The great PC-Task thread

[nicholas]

I used PC Task in, like, 1992 or 1993 to do a programming assignment for college in Turbo Pascal.  It was really slow on my stock A1200 with a Power Computing 2MB Fast RAM and FPU board, (way slower than the 286's they had in college) but I got the work done and got a distinction.

Ditto. I even coded a Windows 3 look-alike GUI in Pascal with inline assembly that used a serial mouse to operate it.

Distinction was guaranteed.

[hardlink]

Windows 3.1 ... is the only Windows OS to be 100% safe and immune to modern virii and malwares.

Modern problems, maybe.
-No Windblows is safe and immune
-Windblows 3.1 is not an OS, even MS never claimed that, it is a graphical shell for MS-DOS, which had plenty of malwares

That said, I have had the commercial/paid for version of PCTask for years, and it is fun, which is the best compliment. However, BridgeBoards are even more fun, and you can hardware hack as well as software hack, and use network cards

And as far as just wrong, I bought a US$12 luggable clone with a Plasma Display at the thrift shop for an art project, for the Plasma Display, and it turns out to be an Intel x386. Plugged it in, turned it on, and 15 minutes later it finished booting up into Windblows 95!?! The hardware is pre-PS/2 ports, so it was looking for a serial mouse; remember those? If it can run on this ancient scrap, I may try on an A500 with one of those clone emulator belly boards.

[Xanxi]

Modern problems, maybe.
-No Windblows is safe and immune
-Windblows 3.1 is not an OS, even MS never claimed that, it is a graphical shell for MS-DOS, which had plenty of malwares

I have understood that modern virii and malwares won't even run in a 16 bits environment (including DOS + Win 3.1).

That said, I have had the commercial/paid for version of PCTask for years, and it is fun, which is the best compliment. However, BridgeBoards are even more fun, and you can hardware hack as well as software hack, and use network cards

And as far as just wrong, I bought a US$12 luggable clone with a Plasma Display at the thrift shop for an art project, for the Plasma Display, and it turns out to be an Intel x386. Plugged it in, turned it on, and 15 minutes later it finished booting up into Windblows 95!?! The hardware is pre-PS/2 ports, so it was looking for a serial mouse; remember those? If it can run on this ancient scrap, I may try on an A500 with one of those clone emulator belly boards.

Sure, in a few weeks, i shall be able to fire my A2000 with an upgraded/hacked A2386 to 46SLC2-50MHz + VGA + SB16 +flash drive

There is nothing faster than a 286 for the A500 though (GVP 286 or Vortex ATonce Plus).

[Karlos]

I have understood that modern virii and malwares won't even run in a 16 bits environment (including DOS + Win 3.1).

Most modern software won't run in that configuration, period.

[Templario]

I didn't get that run in my Sam with OS4.1, and I like run it to again handle DrDos the best Dos system in PC.

[amigadave]

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..........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

I have tried to register at toofiles.com, but never received the registration confirmation email (checked my junk mail for it too).  Also, searching for the PC-Task 4.4 file on the toofiles.com site yeilds NO RESULTS.  Can anyone confirm that it is still hosted there, or tell me of another location it can be downloaded from?  I would like to run it on my A1200/1260 w/256mb RAM and also on my A4000 CS/PPC 68060/50MHz & 604e/233MHz.

[Xanxi]

I have tried to register at toofiles.com, but never received the registration confirmation email (checked my junk mail for it too).  Also, searching for the PC-Task 4.4 file on the toofiles.com site yeilds NO RESULTS.  Can anyone confirm that it is still hosted there, or tell me of another location it can be downloaded from?  I would like to run it on my A1200/1260 w/256mb RAM and also on my A4000 CS/PPC 68060/50MHz & 604e/233MHz.

Yeah this links seems dead but you can find it in the English Amiga Board server if you have access to this board.
Otherwise, just tell me and i will upload it somewhere else.

[amigadave]

Yeah this links seems dead but you can find it in the English Amiga Board server if you have access to this board.
Otherwise, just tell me and i will upload it somewhere else.

Why have we never had a download section here at Amiga.org?  Cost of the additional bandwidth?

Thanks for the tip, I will check the EAB site to see if I can get it from there.

[Xanxi]

Why have we never had a download section here at Amiga.org?  Cost of the additional bandwidth?

Yes, it would be a great addition to the board, just as the Gallery is

[warpdesign]

it is a graphical shell for MS-DOS

The fact it runs on top of MS/DOS doesn't mean it isn't an OS.

Windows provides a base for applications, and manages the hardware (and bypasses the DOS for a lot of hardware). It is enough for it to be an OS. But this has nothing to do with the subject...

