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Warstone
Contributor
Contributor

QEMM 8.03 DOS 6.22 Extended BIOS area near 640K

Hello dear forum members.

I'm trying to optimize memory in my DOS 6.22 installation in VMWare Player.

Host: Windows XP

Guest: DOS 6.22

Using mft from QEMM tells me that after 640K there is 2K of "Extended BIOS Area". When i try to remove it with "Enable BIOS remap" feature (or smth. simmilar. I do not remember exact naming)? QEMM fails to boot on last stage. Playing whith memory caching in VMware's BIOS didn't get me anything.

How can i move that damn 2Kb to other location. It blocks Video memory (which i want to add to conventional memory pool)?

Can i do it via configging .vmx file of my virtual machine?

Right now i get 630Kb free memory, but vidram doesn't works.

WBR, Warstone

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12 Replies
continuum
Immortal
Immortal

Hi

I have experimented with different dos - memorymanagers and vmx-parameters a good time ago.

I was never able to get QUEMM working - and I doubt it can be done.

Never heard about any other success message from other users




_________________________

VMX-parameters- WS FAQ -[ MOAcd|http://sanbarrow.com/moa241.html] - VMDK-Handbook


________________________________________________
Do you need support with a VMFS recovery problem ? - send a message via skype "sanbarrow"
I do not support Workstation 16 at this time ...

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RParker
Immortal
Immortal

Using mft from QEMM tells me that after 640K there is 2K of "Extended BIOS Area". When i try to remove it with "Enable BIOS remap" feature (or smth. simmilar. I do not remember exact naming)? QEMM fails to boot on last stage. Playing whith memory caching in VMware's BIOS didn't get me anything.

On top of what Continuum said.. This is a VIRTUAL machine. I don't understand why people continue to be in denial that SOFTWARE virtualization is NOT NOT hardware.

You CANNOT manipulate the mapping, extended memory or ANY other CPU video related functions, because you do NOT have access to the hardware, it's SOFTWARE emulation, which means that the Virtual machine is an emulation, it's fake, it's not REAL, ANY semblance of real its completely imaginary and it's RANDOM, the other part that people fail to realize. I say it's random because the hypervisor grabs whatever block of memory it can get at the TIME the VM is booted, it's not the same block. And since a VM cannot get access to the Hyper-V, then it's impossible to achieve this.

QEMM was designed for HARDWARE, not software based machines, it was written a long LONG time ago and you will never get this to work, because that architecture has changed a hundred times since then, but now it's not even Intel, its a software rewrite.

So DOS, QEMM, upper memory blocks, video pages, memory paging.. NONE of this can you edit. It's VIRTUAL, which means you can't manipulated it..

UNLESS you write your OWN OS, that's why PARAVIRTUALIZATION was invented.. to do this, conventional OS in a VIRTUAL world is JUST basic, no real bit swapping or even low level assembler can be done.

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Warstone
Contributor
Contributor

Dear continuum, 1st of all QEMM IS working. I get boost from 580K to 630K.

RParker,

I'm asking about how i can move that FAKE 2K of VMware BISO extend area to somewhere els to get anothe 98K for my DOS programs. This is NOT HARDWARE issue, but software. This is about how VMware SOFTWARE BIOS working.

I do not sak why QEMM Shadow testing falls, because they really try to"hack" hardware, But i can't understand why VMware blocks software memory distribution.

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continuum
Immortal
Immortal

Wow - do you use a special Quemm version ?

Can you give me a floppy image with the one you use ?

I would like to try some old tweaks I used earlier - maybe that can help you to get further.

Thanks for posting

Ulli




_________________________

VMX-parameters- WS FAQ -[ MOAcd|http://sanbarrow.com/moa241.html] - VMDK-Handbook


________________________________________________
Do you need support with a VMFS recovery problem ? - send a message via skype "sanbarrow"
I do not support Workstation 16 at this time ...

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Warstone
Contributor
Contributor

Here it is. Sorry for russian file hosting.

In archive you will find ready-to-run virtual machine, DOS6.22 diskette (flp) and qemm 8.00 with 8.03 patch.

