FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
(mostly, but not entirely, about Windows compatibility)

A:  Yes. Maybe. Indirectly.  Some testing has been done under DOS emulation, invoked in X windows as "xdos".  This means running an emulator within an emulator, but the same thing is happening when you run Tosbox within a DOS window in Windows 95/98 (see "How can I tell whether something is a bug in Tosbox?" below).  It turns out that Linux's DOS emulation is better in some ways than Microsoft's.  Mouse support is much better (use mouse type 4, "Linux/DOSEMU" in Tosbox setup) than in Windows, for instance.  On the other hand, dosemu is nontrivial to get set up and working.  I've managed to get it working nicely on one of my PCs but not on the other, and have not yet figured out what is different between the installations.  So I probably can't help much with your dosemu setup, at least till somebody helps me straighten out mine.

A:  In the configuration program, try setting the video type to planar (this used to be the default).

A:  Any DOS program running within Windows lives in something called a "virtual machine." This means that a DOS box is actually an emulator, emulating DOS under Windows.  When the DOS program itself happens to be an emulator (which in this case converts it to a TOS box, you see), this means you are running an emulator within an emulator, though the outer one doesn't need to emulate an entirely different CPU and can therefore run at pretty close to full speed.  Neither of these emulations can be expected to be entirely seamless; but when something doesn't work, it is not a trivial question to ask where the failure may have been caused.  Here is a fairly straightforward method you might use to track down a bug:

1.  To make sure the problem is not in the ST domain, boot into a clean virtual ST with no desk accessories or AUTO programs.  If the problem goes away, it was a conflict between your ST programs.  If it persists, go to step 2.

2.  Disable Tosbox features: sound, parallel port, serial port, custom video (try ST mono), VT52 emulation, blitter emulation, etc.  If the problem persists, go to step 3.  If it goes away, start adding features one by one until you see it reappear; and then you might want to report your findings, because it's possible that I didn't know about the incompatibility, and might be able to fix it.

3.  If you're curious and stubborn enough, shut down Windows and run Tosbox from MS-DOS mode.  (You may find that you have to install a separate mouse driver -- see below.)  If the problem goes away, what you have found is evidence of the incompleteness of Windows' emulation of DOS.  However, that doesn't necessarily mean nothing can be done about it.  Please notify me, in case I didn't know about it before; sometimes workarounds can be implemented.

4.  If you still have not been able to make your problem go away, then by this time you can be much more confident that it is a bona fide Tosbox bug.  Again, maybe nobody else has reported it yet, so please contact me.

A:  Tosbox merely requests a VESA mode of a given resolution and color depth, and the operating system supplies it.  The refresh rates (and, ultimately, the existence and functionality of those modes) are system configuration issues; this is the way VESA works.

If you seldom run DOS, you may have never had reason to look into your system's VESA configuraton.  A plain-vanilla VESA driver usually provides only the most commonly used graphic modes, and at refresh rates that almost all hardware can tolerate, which means much more flicker than necessary.  Any particular video card should come with a floppy or CD with a driver (and/or small suite of utilities) that informs the operating system of the capabilities of the card, and lets you specify refresh rates.  Of course this is how things are done in the Windows world too.  So look through the disks that came with your PC, or with your video card.  Even if you didn't install your card, your vendor doesn't expect you to be running DOS programs and so is unlikely to have bothered setting up the VESA driver.

If you can't find a suitable driver among the various CDs and floppies that came with your hardware, you can usually find something to download free from the card manufacturer's website.  Failing that, a "universal" display driver that is supposed to work well with DOS-based applications under W95 is available from SciTech.  It's expensive, but they do let you download and try before you buy.

A: Starting with version 1.08 this is possible on some systems, with certain restrictions.  The Windows driver for your video card may or may not allow graphic DOS applications to run windowed; I find that I can do it with one (Cirrus) and not another (Trident). The mouse response is sluggish, making it suitable really only for text-oriented ST programs, but it's okay otherwise.  As I'm typing this into Netscape Composer, Tosbox is in a separate window running the Everest text editor.