[Xanxi]

I have uploaded it again here http://dl.free.fr/lhZha2JIx
Should be available 30 days.

[rvo_nl]

So, today I've decided to have a go at PC-Task. One of the last things I want to get running on my machine. Unfortunately, I havent gotten very far. Here's what's happened so far..
 
First off, I had lots of trouble creating a bootable disk. Windows 7 has lost all support for creating 720kb boot disks, it seems. Then I found out I can mount a disk IMAGE instead. Crossdos is able to create a dosdriver for that. I was able to find some bootdisk images on bootdisk.com. So I can now boot into MS-DOS 6.22. So much fun!

Then I tried installing Windows 3.11 from disk, but when loading SETUP it complains about a missing file. Fortunately, 'on some other site' I found a hardfile that contains all the Windows 3.11 installation files. Mounting the hardfile is no problem, but installing Win3.11 gave me quite some trouble again.
 
First, I needed a dedicated Windows partition. When I installed my drive, I made sure to leave a 1.4Gb partition free (well below the 4GB barrier) for PC emulation. So I booted from the MS-Dos 6.22 Disk Image and selected FDisk to set the partition as active and after that ran format to format the drive. Unfortunately it only recognises 344.5MB.. After doing this I could no longer acces the drive on the Amiga side so I tried creating a dosdriver for it using Crossdos. This worked but still I can not access the drive. (had no problem with this for my Mac partitions, mind).

Anyway, the emulation recognises the partition so I decided to continue with Windows 3.11 installation. So the install itself goes fine, but after that it says I have to wait for Windows to load. I did wait for 30 minutes but nothing happens although CPU is 100% occupied. When I give up and check the files installed there is a Windows folder but no autoexec.bat's or anything like that, so I guess its impossible to boot from this partition. So I'm stuck here.

What's more, Ive done all this using the Dynamic version of PC Task 4.4, since the Interpretive version crashes when I set it to boot from the Disk Image. I've also tried PCx but that doesnt load at all.

So basically, Im a  bit stuck here and could use some help!

What is the better emulator, PC-Task or PCx? Do both programs allow me to install Windows 95 (my ultimate goal - yes I know I need to get out more) ?

Do I need the Interpretive version of PC-Task to install Windows 3.11?

What can I do to succesfully install Windows 3.11?

What MS-DOS version should I use?

Should I worry about MS-DOS / PC-Task not recognising the entire partition? Is there an explanation for this?

Is it possible at all to have access to the pc files under AmigaOS or is this really risky?

Does someone have, uhm.. a hardfile containing a working Win3.11 or Win95 installation? That I could study?

[mongo]

What is the better emulator, PC-Task or PCx? Do both programs allow me to install Windows 95 (my ultimate goal - yes I know I need to get out more) ?

PCx won't run Windows 95.

[Xanxi]

Windows 95 may be installed succesfully but won't be usable anyway. With my 68060@50MHz, the emulated PC is close to the level of a 286 CPU@ 16 MHz and the AGA video is of course slower than a native planar board (or is it chunky?).
If you want windows95 use a bridgeboard instead. With my A2386 upgraded with a 486SLC2@50MHz cpu, i have a setup equivalent to a 486DX33 according to Norton Sysinfo.

Either way, the best DOS version IMHO is MSDOS 5 that comes on 3 DD floppy disks. Windows 3.1 installs itself flawelessly on it. I prefer Windows 3.1 instead of 3.10 or 3.11 for workgroups, as you won't be using network with PC-Task anyway.

As for the partition problem, there is a specific mask to enter (explained in the PC-Task FAQ available from aminet). I remember i tried this once or twice and that sometimes the entire partition can not be recognized by FDisk. In this cas, destroy the partition and try again until the full capacity is recognized.
However, hardfiles are better IMHO for PC-Task, and you won't risk ruining your harddrive. Make sure to use a fast file system like SFS and a good amount of buffers.

[rvo_nl]

Whoops, I had not configured valid screenmodes for the video modes listed under advanced options in Pc-Task. Windows 3.11 now installs properly!

However, I tried changing the Identifier of my dedicated partition so it reads MSH\00 instead of custom filesystem, but still only around 340MB is recognised under DOS, so I reverted this change.

BTW, I gave up trying out PCx, although I found out it was MCP that was causing the crash. When I remove MCP from startup-sequence however, PCx wont start at all.

[freqmax]

Regarding the partition, check out which translation scheme your pc-task "BIOS" is using. Ie CHS, Large, or LBA. Use the last one if you can. Second, some BIOS have support for INT 13 extended disk drive. Which makes it possible to use LBA all over the place.

This just reminds me why I deplore x86-ms junk hardware and software.