[Freedos-user] Installation Instruction Error

2012-03-01 Thread nweissma
https://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/freedos/index.php?title=Install  states:



  If your computer has no partitions with FAT filesystem yet, you will have to 
create one before you can install DOS. For example GPARTED which is included 
with many Linux distros and many Linux versions which can be run directly from 
CD or DVD (no installation of Linux on harddisk needed) can resize your 
existing NTFS Windows partitions to make space for DOS without having to 
reinstall Windows.




this may not be correct: http://gparted.org/faq.php#faq-14  and 
http://gparted-forum.surf4.info/viewtopic.php?id=13777
--
Virtualization  Cloud Management Using Capacity Planning
Cloud computing makes use of virtualization - but cloud computing 
also focuses on allowing computing to be delivered as a service.
http://www.accelacomm.com/jaw/sfnl/114/51521223/___
Freedos-user mailing list
Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user


Re: [Freedos-user] Installation Instruction Error

2012-03-01 Thread Rugxulo
Hi,
   There may indeed be bugs in GParted, we don't know.

Long story short: to install DOS, you need to do this:  fdisk,
(reboot), format, sys. Make sure you at least minimally have
KERNEL.SYS (akin to MSDOS.SYS, IO.SYS or IBMBIO.COM IBMDOS.COM) and
COMMAND.COM, preferably something more useful too!

Anyways, WinXP didn't let you resize NTFS, so that's where the real
problem began. However, Vista and Win7 both have an in-built ability
to (mostly) resize your NTFS cleanly, so that is preferred.

For changing the boot sequence on newer Windows (Vista and Win7), your
best bet is probably? something like EasyBCD freeware, as it changed
compared to WinXP and no longer uses the same old BOOT.INI method.


On Thu, Mar 1, 2012 at 4:43 PM, nweissma nweis...@verizon.net wrote:
 https://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/freedos/index.php?title=Install
 states:

 If your computer has no partitions with FAT filesystem yet, you will have
 to create one before you can install DOS. For example GPARTED which is
 included with many Linux distros and many Linux versions which can be run
 directly from CD or DVD (no installation of Linux on harddisk needed) can
 resize your existing NTFS Windows partitions to make space for DOS without
 having to reinstall Windows.


 this may not be correct: http://gparted.org/faq.php#faq-14  and
 http://gparted-forum.surf4.info/viewtopic.php?id=13777

--
Virtualization  Cloud Management Using Capacity Planning
Cloud computing makes use of virtualization - but cloud computing 
also focuses on allowing computing to be delivered as a service.
http://www.accelacomm.com/jaw/sfnl/114/51521223/
___
Freedos-user mailing list
Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user


Re: [Freedos-user] Installation Instruction Error

2012-03-01 Thread Eric Auer

Hi Rugxulo, NWeissma,

There may indeed be bugs in GParted, we don't know.
 
 Long story short: to install DOS, you need to do this:  fdisk,
 (reboot), format, sys. Make sure you at least minimally have
 KERNEL.SYS (akin to MSDOS.SYS, IO.SYS or IBMBIO.COM IBMDOS.COM)
 and COMMAND.COM, preferably something more useful too!

Please see below - if you have any Windows data that
could get lost, GPARTED is much better than FDISK as
FDISK will almost always lose data because you cannot
resize with it - you can only delete and create. Note
that you can only resize inactive partitions, so your
Windows (or Linux, if you have it) must be shut down
and not just sleeping while you resize it's disks.

 However, Vista and Win7 both have an in-built ability
 to (mostly) resize your NTFS cleanly, so that is preferred.

That is good to know :-) Note that FreeDOS can only boot
from a primary partition, not extended / logical, unless
you use some advanced tricks. You can have at most four
such partitions, or three if you have any extended ones
or logical ones, which is often a bottleneck. You could
also boot DOS from CD/DVD/BD or USB/SD or similar disks.

You can even let DOS share a FAT partition with an older
version of Windows, with the right boot loader trick. Be
careful to not make your Windows unbootable if you do it
wrong, or have a Windows boot disk around to fix it ;-)

 For changing the boot sequence on newer Windows (Vista and Win7), your
 best bet is probably? something like EasyBCD freeware, as it changed
 compared to WinXP and no longer uses the same old BOOT.INI method.

