Home Page Forums MAME MAME The MAME OS installs instructions thread

Welcome! Please do NOT post discussion or requests for help here. This thread is strictly for instructions on setting up and installing operating systems for computers in MAME.

Feel free to post your own OS install guides. Please try and follow a similar format to what I've done here, with screenshots showing important steps.

A few notes:
- You are limited to 10 pictures per post, so guides will generally need to be at least two consecutive posts.
- Please use a reliable host for photos!
- Suggestions for improving guides are welcome, especially if you tried to follow one and got confused at some point.
- I'd love these guides to end up on the mess.org wiki eventually; if someone wants to start converting them, feel free. I think it's easier to 'beta test' them here though.

Stage 1: ct486 PC driver setup for all OSes.

Handy things to have include:
- Preformatted blank 2GB and 4GB hard disk images.
- A DOS 7.1 boot disk with third party CD-ROM drivers.

Step 1: Extract the hard disk images. Make a copy of one of them named after the OS you're going to install, such as win2k.chd. (For Win 95/98/ME you must use the 2GB disk only as a source!)

Step 2: Start the ct486 driver with the following minimal options: -ramsize 64M -hard1 win2k.chd (or whatever you named it).



If you are starting from clear NVRAM, you'll see this message. Press F1 to enter SETUP. If you have previously used the driver, press DEL to enter SETUP during the RAM count-up.

- Choose the first option "STANDARD CMOS SETUP" and press Enter twice, skipping the dire warning.



- Setup the date and time to current and move the cursor down to the Hard Disk C: Type.

- Press Page Up to get type 47 USER TYPE.

- Use the right arrow and number keys to change Cyln to 4161 (2GB) or 8322 (4GB), Head to 16 and Sect to 63. Do not change WPcom or Lzone.

- Select Floppy Drive A and press PAGE UP/PAGE DOWN until it's set to "1.44 MB 3 1/2".

- Press Esc and choose ADVANCED CMOS SETUP. Press Enter to skip the warning screen once again and scroll down to System Boot Up Sequence.



- Press PAGE UP/PAGE DOWN to select "A: C:" as shown

- Press Esc.



- Choose WRITE TO CMOS AND EXIT and press Enter. Confirm when it asks if you really want to.

Congrats, ct486 is now configured! Additional OS-specific instructions will follow.

This is for Windows 2000 (2000 original and SP1 are known to work, and these instructions are generally true for NT 4 as well).

FAIR WARNING: this install will take several hours on a machine that runs ct486 at 100% speed and longer on one that doesn't. On machines capable of going above 100%, I highly recommend turning off the throttle any time you don't have to type something.

Step 1: After doing the general PC setup in the post above, extract the boot floppy as well, and get an ISO and product key for the Windows version you plan to install. We can't help you find them, and of course we encourage you only to install operating systems you legally own.

Step 2: start ct486 with some additional parameters: mess ct486 -ramsize 64M -hard1 win2k.chd -flop1 win98boot.ima -cdrom whatever.iso (change whatever.iso to your Windows install disc).

Step 2a: If you think you'll want to use networking later to get the emulated Windows online, you can save some steps by adding -isa4 ne2000 now.

Step 3: After the system boots up to an A:\> prompt, type sys a: c: and press Enter. You should see this:



Step 4: Type d: and press Enter.

Step 5: Type cd i386 and press Enter.



Step 6: Type winnt and press Enter. Accept the default option for where to copy the files. You'll see this warning:



Just press Enter to continue. Files will copy.



When you reach the end of copying, like so:



Close MESS (press ScrLock on Windows/Linux, Delete on OS X to change to partial keyboard mode, then Esc to exit, or simply close the MESS window with your mouse).

Step 7: Restart MESS without the floppy disk inserted. So remove -flop1 win98boot.ima from the previous commandline. You should boot to this:



Just press Enter on the default as shown and setup will continue after a moment:





When you get here, just press Enter.



It will ask you to agree to the license, press F8 to do that.

Choose the default, drive C:, by pressing Enter.



Leave it intact, by pressing Enter.

