just got WC2

[Essex]

I just got this and my question was: When starting the game, do I have to have a specific disk in the drive? Also, if I usually run on windows, how do I get to MS-DOS?

 

[Wedge009]

Erm, do you have the disk or the CD version?

Just go to a DOS window in Windows, or you can even configure a PIF shortcut.

To run from the CD, there should be an WINSTALL.BAT in the root directory. Use that. Copy the files to the HD directly if you want to play from the HD. Switch the read-only attribute off before playing.

Does that answer what you were asking?

 

[Saturnyne]

Not enough conventional memory? That would mean you have the old DOS version....

To get into true DOS, press F8 while the computer is at the summary screen, right before it says it's loading Windows. Then, choose step-by-step confirmation. Here are some of the things you don't want your computer to load:

DoubleSpace Driver
DriveSpace Driver
DBLBUFF
Setver.exe
IFSHLP

Of course... it helps if your autoexec.bat and config.sys files have links to DOS device drivers for your sound card, because WC isn't the same without it. Short of that, all you should need to load into memory are:

command.com
The system registry module
mouse.com (or mouse.exe)
Sound card drivers
HIMEM
EMM386

People say you don't need HIMEM and EMM386, but I find that it opens the Upper Memory Area, and dumps some stuff there that would otherwise be dumped on the conventional memory. Oh, and you can't get into true DOS if you use Win2K or WinME.

Hope that helps.

 

[Wedge009]

Originally posted by Saturnyne
People say you don't need HIMEM and EMM386

Who in their right mind would say that? I don't think you can get access to more than the base 640KB without them.

 

[cff]

Originally posted by Wedge009
Who in their right mind would say that? I don't think you can get access to more than the base 640KB without them. [/B]

Correct. DOS real mode can only access 1MB of memory. Only 640 MB of that memory is available without drivers.
Himem provides XMS. XMS means you can access all memory you have. But is quite a pain to do so.
EMM provides EMS. What EMS does is to 'copy' a 64k chunk of XMS memory down into the 1MB range. That is the 64k EMMs window. Now DOS can access that window. Then you can again upcopy the data and grab the next chunk.
(Very basic description)
And yes EMM helps to free up a lot of memory because of the LH and devicehige programs. QEMM is a lot better however.

 

[Wedge009]

I believe XMS and EMS are similar but... different. EMM386 does what you describe - allow access to upper memory (between 640 and 1MB), but it also uses extended memory to emulate expanded memory. HIMEM allows access to extended memory.