Geos and Dosbian

HI!

I have installed Geos on Dosbian. Link to Dosbian: https://cmaiolino.wordpress.com/dosbian/ . There is also Facebook support from the author. You will find the link on the Dosbian site.

Dosbian is a emulated 486 DX DOS PC on a Raspberry Pi. I use a Rapberry Pi 3. I recommend a Raspberry Pi in a box, an external monitor, keyboard and mouse.

DOSbian is distributed as an image file, you need to download the image an flash it to an SD-Card, with software like Win32DiskImager, Rufus or Etcher or any similar software. Maye you need to format the SD card. I use a 16 GB SD card, you might get away with an 8 GB SD Card?

Hint: Copy the zip file from Blueway Softworks into the DOsbian folder. Boot Dosbian. Unzip the zipfile in the booted Dosbian folder. Do not use the included Norton Commander clone, as it appears to trash the Geos files. You also need to copy some kind of DOS unzipper to the folder.

Hans

Thank you, Konstantin! It was you who hinted me about Dosbian.

Hans

Correction, it is possible to use 2 GB SD card for Dosbian.

Geos have problem with sound in Dosbian and DOSBox with the built-in sound drivers. Could it be a bug? Geos crashes with a KR-09, in Solitaire and in Columns. The wisest thing is to turn sound off. However, I have not yet tested it with Dirk Lauseckers sound drivers.

It is a different version of DOSBox, the SVN version, I think it works better with Geos, a bit faster. I am tempted to test it on my Raspberry Pi with the 7 inch monitor, after testing it on my Raspberry Pi with external monitor. I have to get another SD-card, so I can easily switch back, if it doesn't work out well. The future promise om Ethernet support sound very good :p

I did a false correction above based on what I read on Facebook. You will need a Micro SD card of 4 GB or larger. The image is 3.9 GB.

Zitat von hanslse

Geos have problem with sound in Dosbian and DOSBox with the built-in sound drivers. Could it be a bug? Geos crashes with a KR-09, in Solitaire and in Columns. The wisest thing is to turn sound off. However, I have not yet tested it with Dirk Lauseckers sound drivers.

I have now tested with Dirk's drivers and they work, when I play with Solitaire and Columns. There are no KR-09 crash anymore. It seems to be a bug/bugs somewhere in the default Geos sound driver(s). Here are the working drivers from Dirk: http://www.geos-infobase.de/KATTER/PROGRAMM/Sound.zip

Hans

Doasbian 1.0 is now released with ethernet support via something which is called IPXBox. Will check it out in the comming days.

Anyone having an opinion? What is the best way for doing ethernet, tap or libpcap?

It depends if the modules for the second alternative is included i Raspian Buster. Carmelo, who is the creator intends to add the NE2000 patch in Dosbian 1.2. I tried to connect using the serial patch in Raspian and the DOSBox (not Dosban) originally distributed for Raspian and Raspberry Pi, but I never managed to connect. Probably, something is missing. I wil try using the serial patch with Dosbian, when I have the time.

I would say that Dosbian is the best DOSBox distribution so far. Ensemble works nicely with a Raspberry Pi 3B, miss only the ethernet/internet part. I have also tried Dosbian on a Raspberry Pi B+ and the B+ is much slower than 3B, no doubt. So if you want to try it, I suggest the 3B or the Raspberry Pi 4.

Hans

Dosbian might be a dead end, as the developer demands payment for the new version 1.5. And he only accepts Paypal.

Hans

Well, he apparently changed his mind, maybe he just wanted to scare people, some are really nasty there, or the developers of DOSBox and Raspian contacted him and asked him what he was doing, I guess they would not be happy about turning DOSBox and Raspian into
pay-me-a-donation-ware otherwise you will get no software, that is profiting on others work, especially as he claims it is not allowed tp use his work commercially, so it is a bit hypocritical.

I actually contacted him and offered a donation, but I don't want to use Paypal, as I had bad experience of them over ten years ago when their database was hacked and my debit card was floating around internet. Luckily my bank saved me.

Hans

Well, I got tired of the whole situation, will try 1.5 when I get some new energy. Dosbian, is a bit clumpsy, as one have to put a new image on the SD-card with every new version, which gives a lot of work with backups of the SD-card with every new version. The included Norton COmmander clone trashes the Geos files when copying, so it is better to use another computer with a SD-card reader to do the backup and restore.

Hans