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[raekwonchef]

Gang,

I used to play many of the "Super Solvers" series games as a child and have been trying to get them and other Borderbund/TLC games working for awhile now with issues. I am hoping some of you game gurus can help me get it working. I have a computer that I use for old DOS games and most every game I try works fine aside from these (because they are some of the oldest games I am trying to play).

Specifically, I need Operation Neptune working. This was one of my most favorite games as a young boy. I do see that the game has some DosBox compatibility, but I am, of course, against emulation mostly. I spent a lot of time putting together and configuring this PC for DOS to gain the real experieince again. Here are my PC details:

Pentium 3 733MHz CPU
256MB PC133 RAM @ 100MHz (other bios optimizations disabled to lower perfomance)
Gigabyte ga-6vxc7-4x motherboard (with ISA slot!)
Vibra 16 CT2260 (OEM CT2230) ISA soundcard (IRQ 7 - DMA 1,5)
ATI Rage Ultra 128 AGP (running at 1x AGP)
Two HDDs (one 10GB and one 40GB)

I am dual booting DOS 6.22 with enhanced tools and Windows 98 SE. 40GB drive is master with a 2GB FAT16 DOS partition up front, a second 4GB Windows 98 FAT32 partition next, and another FAT32 partition that uses the rest of the HDD as a storage partition for Windows. The second, 10GB HDD has a 2GB FAT16 partition on it as primary (I use this to share files between Windows 98SE and DOS 6.22 which is a hidden partition). The rest of the 10GB HDD is FAT32 storage for Windows. I had to use a second HDD because FAT16 partitions in LBA extended partitions are not readable by DOS. I use Partition Magic Boot Magic to dual boot both OSes.

I have almost every game working flawlessly in DOS including some more difficult titles like the Ultima series games, but I can't get Operation Neptune to work. Until yesterday, I couldn't even get past the first frame (the game would freeze). I used the "ON -si" switch to force sound to the PC speaker and it launched, ran through the intro and past the title screen, but then I reached a point where you have to hit "Enter" three times before the actual game loads (some paragraphs to read). When I reach the last "Enter", it freezes. It also freezes if I press "ESC" at any time during the intro (probably the same issue as it goes to skip those screen and probably locks up at the same point). I don't understand why the Soundblaster won't work. I have tried the "-sb" and "-gv" switches with no success. I use "slowdown.com" to eat up CPU. Any ideas? I am deperate! :cheesy:

[The Fifth Horseman]

Did you try a different copy of the game?

[dosraider]

Tested the abandonia version on my ol'P1 100, 64MB, S3, SB-ISA.
No problems, EMS or NOEMS.
No switches needed.

So, or your material is the problem, or:

Originally Posted by The Fifth Horseman

Did you try a different copy of the game?

Try the AB version I would say.

[raekwonchef]

Originally Posted by dosraider

So, or your material is the problem, or:

Try the AB version I would say.

dosraider,

I tried the AB version with no better results. I did try the "-sa" switch (for Adlib) and all of a sudden I got music and sounds through the soundcard/speakers??? This is a CT2260 Soundblaster Vibra 16 card?! Anyhow, as please as I was with the music and all, it still froze after the intro. Sad I be.

If anyone has gotten this to work on a newer system, or know what my problem might be, please advise.

Thanks for your help and time again dosraider. I really appreciate it. :cheesy:

[dosraider]

Wasn't much of a help, as it didn't work out afterall.

Also did a try run on a P2/ 333MHz/ 128MB/ S3Virge/ SB16 PNP/ W98SE, restart-> dosmode, ran fine, with sound through the speakers.
Maybe you could try the same and see what it gives?

That's 'bout it for me I guess.

At least my grandkids are happy that they can give that game a run.

[raekwonchef]

Dosraider/Those Who Care,

Guess what, I pulled the sound card and everything works fine!?! WTF?! I need an ISA soundcard for other games, so I need to figure this one out! I tried another card, the game worked fine, but sound was through the PC speaker (it didn't freeze this time). Problem is that the MPU401 Midi port was stuck at 300 instead of 330 (the usualy default) and I couldn't figure out how to change it back. Of course this CT2890 card is OEM! ARGH! Any ideas?