1. When configuring Tosbox, set the mouse type as absolute and choose an ST-compatible video mode.
2. Remove or disable any mouse accelerator on the emulated ST.
3. After starting Tosbox, press Alt-Enter.
4. In ST high there will be black borders at the top and bottom of the window which can be elimitated if necessary by resizing the window and maniuplating sliders.  In ST low or medium you may have to change preferences in the ST desktop to get the desired resolution, but there are no borders.
5. (optional) To enable pasting of text from Windows applications, under "properties...misc" for the Tosbox window, deselect "fast pasting".
6. (optional, not recommended) To get rid of the duplicate mouse pointer, under "properties...misc" for the Tosbox window, you can select "exclusive mode". If you do this, you'll need to use one of the Windows keyboard shortcuts to switch to another application, just as if Tosbox were running in a full screen.

A: Windows spools DOS-based printer output in such a way that it waits up to nearly a minute after your Atari program stops sending data before it begins feeding it to the printer.  The updated documentation lists three solutions; the only one that doesn't involve altering your Windows setup is to configure Tosbox's parallel port as "prn: flushed".

A: Compatibility varies from one NT system to another.  It is not known for sure what factors matter (hardware, NT version or service pack version).  However, if you are having problems, don't give up right away.  Reconfigure Tosbox to temporarily disable the sound, the parallel port and the com port.  After you have verified that Tosbox runs, you can try re-enabling features one by one to see what is conflicting with your particular system.

A: You only need it when running under plain MS-DOS.  Most modern PC operating systems including Windows and OS/2 provide a DPMI environment for memory management.  When in plain MS-DOS, just make sure it can be found in the current search path (type PATH from the command prompt for a list of suitable locations, or just leave it in the same directory with TB.EXE).

A: First, make sure the nationality (language setup) of your TOS image file matches that of your PC.  If problems remain, enable the "auto ascii" configuration option.

A: Actually, now you can.  From version 1.07 onwards, Tosbox contains a utility for copying the contents of an ST-formatted floppy disk into a read-only virtual drive.  From there the files can be recopied anywhere on your system, say onto your hard drive, or onto a newly formatted floppy.  The feature is not seamlessly integrated into normal emulation, but it is effective and reasonably simple once you figure out how to use it.  That is to say, it's easier to use than to explain.  Please consult the updated documentation.

A: Except with regard to the new feature described above, Tosbox only knows how to deal with MS-DOS files and directories, and does not understand what a disk sector is. While this is a fundamental limitation of its design, it also has some very important benefits.  It makes possible Tosbox's unique ability to support multiple mounted directories, and its reliable access to CD-ROM and high density floppies.  It also serves as an important safety feature, providing a logical firewall that prevents the emulated machine from tampering with its host machine's hard drive boot sector and other vulnerable spots.

A: There are at least two possible reasons.

 1. You have configured Tosbox to use a serial port that your mouse is connected to, and should change the configuration.

 2. Your mouse driver may be inactive outside Windows.  To find out, from the DOS command prompt type EDIT and then try moving the mouse around.  If you don't see a rectangular text-mode cursor acting like a mouse pointer, then you don't have a mouse driver working under DOS.

Look for a file named MOUSE.COM or MOUSE.SYS.  It is likely to be in your \WINDOWS directory, or maybe \DOS or \MOUSE. If you don't find it in one of those places, try typing the following from the DOS command prompt:

  C:
  CD \
  DIR MOUSE*.* /S | MORE

Once you have found a driver, add a reference to it in your CONFIG.SYS or AUTOEXEC.BAT file (not both).

To use a driver whose filename ends with .SYS, add a line like this to your CONFIG.SYS file:

  DEVICE=C:\MOUSE\MOUSE.SYS

  C:\MOUSE\MOUSE.COM