Welcome to another new post. This time I come to show you how to install Windows 3.1, one of the oldest systems in the world, in a virtual machine called VirtualBox, specifically in its version 3.0. Windows 3.1 runs on top of MS-DOS. A boot disk for MS-DOS is what you need. You can go out to a DOS prompt and type format a:/s to make a bootable DOS disk.
- Windows 3.1 Install Disks For Mac
- Windows 3.1 Boot Disk
- Windows 3.1 Setup Files
- Windows 3.1 Install Disk Files
Install Windows 3.1 in DOSBox to run old 16-bit Windows games on 64-bit versions of Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, and anywhere else DOSBox runs. This is particularly useful as only 32-bit versions of Windows can run those 16-bit applications.
Windows 3.1 was actually just an application that ran on DOS, and DOSBox is an emulator designed to run DOS and DOS applications. Windows 3.1 in DOSBox is an ideal combination for running old Windows 3.1-era applications.
Install Windows 3.1
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First, you’ll need to create a folder on your computer. This folder will contain the contents of the “C:” drive you’ll provide to DOSBox. Don’t use your actual C: drive on Windows for this. Make a folder like “C:dos”, for example.
Create a folder inside the “C:dos” folder — for example, “C:dosINSTALL” — and copy all the files from your Windows 3.1 floppy disks to that folder. Windows 3.1 is still under Microsoft copyright, and can’t legally be downloaded from the web, although many websites do offer it for download and Microsoft no longer offers it for sale.
You can use Windows 3.1 or Windows for Workgroups 3.11 — whichever you have available.
Next, install and launch DOSBox. At the DOS prompt, type the following command and press Enter to mount the folder you created as your C: drive in DOSBox:
mount c c:dos
(If you named the folder somewhere else or placed it at another location, type that location instead of c:dos.)
Switch to the C: drive by typing the following two characters and pressing Enter:
c:
Next, enter the folder containing your Windows 3.1 installation files:
cd install
(If you named the folder something else, type that instead of install.)
Finally, launch the Windows 3.1 setup wizard:
setup.exe
Go through the Windows 3.1 setup wizard to install Windows 3.1 in DOSBox. When it’s done, close the DOS system by clicking “Reboot” in the wizard.
When you restart DOSBox, you can launch Windows 3.1 by running the following commands in order:
mount c c:dos
c:
cd windows
win
Install Video Drivers
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DOSBox supports standard VGA graphics. However, it also supports some other types of graphics. By default, it’s set up to emulate S3 Graphics. For best graphics support, you’ll want to install the S3 graphics drivers and configure Windows 3.1 to use a higher resolution and more colors.
You can download the S3 video driver from the Classic Games website. Unzip the .zip file to a folder inside your DOSBox C: drive folder. For example, it would make sense to put these files in the “C:doss3” folder.
In Windows 3.1, double-click the Main program folder and double-click the “Windows Setup” icon. Click the “Options” menu in the Windows Setup window and select “Change System Settings.”
Click the “Display” box, scroll down to the bottom, and select “Other display (Requires disk from OEM).”
Type the path to the S3 drivers. For example, if you unzipped them to the C:doss3 folder, you’d type “C:S3” here.
Choose your preferred resolution and colors. We recommend choosing 800×600 with 256 colors. This is the highest resolution and number of colors many games will support.
Click OK several times. Windows will install the drivers and you’ll be prompted to restart it. After you do, you’ll see your new graphical settings in effect.
If Windows won’t work properly after you select a display mode, run the following command after using the “cd windows” command to enter the Windows directory:
setup.exe
You’ll then be able to select a different video mode.
Install Sound Drivers
There’s one more driver issue to take care of. Windows 3.1 doesn’t include sound drivers that will work completely with the SoundBlaster sound hardware DOSBox is emulating. You’ll want to install those, too.
As with the S3 video driver, you can download the Sound Blaster 16 Creative Audio Driver from the Classic Games website. Unzip the downloaded archive into a folder like c:dossb
Exit Windows 3.1 by clicking “File” and selecting “Exit Windows” if it’s open in DOSBox. Run the following commands to launch the Sound Blaster 16 driver installer, assuming you unzipped the folder to c:dossb
cd c:sb
install.exe
Press Enter to install the drivers, select Full Installation, and press Enter again. By default, you’ll see the line: “Microsoft Windows 3.1 path : None”.
Select “Microsoft Windows 3.1 path” with the arrow keys and press Enter.
Enter the default path, which is C:WINDOWS, and press Enter. Press Enter again to continue.
On the next screen, select the “Interrupt setting: 5” value and press Enter. It’s set to 5 by default, but DOSBox’s default is 7.
Select “7” for the Interrupt Setting and press Enter. You can then press Enter to continue. Allow the installation process to finish and “reboot” your DOS system by closing DOSBox and reopening it.
