Poll

Which Operating system install disks do you have? (you can choose more than 1)

System Manufacturer copy Vista Install Disk
4 (8.3%)
Retail or System Builders copy of Vista Install Disk
2 (4.2%)
System Manufacturer copy of Windows XP
15 (31.3%)
Retail or System builders copy of XP
21 (43.8%)
Other Microsoft Operating System (Please list if it is Manufacturer or Retail / system builders copy)
6 (12.5%)

Total Members Voted: 34

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Topic: Operating System Poll  (Read 2655 times)

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Offline Pestalence_XC

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Operating System Poll
« on: April 26, 2008, 08:26:08 am »
The reason I am posting this is to find out who has Vista on their system and are willing to sttempt to put a second Operating system on their computer for Dual Boot to get the Starfleet Command and older game titles to work on their computer correctly.

I have not attempted to use any System Manufacturer install disk since usually those are coded to your hardware, however I do think that there is a way to bypass this and skip activation of the operating system.

I want to get the results from people out there in order to find where I need to direct my research in order to build the player base again for the older games but more speciffically, the Starfleet Command games.

I already have a guide for Vista already installed and putting XP on to your system for Dual boot so that you can play on the Dynaverse. I have that guide tacked to the bottom of this post as well as logging my usage in the Engineering forum to track stability. So far there are no stability issues.

If enough people have a System Manufacturers install disk, I will attempt to create a guide on how to extract the Operating system off the disk for install.

Anyhow, I just want to help the community..

Check with your friends and find out their information.. you may not be able to vote again, but you can post. We lost many people due to their frustrations with Vista and although I am still working on a Vista fix for the SFC Titles, Dual Booting is the best possible solution currently.

Hope that this helps.


The guide below is to Dual boot with XP using Retail or System Builders version of XP install disk and having Vista already installled on your system. So far this method is working without incident on my system and all game titles work just fine so long as you install to the proper Operating system..(I would try Vista first, and if the game is broke in Vista, uninstall and reinstall in XP)

This way yo are set up for newer software titles coming out that are Vista only, and older software that does not work correctly in Vista.

Thanks again.

Make sure you create a XP Driver Disk before you install XP for dual boot. The first thing you will need to do after installing XP onto your system is install the device drivers. Use your Device Manager and look for drivers part by part.
« Last Edit: April 26, 2008, 08:59:25 am by Pestalence_XC »
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Offline Wraith 413

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #1 on: April 26, 2008, 09:32:16 am »
 Thanks Pesty !! It's a shame you're having to do all this just to get OP to run w/Vista.
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Offline Pestalence_XC

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #2 on: April 26, 2008, 09:39:57 am »
Quote from: Wraith 413 on April 26, 2008, 09:32:16 am
Thanks Pesty !! It's a shame you're having to do all this just to get OP to run w/Vista.

The only thing that does not work correctly with OP and Vista is the Dynaverse because of the lagging when the server reports back to the game. Other than that, Single player, Gamespy Arcade, and TCP/IP game play works perfectly under Win XPSP 2 compatibility.

The problem is those who want to play on the D2.. the guide above is the current solution if you have a retail or System Builders copy of XP. Given other people may have other Operating Systems (Win 2K3, Win 2K) and Manufacturer OEM installation CD's (talking about stuff like Dell Restore disk or Gateway System disk), I will create other guides for Dual booting; although, I have not given up hope on Vista as of yet.
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Offline FPF-Paladin

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #3 on: April 26, 2008, 02:04:17 pm »
Really appreciate your continued efforts for the community Pestalence :)
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Offline Wraith 413

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #4 on: April 27, 2008, 09:57:04 am »
 Instead on creating a Dual boot partion, would it not be easier to install the non-Vista system operating software onto either another internal harddrive or an external harddrive and change the "OS Boot Device" in the bios ?  Just a suggestion.
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Offline Pestalence_XC

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #5 on: April 27, 2008, 10:18:43 am »
You can do the dual boot that way, but I set the guide up as most people only have 1 HDD.. but if you have 2 or more drives, you can certainly install to a different drive, but for both OS's to be on the same computer at the same time, you still have to adjust Vista's boot record. That is what the guide is mainly about, how to configure both OS's on the same box without having to swap drives or unplug drives. It eliminates the need to change the Bios as most people are uncomfortable messing with that.