Windows may ask to reboot at this point, press Enter if it does and wait for it to reboot. This will place you back at the start of step 7.

(continued in next post)

Step 8: The main install will begin. This will take a while...



After a while, you'll get here:



And then here:



Step 9: You will be asked to set up your passwords and time zone and stuff. It's full GUI at this point with the mouse so I'm omitting the screenshots. Once you've done that, it'll grind a while longer and you'll get this:



Exit MESS as you did earlier, and remove the -cdrom whatever.iso from the command line, then start MESS again.

Step 10: It will come up with a Network Identification Wizard; simply accept the default (always log in the user you created earlier) and Windows will (eventually) start up.

Success!

To install Desqview/X with networking. Requires a bit of DOS knowledge and a bit of X11 knowledge for the X remote stuff.

1. Create an hdd image. Your best bet is a 504MB image with 1024,16,63 chs geometry. Refer above for NVRAM setup.
2. Get Desqview/X floppy images. Symantec doesn't seem to care so they aren't hard to find.
3. Use the at486 or ct486 driver. at486 works fine with 64MB of ram now so using ct486 isn't necessary any more. Use "-isa3 3c503" on the command line.
4. Use Fdisk to partition the image, format it and use sys to install MS-DOS (best 5 or 6.xx). Desqview/X requires QEMM which seems to hate FreeDOS. Make sure you have "FILES=50" in your Config.sys.
5. Remove the install floppy and reboot.
6. Get CuteMouse (for mouse support obviously) and TLIVESA.COM (for higher res video modes with the ET4000, unneeded if using the S3) and use a floppy image to transfer them into your hdd image. Easiest to run them from your Autoexec.bat.
7. Mount the first dvx floppy and type "a:install" at the dos prompt.

8. It will ask for owner info and the serial number. Use Express Install unless you really want to configure something.
9. Select the video mode. If you use the S3 or TLIVESA you'll get more options than just 640x480x16.

10. QEMM optimize will run. Just use Express. It'll reboot a few times.

11. You can now run Desqview by typing "dvx" at the command line.


For the next bit you must have a mess binary built with networking. "USE_NETWORK=1" on the make command line if you built it yourself.

12. You'll need LSL.COM from this package and TCPIP.EXE from this package (both are freeware from Novell). You'll also need the 3c503 ODI driver (get it here) as the NE2000 ODI driver doesn't work currently.
Here's a NET.CFG that works. Change the IP address and router to whatever is correct for your network and put it in the same path as the network programs.
Run them from a bat file in the order lsl, 3c503 and tcpip last.
13. Run nsetup from the desqview directory. Novell should be the only network option. Use whatever you want for user and RSH, REXEC and FTP select no unless you know what you are doing.

14. Run remote X11 software.

Note, most modern X11 apps, even xterm from xorg (shown is rxvt), don't work. Gtk+ apps require xrandr and QT apps just don't work.

Here's how to setup the Damn Small Linux Live CD. It is fairly straightforward, but getting some hardware to work can be tricky if you're unfamiliar with Linux. I'll go through a whole HD install sometime later, when I have some more spare time.

First, you'll need the DSL Live CD and a boot floppy. You can find these at http://distro.ibiblio.org/damnsmall/current/
Grab dsl-4.4.10.iso and bootfloppy.img.

The boot floppy is not required if you're using at586, as it can boot directly from the CD, but ct486 is the recommended driver. Alternatively, you can use Smart Boot Manager on a bootable floppy to boot from the CD.

Start MESS with the DSL ISO and boot floppy mounted, with ramsize set to 64m, and use svga_s3 in the first ISA slot. Press DEL during the memory test to go to the BIOS setup, and make sure you enable the floppy drives, any hard disks (not required), and make sure that the boot order is A: then C:. Select Save to CMOS and exit. Now wait, and let the floppy image boot. You will be greeted with the splash screen and the boot: prompt. Here, enter "dsl xsetup" (without quotes) and press enter.



This will make xsetup run before starting X11, so that video mode and some other stuff can be set.