Launch Windows 3.1 again and you’ll have full sound support, including support for MIDI audio. You should hear a sound as soon as you launch Windows 3.1 again.
Install and Run Games and Other Applications
To actually use an application, download it (or copy it from old disks) and place it in a folder inside your c:dos folder. For example, you might want to place it in c:dosgamename.
You can then create a shortcut to the game’s .exe file by clicking File > New and browsing to its .exe file. Double-click that shortcut to launch the game.
The game should just work, launching within the DOSBox window as if it were running on Windows 3.1 — after all, it is.
You don’t have to go through this entire setup process again in the future, either. Just take that c:dos folder — or whatever else you named it — and back it up. Move it to another computer and you can use it after installing DOSBox. Because we haven’t configured DOSBox at all and have just used its default settings, you won’t even have to tweak your DOSBox settings before it will work.
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Developed during the 1960s, a Floppy Disk is certainly a thing of the past. But there may be some users who may need to use the Floppy Disk for some reason.
Floppy drives were used extensively used during the 1980s, 1990s and early 2000s, however, with the invention of CDs, DVDs, and external USB drives with storage, use of floppy disk eventually died with time. Most modern PC’s today don’t even house floppy drives, in fact CD / DVD drives are also being phased out slowly in favour of USB external devices.
Why would you need to use a Floppy on Windows 10
You might wonder about why we need to use a floppy disk in the first place. Maybe some old favorite software or game installation processes require the usage of floppy disk. Then some of the other uses could be while partitioning a hard drive, accessing the command line prompt or even transferring files between virtual PCs. Or maybe you want to use it just for the heck of it!
Well you can use your physical Floppy Disk Drive or you could use a Virtual Floppy Drive.
How to use Floppy Disk Drive on Windows 10
If you have an old physical Floppy Drive that you can attach to your device, then you will need to download the latest driver from the Windows Update website to use it with Windows 10. Attach the drive, open the Device Manager and select Scan for hardware changes and then Install or Update the driver. If this works, good, else go down to the manufacturers website and download and install the latest device driver.
Windows 3.1 Install Disks For Mac
If you plan to buy a new one, then there are several USB Floppy Disk Drives available even now in the market that are Plug and Play. and work just fine on a Windows 10 computer. Just plug the device, wait for the device to install the drivers, and start using the Floppy Disk Drive on your Windows 10 once the process is completed.
What is a Virtual Floppy Disk
A Virtual Floppy Disk is a disk image stored as a file on your computer’s hard drive.. It is a substitute to traditional floppy drive, with the exception that it exists as a file rather than a physical media that conventional floppy drives have been. As the word “virtual” suggests, a virtual floppy disk works as a disk image stored as a file on the hard disk with the same drive letter – A. It works in the same way as a CD, DVD or ISO image file. You create or download a virtual copy of a Floppy and mount it.
These free tools let you create a virtual Foppy disk image from the files on your PC, as well as bootable images from Floppy Disks.
Create a Virtual Floppy Disk on Windows 10
No desktop computer or laptop comes today with a physical Floppy Drive, but there are several free tools that can help you create a virtual floppy disk on Windows 10/8/7. Here are some of them that you can use.
1] Simplified Virtual Floppy Drive (VFD)
Simplified Virtual Floppy Drive mounts image files (. Image) as new browse able computer resources. The program allows you to mount a floppy image file as a virtual floppy drive and directly access the contents. You can perform all regular functions of a conventional floppy drive like view, edit, rename, delete and create files on a virtual floppy. This tool also allows you to format and launch a program on a virtual floppy.
2] ImDisk Virtual Disk Driver
Windows 3.1 Boot Disk
ImDisk Virtual Disk Driver allows you to reserve a part of your RAM so as to create virtual disks on them by using image files. This allows for quick and easy creation of devices, formatting, error checks, locking the volumes, and dismounting of file systems.
The only part lacking in this program is that it is not user friendly and you have to make use of the command prompt to use it.
3] Magic ISO Maker
Magic ISO Maker is a CD/DVD image utility that can extract, edit, create and burn ISO files. This tool can be used to create floppy disk images from the files present on your PC. You can also use this tool to create bootable images from floppy disks, although you will need a floppy drive on your PC to do that.
The free version of the software supports image creation upto 300 MB only.
4] PowerISO
PowerISO is an another CD / DVD / BD image file processing tool, which allows you to open, extract, burn, create, edit, compress, encrypt, split and convert ISO files, and mount ISO files with internal virtual drive like that of floppy. The program supports floppy disk image files, such as BIF, FLP, DSK, BFI, BWI, BIN, IMG and so on.
With the free version, users can create or edit the image files upto 300MB only.
Cheers!
Windows 3.1 Setup Files
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Windows 3.1 Install Disk Files
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