I then tried a CT4170 fully PNP ISA card and had similar issues. I am having a hard time figuring out how to change the default settings of the fully PNP card. I tried some CTCM and CTCU programs I found with driver supposedly for DOS and Win 3.1. I need to fiddle with them more. Any ideas on this front? Same with this card, the MPU401 Midi wants port 300 by default, which some of my games hate and I can't figure out how to change either the game, or the card (most install progs only ask for IRQ and DMA). If I try to set to 330 in the CTCU, or diagnose, it fails. I tried ON with this card and it locked same place although I had speaker sound. Sheesh! I am making progress though!

Can you help me out by telling me your configs? IRQ, DMAs, all port values, etc. Also, what autoexec.bat and config.sys statements you are using to set the sound, etc. Also, what kind of SB16 do you have? What's the CT model #? Any other help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!! :laugh:

[dosraider]

..........
Pentium 3 733MHz CPU -> totall overkill
256MB PC133 RAM @ 100MHz -> total overkill, but *shouldn't* hurt as MSDos only uses 64Mb, though some older games will choke on that speed.
Gigabyte ga-6vxc7-4x motherboard (with ISA slot!) -> can do
Vibra 16 CT2260 (OEM CT2230) ISA soundcard (IRQ 7 - DMA 1,5) -> nice but ....***
ATI Rage Ultra 128 AGP (running at 1x AGP) -> total overkill
Two HDDs (one 10GB and one 40GB) -> 2 Gb partitions for Dos??? What a waste of space (clustersize !!!!!!)

I am dual booting DOS 6.22 with enhanced tools -> get rid of those 'enhanced tools, only gives compability troubles with older dosgames. Eventually make a dosbootmenu with different configs...

II have tried the "-sb" and "-gv" switches with no success. *** -> Think you should set soundcard IRQ to 5, many older games expect it to be 5, the IRQ 7 was used later....

I use "slowdown.com" to eat up CPU. -> And another TSR running on the background ... :/

[Edit]

Originally Posted by raekwonchef

I spent a lot of time putting together and configuring this PC for DOS to gain the real experieince again.

You hardly can say you even can get "the real experience again" on such PC -(talking MSDos here of course, not W98)-, you probably would get a better feel of a "real experience" on VPC/MSDos or even dosbox .... you can boot MSDos in dosbox ... did you knew that?

[raekwonchef]

Dosraider,

Thanks for your response. Here's my feedback:

I know the P3 733 is overkill, but I wanted to be able to play a wide range of games on this box including some later windows 98 titles. Slowdown.com has always worked well for me. I had an AMD K7 850MHz before with an ISA slot... lol...

Yeah, again I know 256 is a lot for any DOS app (64MB limit in DOS), but I need it for later games in windows. I see my expanded memory in DOS at 64MB (could that ever cause an issue? Should I limit memory with emm386 somehow?)

At least the mobo is alright!

The soundcard rocks, yes. I just changed it from IRQ 5 to IRQ 7 because I read exactly the opposite of what you said. I read that SB card started off with IRQ 7, but people had conflicts with LPT port (which also wants IRQ 7), so later cards switched to IRQ 5. I read that some of the games developed during the early period were hard coded for IRQ 7 instead of 5 and can experience issues if using something other than IRQ 7! No matter, I have tried both IRQ settings and neither let me past the first frame. The only thing that did was setting the "-si" PC speaker switch. BTW- I used diagnose.exe to change the PNP IRQ setting for my card and am forced to use the "diagnose /s" in my config to set the IRQ tomy blaster environment on boot.

ATI Rage is overkill, but I need it for the newer games and it works with everything else (this setup works with everything else) like Ultima 7, 8, One Must Fall 2097, Descent 1-3, all old ID games, 7th Guest series, Slipstream 5000, Day of the Tentacle, etc. I even got Search and Rescue, or whatever that other Learning Company game that's older (from 1988 or 89 I believe), to work!

