Thomas Davie Posted January 10, 2000 Share Posted January 10, 2000 The bookstore at the university where I work participated in the beta program for Windows 2000. I had a chance to get a free copy, so I did. End result (and this is the warning); 1) NO Dos games work. 2) Nothing by Talonsoft works. 3) Few W95/98 specific games do work, and this is the list of what I have/own that does; -Combat Mission Beta Demo -Heroes of Might and Magic 3 -Starfleet Command -Close Combat 1,2 and 3 I decided I'd buy Partition Magic, make a 2 Gb partition, and reinstall Windows 98 on *that* partition. Well, Partition Magic does not work on Windows 2000 I then thought 'The hell with it, I'll reinstall Windows 98'. I decided just to recover Windows 98 rather than format and reinstall, since I was too damn lazy to backup my harddrive to 20 cd's. Windows 2000 resisted reinstalling Windows 98, so I ended up with a corrupted hard drive that would not boot either OS. I had reboot from the Windows 2000 CD, and completely reinstall Windows 2000, losing all of my registry settings for every piece of software I have. Final comment: Gosh Windows 2000 is stable and fast. That's about it Tom Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Berlichtingen Posted January 10, 2000 Share Posted January 10, 2000 It really made me feel good to read your post ------- Dan Brown dbrown@owc.net Mac user since 1985 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Davie Posted January 10, 2000 Author Share Posted January 10, 2000 Don't feel too good; I own several Macs as well But in all seriousness, there are several things about W2000 I like, and several more that I hate. I'm just po'd that none of my Steel Panthers games work, and am seriously considering picking up a 486 tomorrow just so I can play them. But CM does run flawlessly so far, and with no graphic glitches that I saw on W98. Time will tell. Tom Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doug Beman Posted January 10, 2000 Share Posted January 10, 2000 Yeah, WIN2000 has officially done away with DOS. This was perhaps the biggest thing about it, IMHO. Microsoft is basically breaking the legacy; in effect they're screwing with a lot of people who are still married to SOMEthing that runs only under DOS. DjB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ralph D Posted January 10, 2000 Share Posted January 10, 2000 I've been testing Win2k Pro as well, and I've found that a the newer games you mentioned that don't run have problems due to Directx 7, which is in Win2k. Not that EF2 or WF have had any time from me since getting the CM beta demo! DOS games - oh well, TOP2 and PITS have been burned to CD and they run fine in NT4. THat's all I care about with DOS. I'm running Win98 too, and to save headaches install Win2k from Win98 and make sure it goes on its own partition. That way, if you want to get rid of a Win2k install, just make a boot disk from Win98 (DOS 7), copy over sys.com. boot from the disk and run sys c: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spook Posted January 10, 2000 Share Posted January 10, 2000 A request for clarification, Thomas. I am still under the general impression that Win2000 is primarily intended as a business networking OS to supercede NT. (After all, NT is supposed to be the base of Win2000?) And I am not surprised in the least that TalonSoft games can't run on Win2000, as Talon has stated since '98 that they wouldn't make NT-ready versions of their games. What I am curious about is whether or not there is an impending blitz on Microsoft's part to market Win2000 as the OS for home PC's also. Have you any info? Ed Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Davie Posted January 10, 2000 Author Share Posted January 10, 2000 Ed, I can't answer your question. I've been going to the same bookstore and buying computer stuff for approx 20 years, hence the reason I got into the W2000 beta program. Now, I should have mentioned that Office 2000 (which is the only application on my home PC that I MUST run) works flawlessly. But as far as an impending marketing blitz on MS's part....just a guess, but yes, I'd say that W2000 will be marketed as a 'home' OS. This is hypothetical, but all of the games that require Dos on my end of things use setsound.exe to configure the soundcard. During the upgrade process on my computer, W2000 explicitly stated that my soundcard would not work under legacy/Dos conditions. And I know that some Dos game have to have the sound configured 'just so' or they don't work at all. I figure on this Friday, I'm gonna buy a newer soundcard and test things out. Tom Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dumbo Posted January 10, 2000 Share Posted January 10, 2000 Ouch sorry MS no Win2000 for this boy then. I still play Fantasy General and the SP series and will not do without them. In addition my telescope software is MSDOS and if they think I am going through that setup nightmare again they are wrong Sod it anyway, I fail to see what benefit upgrading would do for me anyhow. dumbo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spook Posted January 10, 2000 Share Posted January 10, 2000 Thanks, Thomas. Weeks earlier, I did try to find some general info on Win2000 at Microsoft's site, but I seemed to reading more "doublespeak" than a direct answer as to Win2000's application for the home PC. That's what I get for wandering into the land of Bill....... Ed Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Davie Posted January 10, 2000 Author Share Posted January 10, 2000 Ed, fra be it from me to keep Bill from earning a dollar But here's what I had to do to get my soundcard working under W2000 (but not Dos ). 1) Reboot my comp, enter Bios and disable plug and play OS 2) Finish the boot process with my 'rescue' CD from Hewlett Packard installed. 3) Ignore 'reinstall software', and drill down through many directories to NT drivers. 4) Install an NT driver for my soundcard. That got sound working in Windows. I managed to do that by searching for rockwell+soundcard on Altavista plus visiting the HP home page. I expect that with a better soundcard, I'd not have to do that, but would still have problems under Dos. Who knows. Specifically, here are the positives I've noticed in 2 days; 1) Transfer rates for a Lan City personal modem (cable) have increased about 25%. 2) Zero crashes. 3) System boots and shuts down quicker. 4) Programs open quicker. Pretty crappy tradeoff if you ask me, but then I do get the feeling that this is nto aimed at the home user. I don't know the price in the States, but in Canada about $250 seems to be the going price. Email me if you want any more specifics, since I'm in too deep now to back out Tom Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ralph D Posted January 10, 2000 Share Posted January 10, 2000 Not that I want to pat Bill on the back, but I've been able to get all but one hardware item running in Win2k Pro including: Guillemot Xentor TNT2 card Aimlab video Highway Xtreme (NT4 drivers and the company is defunkt) Soundblaster PnP Awe64 3COM 10/100 PCI busmastering card Pioneer 10x DVD etc... The only gadget I haven't tried is the Thrustmaster ACM card, and I'm sure it will be a challenge if at all possible, but who cares - I don't need it for CM, which runs flawlessly on Win2k. Personally, I've wanted to just use 1 OS at home for a long time, but NT 4.0 Workstation could cut it with the entertainment stuff. Win2k does but I'll wait 'til I get it before I kick Win98 out <g>. Luckily the fact that I don't have the full copy of CM yet allows me the time to piddle around with this bs. Regards Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Posted January 11, 2000 Share Posted January 11, 2000 In answers to your Win2000 questions - Windows 2000 is Windows NT 5.0; Windows NT has never used DOS and was primarily a networking OS in the beginning. Windows 2000 Workstation edition is aimed both at corporate and home users. There will be one more release of Windows after Windows 98 Second Edition based on the Windows 95 kernel, after that, no more DOS. Personally, I'd love to see the Linux version of CM... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doug Beman Posted January 11, 2000 Share Posted January 11, 2000 Stone the heretic! He speaks against The Bill! Defiler! Open-sourcer!! DjB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Posted January 11, 2000 Share Posted January 11, 2000 LOL Doug - wait till you here what I have to say about The Bill's labyrinth of a website.... ------------------ Inferi nihil timent, non habent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest rune Posted January 11, 2000 Share Posted January 11, 2000 Scott is half correct. There will be one more operating system based on the 95/98 kernel. there is, however, no more ability to drop to a command prompt or boot in dos. Sorry, not allowed to say more Tim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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