re-start in DOS mode

[Mel Bishop]

I really don't know if this shouldn't be in the PBCC forum, but
I will take a shot in the dark.

I have a DOS program that I have been running a number of years.
Recently upgrading to Windows-98 R-2, I ran across a real
puzzling problem.

When I go to "Start > Restart in DOS mode" or open a DOS window,
and try to run the program, it gives me an error 5, Illegal
function call OR error 6, overflow. It goes "burp" on the same
lines every time.

The illegal function call line is:
m$ = m$ + cr$ + cr$ (cr$ = chr$(13) + chr$(10))

The overflow is:
reg 1,0

What makes this problem really interesting is when I F-8 to the
DOS prompt on boot up, it works every time. Anybody got any
ideas as to what's happening????



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[Lance Edmonds]

It would seem you answered your own question in a round-about way...

Originally posted by Mel Bishop:
I have a DOS program that I have been running a number of years.
Recently upgrading to Windows-98 R-2, I ran across a real
puzzling problem.

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Lance
PowerBASIC Support
mailto:[email protected][email protected]</A>

[Amos Vryhof]

That is why it's happening, but not exactly what is happening.

Try the Shut Down to DOS Mode method ant type either

MEM/C or MEM/DEBUG

at your DOS Prompt. You will notice that Windows isn't gone
it's just "hidden." This being said, your program is probably
unhappy with this.

When running DOS programs, you should always hit F8 while
starting. You don't need Windows on its haunches ready to pop in
tha background.

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Amos

[Randal Milota]

Mel, Lance, Amos,

So does this mean that the "Restart in DOS mode" really doesn't?!!

Very disturbing. I thought that "restart in dos mode" was EQUIVALENT to an F8 start.

Can someone more experienced than I tell us (by looking at his example) what PART of win98 is missing or altered to cause something as basic as string concatenation to burp? i.e. since the two modes of startup give differing results, what ARE the differences?



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[Lance Edmonds]

Contrary to what has been said above, when you restart in MSDOS mode, you get 16-bit mode MSDOS 7.x (depends on version of Windows running). MSDOS 7 may have certain drivers loaded regardless of CONFIG.SYS settings (ie, for Fat32 support, etc), but as such "Windows" itself is NOT running. Try it yourself... type WIN and the command prompt and note that Windows has to go through the long startup process as it does normally.

The most likely cause of your problems is the memory manager supplied with Windows 98. Try altering CONFIG.SYS to use another version of HIMEM and/or EMM386 (for example, from your previous version of MSDOS or Windows).



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Lance
PowerBASIC Support
mailto:[email protected][email protected]</A>