The method you prescribe would require that you install vista on 1 drive, remove the drive, set up the second drive, install the other OS on the second drive, and then swap drives out depending on which OS you want to use.

If both drives are installed, the computer will load the first OS it sees, then the OS will check for other windows versions, and that means Vista won't know that XP is there because the boot record is incomplete, and XP won't know Vista is there because XP doesn't recognize vista at all..

You left with swapping drives or changing the Bios every time you want to use a different OS..

The way I am set up, I just restart the system and choose the different OS.

Partitioning the HDD is just a way to trick the computer into thinking it has more than 1 drive.. as such, the guide will work if you have multiple drives.

It is conceivable that if you have several drives, you can put all the older OS's on your system at 1 time, though most people will only need XP and Vista for newer and future programs.. but Win2K3 and Win 2K should be able to install using the same method as the guide points out, you just have to change the name of the OS when configuring Vista so that Vista Boot Record will recognize the OS and give the selection at start up.

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Offline Panzergranate

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #6 on: April 27, 2008, 02:57:46 pm »
I run WIN ME on all the LAN machines we use for our SFC 1 campaigns.

The laptop here uses Vista and SFC 1, Bridge Commander, Legacy, etc. all run perfectly fine.

However SFC 1 does thrw up a few problems on a friend's XP machine, but then again, XP gives him recurring crashes with most of his games from time to time. Removing AOL solved the problems he was having with a couple.

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Offline Tulwar

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #7 on: April 28, 2008, 12:26:14 am »
I have a dual boot.  I bought a lot of nice software that works with XP, so I don't use it as a Linux machine.  Every software developer seemed to take advantage of Vista by releasing OEM versions of their software that work on XP, but cause serious problems for Vista users.  What a racket!  Any wonder I'm bitter?  Dell is offering Linux on their machines, so you may be able to buy a Linux machine without suffering blood, sweat, and tears trying to get it to work.  Commercial Linux packages are very expensive, but Ubuntu is free.  Unfortunately, you might learn that Ubuntu is worth what you pay for it.  So far, the really good "Open Source" applications are available in Windows versions, so you don't miss anything with an OS that runs commercial software.
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Offline IAF Lyrkiller

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #8 on: May 07, 2008, 10:39:35 am »
I have XP on my desktop syst, and Win98SE on my laptop to run old DOS games.  ;D
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Offline Age

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #9 on: May 07, 2008, 02:29:40 pm »
Mine is system manufacture of XP third option being a name brand PC.
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Offline KBF MalaK

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #10 on: May 07, 2008, 05:21:49 pm »
I've not attempted messing with the XP files because I have a 'vanilla' copy of XP, but my dyna/OP gaming rig is win98se and I have all flavors of that one as after the install deleting the hardware keys in the registry forces the OS to rescan/reconfigure the found hardware. I suspect XP might be similiar but never tried as I was lucky that XP worked at all (and still does).

Wouldn't it be easier to run an app like 'dosbox' in xp (or vista) to play all those old DOS games ?
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Offline IAF Lyrkiller

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #11 on: May 07, 2008, 08:51:21 pm »
Nope it is not worth it. I have enough junk installed on my desktop system.
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Offline Pestalence_XC

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #12 on: May 07, 2008, 08:57:37 pm »
Depends on how dosbox was written.. if it is a VB 6 construction, it will not work in Vista. I have not tried it since I hate emulating things in the environment.. however I can load up dosbox on Vista and see if the networking will work correctly or not.

I'm not sure what you mean by a Vanilla copy of XP. XP came only in 7 flavors. 1. Home edition, 2. Pro edition, 3. corporate edition, 4. media center edition, 5. server edition, 6. x64 bid pro edition, and 7. x64 bit server edition.

If you have a version stripped down lower than home edition, which plays all SFC games fine, then yours is not a legal copy and you should look into getting a proper install disk of it since June 30, it comes off the market.

Dosbox in XP works fine, but it is not needed to play SFC games.
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"You still don't get it, do you?......That's what he does. That's all he does! You can't stop him! It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead!"

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Offline KBF MalaK

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Re: Operating System Poll
« Reply #13 on: May 08, 2008, 10:50:20 pm »
By vanilla I meant a full version of XP pro, not a restore cd for a factory built compy.  I do have an install cd of XP Embedded somewhere but I've never used it.
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