Next, you'll get a message saying something about passing an undefined video mode number. Select any option you wish, except for 'scan'. Or just press Space to continue on.



Now, DSL will start booting. This can take a bit of time, so make a cup of coffee while you wait.



After a little while, xsetup will be run, and gives you an option of which X server to use. Select XVesa.



Select No for USB mouse, and IBM PS/2 mouse wheel. MESS does not support these at this time.
For mouse port, select com1, since MESS only currently supports serial mice.
For number of mouse buttons, select 2 mouse buttons.
For resolution and bit depth, it's up to you, but 800x600 and 16bit work okay with the 9FX Vision 330 video card (svga_s3).
Select No to choosing your own DPI.
For keyboard mapping, it's your choice, but the default US works fine.
After all that, you should be greeting with the standard X11 cross-hatch pattern, and eventually a usable desktop like this:


Now, some hardware you may be using don't have their drivers installed yet, as MESS only properly supports ISA (not ISAPNP, VLB, and minimal PCI on at586), so you have to load these manually.

Networking (requires a build compiled with USE_NETWORK=1):
IRQ3 seems to conflict with something in Linux, even though it doesn't list anything as using it. This means the 3c503 network card is not really usable. But the NE1000/2000 is, with their IRQ set to IRQ5 (you can set this in MESS' System Configuration menu).
Open a terminal (either the Term button on the taskbar, or DSL->XShells->... menu). At the prompt, type (without quotes) "sudo modprobe ne io=0x300 irq=5" and press enter. Run dmesg at the prompt to make sure the driver is loaded. Now, load the DSL Control Panel, and click Netcardconfig.



If your local network uses DHCP, set DHCP Broadcast to yes, click Apply then Exit. Otherwise, fill in IP Address, Broadcast, Gateway, and Name Servers. IP address will be the IP for the emulated system, and Gateway will be the IP of the TUN/TAP device MESS will use (I guess there's something similar for Win32 and OS X users using PCAP), and click Apply then Exit. Now you should be able to browse the net. Firefox is included, and usable, if you want something that is better than Dillo, just be prepared to wait a fair while for it to load.



Sound:
Just loading the driver should be enough. Open a terminal, and enter:
sudo modprobe gus io=0x320 irq=7 (Gravis Ultrasound - IRQ and DMA is software configurable, so set it to an IRQ/DMA channel not in use)
sudo modprobe sb io=0x220 (Sound Blaster)

You can use floppies, HDs and CDs, by mounting them via the Mount tool (click the Mount button on the taskbar). Click the top button to cycle though mountable devices, and the bottom button to mount or unmount the media. Contents are viewable in the various folders in the /mnt folder. For example: mount the cdrom, and at a terminal prompt display a listing with "ls /mnt/cdrom/" Media can be any formatted any way that Linux supports (ext2, FAT, FAT32, ISO9660 [CDs], among others).



If you have formatted hard disks mounted, you can use them to save settings to. The HDs can be formatted in ext2/ext3 or FAT/FAT32 or anything that Linux 2.4 supports. From the DSL Control Panel, click Backup/Restore, enter the device name (for the first partition on the first IDE hard disk, use /dev/hda1), and click Backup. Now you can shutdown and settings will be saved to the HD.

Slackware 3.x HD installation from CD

CD-ROM images for Slackware 3.2 and 3.5:
http://slackware.cs.utah.edu/pub/slackware/slackware-3.2-iso/slackware-3.2-install.iso
http://slackware.cs.utah.edu/pub/slackware/slackware-3.5-iso/slackware-3.5-install.iso

Screenshots are from a Slackware 3.4 installation, but should be more or less the same as far as the installation process goes.

Step 1: Setup hardware.

First, create the HD image you wish to install Linux to with CHDMAN.
chdman createhd -o <CHD filename> -chd 1024,16,63 (creates a 504MB blank HD image with filename specified by <CHD filename>)

You also need some other OS installed on either a floppy or HD with CD-ROM drivers included. An MS-DOS floppy with CD-ROM drivers and MSCDEX is a good idea, as is a bootable Linux floppy.
Make an extra two copies of the same floppy image, these will be made into the boot and root floppies that will start the installation process.
This tutorial will assume you are using MS-DOS to create the boot and root disks.

