Eric, Thanks much for your kind & speedy response. I'll tell you all I can if it will help you in future. However, I did finally get FreeDOS 1.1 installed into VirtualBox just a few minutes ago... at least it seems to be working and I didn't get that "Bad..." message this time.
How? I "Remove"d FreeDOS & all components for the 3rd time from VirtualBox, downloaded a new copy of FD1.1 from another source (ibiblio.org), burned it onto a fresh disk, downloaded and installed an "Extension Pack" into VirtualBox* and THEN forced FD1.1 to install, with threats to its life. This time I didn't follow the online instructions; I pretty much had them memorized... (The online instructions, while quite admirable, still never quite proceeded exactly as my experience did.) There was some circular repeating again, but I just kept hitting Esc &/or Enter to get past it. And it seems to be working. * [I now see that I installed the wrong Extension Pack (an older version)... it seemed to install OK but I see that FD's log says "NO extension packs installed!"] Now I just have to figure out how to install Fractint (a DOS program). I typed "help" into FD but could find no help on how to install programs into it. Now to try to answer your questions. RE: > Have you tried to boot with fewer drivers? Use the F5 or F8 hotkeys > when the kernel loads to skip all or selected drivers. Or, if that > works as expected, just use the menu provided by FreeDOS config sys: But... how to get at the Menu before FD installed? > It is possible that your EMS/UMB/XMS/HMA memory driver or disk cache > get confused which could make DOS disconnect from your virtual disk. I confess I don't understand, sorry. > Of course it is also possible that you just have some failure in > installing all necessary boot files. Boot from the install CD or > ISO and look if you have command.com in c:\fdos\bin\ as expected. I downloaded the ISO and burned it onto a disk, then installed FreeDOS from the disk into VirtualBox and then -- I think -- got it to install onto my real HD so I wouldn't have to keep the disk in the drive forever.** That seems like a painfully roundabout way to install that 40MB OS! Is it not possible to just leave the FreeDOS ISO, or better yet, the ISO's constituents on the hard drive? **I just did a Search and there is no "fdos" or "fdos\bin" anywhere on my C: drive. The only FreeDOS on my HD is: C:\Documents and Settings\Knute\VirtualBox VMs\FreeDOS 1.1\Logs (Logs contains 2 VBox logs) and \FreeDOS 1.1\ contains 3 files ( FreeDOS 1.1.vbox; .vbox-prev; and .vdi). The "FreeDOS 1.1.vdi" file is 110.6MB, so that's where everything is, bin & all I guess. > Which version of FreeDOS were you installing from? One of the CD ISO > images, I assume? I downloaded "fd11src.iso" which is what I thought was the correct one. >By making the ISO visible as a virtualbox virtual CD? I don't understand. >Or by burning it to real CD or DVD first? The latter should not be >necessary NOW you tell me :) I'm sorry, Eric... I probably haven't been much help because I'm just too DOS and PC ignorant to help much with specifics. Generally, I'll make 2 suggestions: Please make installation easier if at all possible, and second PLEASE fix the Mouse Bug... The FreeDOS window says I can click on various things, but I can't. If I touch the DOS screen it triggers screen Capture (and the Right Control button does nothing.) I will want to click on the window in Fractint so I hope the Mouse Bug can be cured. Most importantly I must tell you that I'm grateful for the yeoman work you've done to create this program that many of us need, and please keep up the fine work!! Now I'm off to try to install my DOS Fractint. ~Knute ----- Original Message ----- From: "Eric Auer" <e.a...@jpberlin.de> To: "Discussion and general questions about FreeDOS." <freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net> Sent: Sunday, February 01, 2015 12:57 AM Subject: [Bulk] Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS install aborted into VirtualBox - Help please > > Hi Knute, > >> Can you help, please?... I finally installed FreeDOS into VirtualBox, >> except at the very end of the install instead of the window where the >> instructions say "Now we boot FreeDOS in our virtual machine" (select >> "1")... instead of that the DOS window says "Bad or missing Command >> Interpreter: C:\FDOS\BIN\command.com ... > > Have you tried to boot with fewer drivers? Use the F5 or F8 hotkeys > when the kernel loads to skip all or selected drivers. Or, if that > works as expected, just use the menu provided by FreeDOS config sys: > > It is possible that your EMS/UMB/XMS/HMA memory driver or disk cache > get confused which could make DOS disconnect from your virtual disk. > > Of course it is also possible that you just have some failure in > installing all necessary boot files. Boot from the install CD or > ISO and look if you have command.com in c:\fdos\bin\ as expected. > > Which version of FreeDOS were you installing from? One of the CD > ISO images, I assume? By making the ISO visible as a virtualbox > virtual CD? Or by burning it to real CD or DVD first? The latter > should not be necessary, I am just trying to gather more details. > > Regards, Eric > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Dive into the World of Parallel Programming. The Go Parallel Website, > sponsored by Intel and developed in partnership with Slashdot Media, is > your > hub for all things parallel software development, from weekly thought > leadership blogs to news, videos, case studies, tutorials and more. Take a > look and join the conversation now. http://goparallel.sourceforge.net/ > _______________________________________________ > Freedos-user mailing list > Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user --- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. http://www.avast.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Dive into the World of Parallel Programming. The Go Parallel Website, sponsored by Intel and developed in partnership with Slashdot Media, is your hub for all things parallel software development, from weekly thought leadership blogs to news, videos, case studies, tutorials and more. Take a look and join the conversation now. http://goparallel.sourceforge.net/ _______________________________________________ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
