@Marc
On Tue, Mar 12, 2024 at 1:18 PM Marc Rochkind <mrochkind(a)gmail.com> wrote:
At a trade show, I bought a utility that allowed me to
run PC-DOS under
PC/IX. I'm sure it wasn't a virtual machine. Rather, it just swapped back
and forth. (Guessing a bit there.)
Hmm ... you sure it was not either VPIX or DOS/Merge -- ISC built VPIX in
cooperation with the Phoenix Tech folks for PC/IX. I always bought a copy
with it, but it may have been an option. LCC did DOS/Merge originally as
part of the AIX work for IBM and would become a core part of OS/2 Warp
IIRC. Both Merge and VPIX had some rough edges but certainly worked fine
for DOS 3.3 programs. The issue tended to be Win and DOS graphics-based
programs/games that played fast and loose, bypassing the DOS OS interface
and accessing the HW directly. For instance, I never got the flight
simulator (Air War over Germany) for Dad's WWII plane (P-47 Thunderbolt) to
run under either (i.e., only under DOS directly on the HW. FWIW: In that
mode, Dad said the simulator flew a lot like how he remembered it).
Both Merge and VPIX used the 386 VM support and a bunch of work in the core
OS. Heinz would have to fill us in here. The version of the 386 port ISC
delivered to AT&T and Intel only had the kernel changes to allow the VM
support for VPIX to be linked in, but it was not there. IICR (and I'm not
sure I am) is that Merge could run on PC/IX also, but you had to replace a
couple of kernel modules. It certainly would work on the AT&T and Intel
versions.
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