On 01/29/2016 08:04 AM, j...@cimmeri.com wrote:
The one thing I'm not seeing mentioned in re VirtualBox is that what if you have a legacy Win 98SE system with hardware in it, like a GPIB card or sound card? Or if you have software that talks to hardware via serial or parallel ports eg. eprom burners, Zector ZVG vector graphic driver for MAME, etc.
As others have mentioned, the best approach is to keep systems that support what you need "just in case". In my case, some of the hardware is of my own design and construction--and employs the ISA interface.
Sure, it's possible to redesign the hardware and write some new drivers, but for the frequency of use, it's just not worth it. So I keep at least one operating 8088, 80286, 80386, 80486, P1, P2 and P3 system around.
On many of my systems, DOS 7.x (Win98SE real-mode command prompt) is also useful. Real MS-DOS also for the non-Win 9x capable systems.
It's not a big thing--just pull an appropriate machine out of the stack, hook it up and you're off and running.
But VB is very useful in lots of cases. In other words, I don't think there's a "one size fits all" solution. --Chuck
