.

I get the impression that the authors thought that this was close enough. But you can't resolve a GPL violation by having the authors say "it's still a violation, but close enough we don't care" unless all the authors agree, including everyone who contributed code to the project--not just the main authors. Ken Arromdee (talk) 20:00, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

The current version that is being distributed on steam is unmodified. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.74.95.41 (talk) 00:11, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

@Horseman

I'm trying to join the abandonia.com forums but get the message "Sorry, registration has been disabled by the administrator." Is this situation permanent? 2fort5r (talk) 11:27, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Seems to be working now. On the other hand, the file server is broken for Christmas... --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 07:31, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Still confusing

The main page of this article contains an illustration of DOSBox in action. If the picture is reliable, it indicates how DOSBox runs on a Windows platform, and opens up inside a screen-sized window of cyn-colored pixels, with a DOS prompt running down the left side of this window. The main part of this window is black. But there are still those light blue "cyn" colored pixels surrounding it.

Is there a version of DOSBox that takes over the entire screen? Some people (like me) find the cyn-colored pixels to be really annoying and distracting. I haven't got a copy of DOSBox yet, so I have no way of trying it out for myself. The main page of this article could be improved with a discussion of how screen colors can be handled, and whether the DOSBox window can be big enough to fill the entire screen. 216.99.198.146 (talk) 20:40, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

Press Atl+Enter and the window will be expanded to full screen. The only thing you will then see is the game/DosBOX screen, no borders or surrounding parts. Naki (talk) 12:32, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

Manually mounting drive letters versus traditional DOS

DOSBox is different to DOS in the way of drive letters.

In DOSBox, you type mount driveletter: path which mounts the directory as a drive letter.

In DOS, the drive letters are already available. DOSBox does not give your storage devices drive letters, only directories.

I definitely think this should be mentioned in the article. TurboForce (talk) 23:30, 14 December 2010 (UTC)

There are several misconceptions here. First of all, even real DOS does not give drive letters to a storage device (a physical drive unit). It gives letters to drive partitions, which is just another way of saying that it mounts a section of the drive to a designation such as C:. Pretty much all file systems do this in one way or another. Secondly, you can configure the drive mountings in DOSBox to be exactly the same as the way your physical drives are mapped, if for some strange reason you desire to do so. Other than that, the mount command in DOSBox is really just a convenience to let you dynamically change the emulator's configuration. You would normally add your mount commands to the .ini file so that they are set up when DOSBox initializes. Ham Pastrami (talk) 07:20, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree that even real DOS gives letters to drive partitions, but I've never known real DOS give letters to directories. The difference between running DOSBox compared to a virtual DOS session in Microsoft Windows (cmd.exe or command prompt) is that DOSBox gives you the Z:\ and will not allocate drive letters for other partitions or storage devices automatically. This is an important difference between DOSBox, real DOS and a "DOS Window" within Microsoft Windows.

I've 100% success with DOSBox running old games and software, which refuse to run in Windows. :) TurboForce (talk) 17:02, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

This still sounds more like user confusion than anything else. The DOS emulation that is running inside DOSBox does not differentiate between drives mounted as drives and folders mounted as drives. That is something only the emulator itself understands. So the DOS programs still see DOS drive letters and only DOS drive letters, and as far as they know, those letters represent whole partitions. It does not affect the DOS emulation in any way. Beyond that, the discussion seems to be about how to use DOSBox, which is user manual content and not encyclopedia content. Ham Pastrami (talk) 07:37, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

No, it's merely a difference between DOSBox and DOS, not "how to use DOSBox". It's a difference that's important enough to mention in the main page I think.

This is what I could add to the main page:

DOSBox is different from DOS; directories are manually mounted as drive letters using the syntax mount drive letter: path and drive letters other than Z:\ are not immediately available until mounted.

TurboForce (talk) 09:14, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Of course DOSBox is different from DOS. DOSBox is an emulator, which is stated in the first sentence. That alone is the reason for the difference. The emulation of DOS performed by DOSBox is not different from DOS in this regard. That's where you seem to be confused, by blurring the emulator with the emulation. Mounting drives is merely a matter of learning to configure the emulator, and it does not produce a difference in the way DOS programs run (the emulation). You also don't seem to have considered that Windows is the only DOSBox host OS that uses drive letters. What do you expect to happen when there is no actual 'C' (or whatever) drive? Also please do not make changes to the article when the discussion is still ongoing. Ham Pastrami (talk) 01:22, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

I'm surprised my point is being missed. The difference between DOSBox and any DOS is that in DOS, the drive letters are already allocated to storage devices and partitions, typically A: and B: for floppy drives, C: for the hard drive and a drive letter for the CD ROM drive is usually D: (once the CD ROM drivers are loaded) and of course letters for drive partitions. In DOSBox, the storage devices don't have the drive letters automatically allocated. It's just a difference between DOSBox and real DOS, not a criticism. I went to a lot of trouble to edit the page with the information about mounting drive letters in DOSBox to show the difference between DOSBox and DOS.

Please add my edits, which I've copied and pasted below:

DOSBox is different from DOS in handling directories and drive letters. Directories (folders) are mounted as drive letters, using this syntax ("mount" is not case sensitive)

MOUNT [Drive-Letter] [Local-Directory]

Any drive letter can be used, except for Z (DOSBox always uses Z:\). The mounted directory and its contents can be accessed like a real storage device, similar to real DOS, with the syntax

[Drive-Letter]: and pressing Enter

(that is the allocated drive letter and colon). Games and programs in the mounted directory can now be run

TurboForce (talk) 11:42, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

I am sorry, but this is really tutorial content rather than something that needs to pointed out as an important difference between DOS and DOSBox. (And btw, DOSBox is obviously not different in handling directories.) I agree with Ham Pastrami's revert. Nageh (talk) 12:28, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Looks like my efforts have gone to waste, unless the original DOS used a "mount" command? I don't think so, therefore we have an obvious difference between DOSBox and original DOS. It looks like tutorial content, however I went to a lot of trouble writing that to explain to readers how "mount" is different to DOS. All efforts are wasted, now it's been taken out of the article! Thanks for nothing!! TurboForce (talk) 15:52, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Why do you take it so personal? Wikipedia is based on consensus, and people have pointed out that the mount command was merely a convenient way of configuring the emulator. FYI, DOSBox is different from DOS in lots of ways because it is not a full-featured DOS emulator but provides just sufficient functionality to support gaming! And BTW, yes, DOS had something like the DOSBox' mount command: it is named subst. Finally, don't whine about a few lost lines, I think other people have put in lots of more effort into Wikipedia articles. Heads up, though, and keep going! Cheers, Nageh (talk) 16:53, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

I don't see any consensiu here though, just two people arguing. Personally I think how an emulator handles storage (there are many ways ranging from "permanently map the host drives" to "work entirely with image files and don't allow file exchange with the host at all") is an important aspect of the emulation (at least as important as say the list of soundcards or videocards) and can be mentioned in a way that doesn't turn into a howto. 00:57, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

DOSBox in DOS

There is a bit in the article about running DOSBox in DOS mode which seems interesting. Unfortunately there is no further information on either how effective this is (would games executed in this manner run better than in Windows?) or on how to do so (such as a link to an article or forum thread or something). The only thing I could find on this with a Google search was a similarly brief mention on the HX page. Perhaps someone could add a bit of info for this option. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Synetech (talk • contribs) 08:30, 27 December 2010 (UTC)