Yes, cluster size is wasteful, but no worries, I have more than enough room for everything. I relaized that after I set everything up! It's been awhile! lol

*** I do use multi-config booting in DOS. Here's what I have for my config files. Any suggestions?:

autoexec.bat:

PROMPT $P$G
PATH=C:\DOS;
SET TEMP=C:\DOS
SET MIDI=SYNTH:1 MAP:E
SET BLASTER=A220 I7 D1 H5 P330 T6
REM SET SOUND=C:\VIBRA16
LH C:\VIBRA16\DIAGNOSE /S
REM C:\VIBRA16\MIXERSET /P /Q
LH C:\DOS\MOUSE.COM
REM SET MSINPUT=C:\MSINPUT

GOTO %CONFIG%

:NORMAL
C:\DOS\MSCDEX.EXE /D:MTMIDE01 /M:10
C:\DOS\SMARTDRV.EXE /X
GOTO END

:OLDGAMES
D:
CD GAMES
DIR/W/AD
GOTO END

:GAMES
C:\DOS\MSCDEX.EXE /D:MTMIDE01 /M:10
C:\DOS\SMARTDRV.EXE /X
D:
CD GAMES
DIR/W/AD
GOTO END

:END

config.sys:

[MENU]
MENUCOLOR=7,0
MENUITEM=NORMAL,All Purpose w/DOS CD-ROM Support
MENUITEM=OLDGAMES,Classic Gaming w/o DOS CD-ROM Support
MENUITEM=GAMES,Gaming w/DOS CD-ROM Support
MENUDEFAULT=NORMAL,10

[COMMON]
DEVICE=C:\DOS\HIMEM.SYS
DOS=HIGH, UMB
FILES=40
BUFFERS=40

[NORMAL]
DEVICE=C:\DOS\SETVER.EXE
DEVICE=C:\DOS\EMM386.EXE
LASTDRIVE=Z
DEVICE=C:\MTM\MTMCDAI.SYS /D:MTMIDE01

[OLDGAMES]

[GAMES]
LASTDRIVE=Z
DEVICE=C:\MTM\MTMCDAI.SYS /D:MTMIDE01

[COMMON]
REM DEVICE=C:\VIBRA16\DRV\VIBRA16.SYS /UNIT=0 /BLASTER=A:220 I:7 D:1 H:5
REM DEVICE=C:\VIBRA16\DRV\CTMMSYS.SYS

PLEASE ADVISE! THANKS!

Originally Posted by dosraider

..........
Pentium 3 733MHz CPU -> totall overkill
256MB PC133 RAM @ 100MHz -> total overkill, but *shouldn't* hurt as MSDos only uses 64Mb, though some older games will choke on that speed.
Gigabyte ga-6vxc7-4x motherboard (with ISA slot!) -> can do
Vibra 16 CT2260 (OEM CT2230) ISA soundcard (IRQ 7 - DMA 1,5) -> nice but ....***
ATI Rage Ultra 128 AGP (running at 1x AGP) -> total overkill
Two HDDs (one 10GB and one 40GB) -> 2 Gb partitions for Dos??? What a waste of space (clustersize !!!!!!)

I am dual booting DOS 6.22 with enhanced tools -> get rid of those 'enhanced tools, only gives compability troubles with older dosgames. Eventually make a dosbootmenu with different configs...

II have tried the "-sb" and "-gv" switches with no success. *** -> Think you should set soundcard IRQ to 5, many older games expect it to be 5, the IRQ 7 was used later....

I use "slowdown.com" to eat up CPU. -> And another TSR running on the background ... :/

[dosraider]

At first glance:
Missing a menu with emm386.exe NOEMS and a 'clean' boot, with as less as possible loaded -( in fact nothing at all)-.

Smartdrive: ditch that, completely useless on such mobo.

More LH and DEVICEHIGH wouldn't hurt.

And when you need EMS (expanded mem) restrict it to some 2048, is usually more then enough.

[raekwonchef]

Originally Posted by dosraider

At first glance:
Missing a menu with emm386.exe NOEMS

And when you need EMS (expanded mem) restrict it to some 2048, is usually more then enough.

Can I load emm386 with himem.sys? How should it look. I forget this stuff!