The great PC-Task thread

[Xanxi]

Hello my fellow amigans.

As you may know, PC-Task 4.4, latest version of the 486 PC emulator for amiga has become freeware lately.
This is the opportunity for everyone to play with this fine and impressive software.

I would like to create this thread so everyone can share here experience and tips with PC-Task.

I am having great fun these days after setting up MSDOS 5, WORD 5.5 and some games on my desktop A1200. Everything runs not so bad with Bliz1230@50MHz/FPU/AGA and 64 MB of FASTRAM.
Some years ago, I remember having been able to use Wolfenstein 3D perfect and even launch Alone in the Dark with an Apollo060@66MHz.


Here is some links to get started:
- PC-Task guide on aminet:
http://aminet.net/docs/help/PC-Task_Guide.lha
- PC-Task 4.4:
http://www.toofiles.com/fr/oip/documents//pctask44lzx.html

[Karlos]

I remember playing with the demo version back when all I had was an 040/AGA. It was fast enough for basic DOS stuff, but little else.

Am I right in thinking only the full version featured a JIT mode?

[Xanxi]

Am I right in thinking only the full version featured a JIT mode?

Yeah, the demo version lacks a lot of things.

About speed, it would say i get a fine 286 with my 1230, referinf to how games work on my setup and memories i have of old PCs (Prince of Persia very good, Conquest of Camelot not bad, Wolfenstein 3D slow).

[zipper]

For max performance in Dynamic mode you needed at least 4x PC memory  - some 96 MB was enough for 16 MB PC emulation. On 060@50 MHz it was about equivalent to 486@20 MHz. Tomb Raider demo ran 1-5 fps...but Wolfenstein was OK.

[Karlos]

For max performance in Dynamic mode you needed at least 4x PC memory  - some 96 MB was enough for 16 MB PC emulation. On 060@50 MHz it was about equivalent to 486@20 MHz. Tomb Raider demo ran 1-5 fps...but Wolfenstein was OK.

I'm intrigued now. I have 256MB on my classic (alas still an 040) and a chunky capable display. Might be fun to see what it is capable of.

[Xanxi]

I'm intrigued now. I have 256MB on my classic (alas still an 040) and a chunky capable display. Might be fun to see what it is capable of.

Go ahead

[amiga1260]

At school I had a course about MS-DOS 6.22 almost every command's works except Memmaker this one doesn't work. I also played Prince of Persia, Star Goose an Blues brothers on it. WP 5.1 and Lotus 1-2-3 does work on it. I also managed to mount a CD-ROM. This was running on an A1200 with a Blizzard 1230 IV with 48 MB of Fast Mem.

A friend of mine had Windows 95 running on his Cyberstorm PPC 060/233 MHz board. It was very slow.

[warpdesign]

I remember using it on my old 1230/50 with lots of RAM and being impressed.

But seeing DSx86 on NDS is so fast (and includes full sound: midi + sound effects) I'm not so impressed... And the NDS only has 4Mb memory...

PCTask is more complete, emulating a full 486 + co processor, but it's really slow...

[Karlos]

IMHO, it's one of those things that should ultimately have had a PPC version. Emulating an x86 on PPC would certainly have been a lot more effective than doing it on 68K, especially with a JIT implementation.

[Xanxi]

Sure but there won't be another version now. This software is now a gift to the community as is, and it's still useful for a lot of things, Word for instance

[Karlos]

Sure but there won't be another version now. This software is now a gift to the community as is, and it's still useful for a lot of things, Word for instance

I took the shapeshifter/macos 7.5.3 route for that when I was back at uni. It was actually quite usable, particularly on RTG.

[zipper]

A friend of mine had Windows 95 running on his Cyberstorm PPC 060/233 MHz board. It was very slow.

I'd say very very very slow. Booting took 2.5 - 4 mins and then you could study in which order the screen was written to. I couldn't do anything useful and then it usually crashed corrupting the HD - a new install took some hours again.

[kolla]

I coded TurboPascal on PCTask at univ (with blizz-1230III), it was a nice alternative when the 286 based computer lab was full

[B00tDisk]

I wonder how it runs under WinUAE on a very robust PC (shut up, it does too make sense!  And even if it doesn't it's fun!)

[Amiga_Nut]

IMHO, it's one of those things that should ultimately have had a PPC version. Emulating an x86 on PPC would certainly have been a lot more effective than doing it on 68K, especially with a JIT implementation.

That was pretty much the reason why I got a real PC and not a PPC card. If only someone had done a PPC x86 emu.