 On Thu, Mar 1, 2012 at 4:43 PM, nweissma wrote:
 https://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/freedos/index.php?title=Install
 states:

 If your computer has no partitions with FAT filesystem yet, you will have
 to create one before you can install DOS. For example GPARTED which is
 included with many Linux distros and many Linux versions which can be run
 directly from CD or DVD (no installation of Linux on harddisk needed) can
 resize your existing NTFS Windows partitions to make space for DOS without
 having to reinstall Windows.

 this may not be correct: http://gparted.org/faq.php#faq-14  and
 http://gparted-forum.surf4.info/viewtopic.php?id=13777

It is good to know that certain resize operations may fail and
it is good to have a Windows boot disk around if a more and/or
resize made Windows unbootable. However, it is still exceptional
to actually lose data or really break things. In that sense, it
is MUCH better to use GPARTED than to use FDISK, because you do
always lose all data on affected partitions if you use delete
one and create two smaller ones instead of a resize and create.
In general, GPARTED is pretty easy to use and pretty reliable.

Regards, Eric

PS: In a virtual computer, you often reboot by clicking a button
on your real desktop to reset the virtual computer. And if you
only have DOS and no other operating systems in the virtual PC,
there is of course no problem with FDISKing and FORMATting that
virtual PC, as it contains no virtual data that would be lost...

PPS: Note that partition types have size limits. FAT16 should be
circa 35 MB to 2 GB, FAT32 should be at least 270 MB. In theory,
you could make them as small as circa 2.2 or 35 MB respectively.


--
Virtualization  Cloud Management Using Capacity Planning
Cloud computing makes use of virtualization - but cloud computing 
also focuses on allowing computing to be delivered as a service.
http://www.accelacomm.com/jaw/sfnl/114/51521223/
___
Freedos-user mailing list
Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user


Re: [Freedos-user] Installation Instruction Error

2012-03-01 Thread Rugxulo
Hi,

On Thu, Mar 1, 2012 at 6:32 PM, Eric Auer e.a...@jpberlin.de wrote:


    There may indeed be bugs in GParted, we don't know.

 Long story short: to install DOS, you need to do this:  fdisk,
 (reboot), format, sys. Make sure you at least minimally have
 KERNEL.SYS (akin to MSDOS.SYS, IO.SYS or IBMBIO.COM IBMDOS.COM)
 and COMMAND.COM, preferably something more useful too!

 Please see below - if you have any Windows data that
 could get lost, GPARTED is much better than FDISK as
 FDISK will almost always lose data because you cannot
 resize with it - you can only delete and create. Note
 that you can only resize inactive partitions, so your
 Windows (or Linux, if you have it) must be shut down
 and not just sleeping while you resize it's disks.

Right, I just meant, minimally, at the VERY least, that's all you
need. But in particular, I meant a clean install from scratch with
nothing else pre-existing (no other OSes or important data).

 PS: In a virtual computer, you often reboot by clicking a button
 on your real desktop to reset the virtual computer. And if you
 only have DOS and no other operating systems in the virtual PC,
 there is of course no problem with FDISKing and FORMATting that
 virtual PC, as it contains no virtual data that would be lost...

In other words, virtual / emulated is worthless, so you don't lose
anything. Of course, just backup the image file if you need it for
something semi-important.

 PPS: Note that partition types have size limits. FAT16 should be
 circa 35 MB to 2 GB, FAT32 should be at least 270 MB. In theory,
 you could make them as small as circa 2.2 or 35 MB respectively.

I personally wouldn't recommend FAT32 for 512 MB size partition or
smaller (or FAT16 on 512+), but that's just me. It wastes too much
space to use FAT16 otherwise.

--
Virtualization  Cloud Management Using Capacity Planning
Cloud computing makes use of virtualization - but cloud computing 
also focuses on allowing computing to be delivered as a service.
http://www.accelacomm.com/jaw/sfnl/114/51521223/
___
Freedos-user mailing list
Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user