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Xt 286

lunchmeat said:
However, I never configured the machine's BIOS in BASIC because I never got a Lithium battery that would work to keep the BIOS options set. I did not want to type a bunch of lines of BASIC just to turn it off and not have it work.
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You need to get the hard drive type number into the CMOS SETUP.

Without a battery, if you want your machine to boot from the hard drive, then every time you power on your computer, you will need to:
1. Boot from a boot floppy that has something on it that allows you to configure CMOS SETUP; then
2. Configure CMOS SETUP, specifying the hard drive type number (in addition to the other CMOS SETUP stuff); then
3. Reboot (CTRL-ALT-DEL).

Alternatively, you could configure the CMOS SETUP from BASIC. It's just another way of accomplishing the same thing.

I'm sure that you don't want to go through that process every time you power on the computer.
 
lunchmeat said:
The C: drive is connected like the diagram shows. However, I never configured the machine's BIOS in BASIC because I never got a Lithium battery that would work to keep the BIOS options set. I did not want to type a bunch of lines of BASIC just to turn it off and not have it work.

So, it is essential to have the battery, because it won't have the capabilities to run from the hard drive, right?

Anybody know where I can get a hold of a cheap BR-P2 lithium battery?
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Just solder in a generic battery holder and mount it externally. You can get some nice enclosed ones. A common "mod" back in the day.
 
Okay, I still haven't made an external battery holder, BUT my new FDD came in. When I run GSETUP on the disk image mentioned earlier in this thread, Half of the menu is shown on one side, and the other half shows up on the other side of the screen. Furthermore, when I press any of the number buttons to change anything, the screen splits into four blocks that all look the same, but the text is too small to read. It gets confusing and I know that I'm not doing it right mainly because I can't see anything. Also, somebody asked me to dump my BIOS image for them. They said to type DEBUG into the command prompt, but it says "wrong DOS version". I think this thing is trying to tell me I have the wrong floppy disk image. Any other suggestions on a image that would let me help the person who needs my BIOS files, and actually let me change the CMOS settings?
 
lunchmeat said:
They said to type DEBUG into the command prompt, but it says "wrong DOS version". I think this thing is trying to tell me I have the wrong floppy disk image.
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No. My fault. It has been fixed. If you re-fretch the image, running DEBUG in the new image will work.

lunchmeat said:
Also, somebody asked me to dump my BIOS image for them ... Any other suggestions on a image that would let me help the person who needs my BIOS files,
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I don't think that you should be too fussed about that. An image of the 5162 BIOS already exists at http://www.minuszerodegrees.net/bios/bios.htm

lunchmeat said:
When I run GSETUP on the disk image mentioned earlier in this thread, Half of the menu is shown on one side, and the other half shows up on the other side of the screen. Furthermore, when I press any of the number buttons to change anything, the screen splits into four blocks that all look the same, but the text is too small to read. It gets confusing and I know that I'm not doing it right mainly because I can't see anything.
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I have never seen GSETUP do that.

lunchmeat said:
Any other suggestions on a image that would let me ..., and actually let me change the CMOS settings?
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You may be forced to use the BASIC method.
 
Okay. After a bit of fussing around with gsetup, I setup the C: drive. I restarted, took my bootable floppy out, and IT BOOTED TO C:!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am so exited right now! THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH FOR YOUR HELP ON THIS THING!!! I definitely could not have done this without you guys. My PlusHardcard 40 still works too!

Now, I have a couple dummy questions. When I type dir, it lists so many files, I can't see all of them. How do I scroll up? Also, how do I start Lotus 123 2.01 after I enter it's directory?
 
lunchmeat said:
Also, how do I start Lotus 123 2.01 after I enter it's directory?
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First, locate anything that is executable; in DOS, those are files that end in .exe or .com or .bat. So if you do a "dir /p" and there are still too many files to figure out what you should run, try this instead:

dir *.exe /p
dir *.com /p
dir *.bat /p

That will list only programs. Then you just type the name of the program to run it. I remember that Lotus 1-2-3's executable is 123.com so just type "123" and hit ENTER when you are inside the directory.

The XT-286 was a snappy machine for its time because it used faster RAM than other 286s. If you have a color monitor, you should be able to run some nice games on that thing :)
 
Trixter said:
The XT-286 was a snappy machine for its time because it used faster RAM than other 286s. If you have a color monitor, you should be able to run some nice games on that thing :)
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I do have a color monitor! My dad said all he ever used it for was Wolfenstein 3d. He has Lotus on it, but no spreadsheets haha! Anyone know where I can get a copy of Wolf3d, and maybe Doom, if you guys think it could handle it?
 
lunchmeat said:
Anyone know where I can get a copy of Wolf3d, and maybe Doom, if you guys think it could handle it?
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If Wolf 3D isn't on the hard drive anymore (Did you look around at some of the folders on the drive?), you can download the shareware version here: http://www.dosgamesarchive.com/download/wolfenstein-3d/
...which means it is not the complete game, but is a "trial" for prospective buyers way back when. Wolf 3D is still technically owned by ID (they just released a new version of it a couple years ago) so the only way to legally own a full copy of it is to buy a copy! :/

Doom wont run on a 286 because it does calculations using features only found on 32-bit CPUs (386, 486, Pentium, etc). Even if by some miracle you got it to work...it would be so slow on a 286. I think the min. requirements for Doom was a 486. (Not even a 386!)

If you're looking for some free, legal DOS games, check out this site: http://www.abandonia.com/ Most of the games on here are "abandonware" or programs/games that the developers literally abandoned and don't want to own the licenses to anymore(or the companies themselves went out of business)! For example, there are some free, Wolfenstein 3D type games from ID and other developers that will run just fine on a 286...and are a little bit of FPS/video game history too!

If you have a lot of downtime, I would take a moment to look at the Sierra "Quest" series too (Police Quest, Space Quest, King's Quest). They're slow games, but they paved the way for the modern adventure game! Also check out some of the early RPG/adventure games like "nethack" and "Castle Adventure". You'll be surprised at what developers could do with so little.
 
Sounds like you have a VGA card and monitor -- that's good, you should be able to run anything that doesn't require more than an 80286 CPU. Wolfenstein 3-D shareware can be found all over the 'net, just google it. As for Doom, that requires a 386.

If you search for "DOS games" or "abandonware" you should be able to find anything you're looking for. I can't provide any direct links on this board, sorry.
 
Darn, I'd have loved to play Doom! How do I know which ones require a certain processor? One of the files for Wolf3d is larger than 1.44 mb. What should I do about that? If I zip it, can my xt unzip it?
 
If you don't use something custom like 64-bit winzip, sure, your XT can unzip it. You'll want pkzip 2.04g (if you want just pkunzip then it is here: ftp://ftp.oldskool.org/pub/TOPBENCH/other/PKUNZIP.EXE ) and make sure you use 7-zip or rar to make .zip files as they stay within the older format.

As for whether or not a game requires a certain processor, use www.mobygames.com to look up the game and then view the Technical Specs link on the left side of the page and it will tell you the minimum CPU required to play the game. Here's a link to the 250 most popular games (according to mobygames, anyway) for DOS+286 that you can use as a starting point for exploration: http://www.mobygames.com/browse/games/dos/tic,11/ti,65/
 
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