On 9/13/2011 7:10 PM, Michael C. Robinson wrote: > Look at it this way, it is extremely hard to support modern hardware in > a DOS style environment because DOS allowed application programs to use > hardware directly. Jim Hall has said himself that he has limited > interest in the GUI end and most people think a Windows 3.11 Workgroups > compatible GUI is too much work. DOS is fast, but Linux stripped down > properly is also fast. DOS is great for playing old games, and there > are some popular applications for it. Thing is, DOS doesn't make sense > at all in the multicore era as a primary operating system. DOS was > needed when the personal computer wasn't powerful enough to support a > more sophisticated operating system. I'd say that Freedos has it's > uses, but without active development on a variant that can take > advantage of multiple cores and modern hardware, there are probably a > dwindling number of uses for it. Without hardware protection and memory > protection, Freedos is certainly fast but probably not acceptable to > everyone. > >
Good reply, but to the wrong thread .. (I fixed the subject line in this reply.) Personal opinion only - I program on DOS for the challenge of it, and because it runs on those ancient machines I like to collect. There are very few instances where I want to use a general purpose DOS computer for daily living. The lack of hardware support has been brought up in other threads. We're slowly losing our ability to run on native hardware. Emulation of entire machines or just pieces of machines (BIOS) helps slow the rate of change down, but the trend line is not good. It also doesn't make a lot of sense to use a multi-core machine with gigabytes of RAM and terabytes of storage for a single threaded single tasking OS with roots in 8 bit hardware from the 1970s. DOS enthusiasts can choose to remain on older hardware, live in emulation environments, or roll up their sleeves and try to keep it running on modern hardware. But that last option is kind of difficult to justify when Linux is so capable and is more than fast enough. Mike ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Using storage to extend the benefits of virtualization and iSCSI Virtualization increases hardware utilization and delivers a new level of agility. Learn what those decisions are and how to modernize your storage and backup environments for virtualization. http://www.accelacomm.com/jaw/sfnl/114/51434361/ _______________________________________________ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