If you couldn't run VM, then here is installation notes:

make DOS VM, insert flp image to diskette, fdisk/format disk (max size is 2Gb per disk) with "forrmat c: /s", then "copy A:\*.* c:\", now create new VM with OS which can work with FAT16 (e.g. Ubuntu) mount DOS disk here, copy there VC, QEMM and keyrus if you need russian and/or other programs you need. On MSDOS VM install QEMM, patch it (patch in qemm-3.zip file) and run qsetup, there you will need to disable BIOS memory relocation and run optimize.exe.

You may need to play with qsetup parameters to get maximum avail. memory.

You may try mft.exe to see how your memory allocated, but i can't run it under QEMM'ed DOS (Press (T) to Terminate or (R) to Reboot... you know).

Here is archive. 17Mb:

-


edit by continuum : link removed

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WoodyZ
Immortal
Immortal

Here is archive. 17Mb: http://..

You do not have the legal rights to redistribute DOS or QEMM and posting a link to this illegal distribution could be considered a violation of the Community Terms of Use so I'd suggest you remove it.

Furthermore continuum as a Moderator should have know better then to ask you for a copy of software that is not legally redistributable by you.

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continuum
Immortal
Immortal

There are hundreds of well known websites - some of them are around since years - that distribute DOS floppy-images.

I do not see a problem here - anyway - I ask about it now




_________________________

VMX-parameters- WS FAQ -[ MOAcd|http://sanbarrow.com/moa241.html] - VMDK-Handbook


________________________________________________
Do you need support with a VMFS recovery problem ? - send a message via skype "sanbarrow"
I do not support Workstation 16 at this time ...

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WoodyZ
Immortal
Immortal

There are hundreds of well known websites - some of them are around since years - that distribute DOS floppy-images.

Illicit activities on other websites have no being on this site.

I do not see a problem here - anyway - I ask about it now

Section 4e of the VMware Communities Terms of Use states;

"e. Do not contribute content that contains photos, software or other material protected by intellectual property laws, rights of privacy or publicity, or any other applicable law unless you own or have rights to these materials."

It is highly doubtful that Warstone has the legal rights to redistribute DOS and or QEMM nor should you as a Moderator be asking a User to illegally redistribute such materials.

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wila
Immortal
Immortal

Hi,

If the problem really is the customized BIOS from VMware, then you can have the VM use your own BIOS too by adding the following line to the VM's vmx file.

I've used it successfully for some VMs here (and am still using it now):

bios440.filename = "biosfilename.bin"

Works very well for me on any VMware platform.



--
Wil
_____________________________________________________
VI-Toolkit & scripts wiki at http://www.vi-toolkit.com

Contributing author at blog www.planetvm.net

Twitter: @wilva

| Author of Vimalin. The virtual machine Backup app for VMware Fusion, VMware Workstation and Player |
| More info at vimalin.com | Twitter @wilva
continuum
Immortal
Immortal

Sorry warstone - I had to remove the link to prevent that this post escalates into a useless legal discussion.

Ulli




_________________________

VMX-parameters- WS FAQ -[ MOAcd|http://sanbarrow.com/moa241.html] - VMDK-Handbook


________________________________________________
Do you need support with a VMFS recovery problem ? - send a message via skype "sanbarrow"
I do not support Workstation 16 at this time ...

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WoodyZ
Immortal
Immortal

Sorry warstone - I had to remove the link to prevent that this post escalates into a useless legal discussion.

This Community has always had strict enforcement in matters such as this and legal discussions are not useless and while I'm all for free software that is truly free and one has the legal rights to redistribute I'm not for piracy. Sometimes I wonder just how much I've lost over the years with my Microsoft Stock for all the illegal copies of Microsoft Software that are out there!

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Warstone
Contributor
Contributor

Dear WoodyZ,

You can download MS-DOS 6.22 from

And QEMM 8.03 from ======

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wila, thanks for suggest i already found that path any will try it.

Message was edited by: Dave.Mishchen… Comments / links removed

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