Step 2: Create Boot and Root floppy disks.

Start MESS (ct486 with -ramsize 64m works well) with the MS-DOS bootable floppy mounted in flop1, your freshly made, blank HD image mounted in hard1 and the Slackware CD mounted in cdrom.

During the memory test, press DEL to go to the BIOS setup, and enter Standard CMOS Setup. Set floppy drives to 3 1/2" 1.44MB, and first HD to type 47, with 1024 cylinders, 16 heads, and 63 sectors (or whatever you used when you created the CHD)



Exit this screen and select Write to CMOS and Exit. The system will now reboot and boot from the DOS floppy.

Switch to the CD-ROM drive (typically D:, but mine is set to E:) and change directory to BOOTDSKS.144 (cd bootdsks.144). Mount one of the floppies you copied earlier to flop2 (drive B:)

Enter rawrite bare.i b: This will write the image bare.i to the disk in drive B:, and will be the installation boot disk.



When done, unmount the disk in flop2, and mount the second copy you made in flop2.

Change to the ROOTDSKS directory (cd \rootdsks)

Enter rawrite color.gz b: This will write color.gz to the disk in drive B: and will be the installation root disk.

Step 3: Partition the Hard Disk.

Unmount both floppy disks, and mount the boot disk in flop1, and restart (press F3, or quit and restart MESS with boot disk in flop1). The boot disk will start up at a "boot:" prompt. Just press enter at this point, and the boot process will continue until you get a message to insert the root floppy disk, at which point, unmount the boot floppy, and mount the root floppy to flop1. It would be wise to bring up the File Manager menu before reaching the prompt for the root floppy, as pressing TAB to get to it will make it continue (despite it saying "press ENTER"). You should now get to the welcome screen, and a login prompt. Login as root (no password required).



You can try to run setup now, but it won't work, as there are no partitioned HDs available, so we must do that first. At the # prompt, type fdisk

Press m then Enter for a list of commands. Simplest setup for Linux is to have two partitions, one for the OS, the other for swap space.

The following sequence will set up the necessary partitions (press ENTER after each item):
n, p, 1, 1, +128M (or whatever size you wish for the swap partition)
n, p, 2, 262 (or whatever is the lowest cylinder available), 1024 (or whatever is the last cylinder available)
t, 1, 82 (sets first partition to Linux swap)
a, 2 (sets second partition to be bootable)

Final partition table should look something like this:



When it seems correct, press w then ENTER to write the partition table to the HD. Now mount the boot disk, and type reboot. The system will now reboot.

Step 4: Installation.

Repeat the previous boot process from the beginning of step 3, and login as root again.

Now you can run setup at the # prompt, and you should get this menu:



Settings the keymap and tags aren't necessary, so you can start by setting up the swap partition (ADDSWAP item). If you have your HD partitions set up as in step 3, then you should get /dev/hda1 available for swap. When asked if you wish to use mkswap, select Yes, and when asked if you wish to activate the swap partition, also select Yes (not required, but won't do any harm). Now the first partition should be in use as swap space.



Now, you can continue on to setting the target partition. If you select No, you will return to the main menu, if you select Yes, then you continue on, as if you select the TARGET item from the main menu.

Next, a quick scan of HDs will occur, and a list shown for you to select the partition to install Slackware to. If your setup is as it is in step 3, then select /dev/hda2. Next, it asks if you want to format the partition, select Format. For inode density, the default is fine, so select that. Wait while the partition is formatted.



(continued next post)

Next, is selecting the source media. Since we are installing from a CD-ROM, select option 5. The next screen selects the CD-ROM type. MESS only supports IDE/ATAPI CD-ROM drives, so select option 1.

Now you have to select which IDE device the CD-ROM drive uses. With default settings, this will be /dev/hdc (Secondary IDE interface, drive 1). If you have the CD-ROM drive configured on the primary IDE interface, then you would select /dev/hda. Clearly, your HD partitions will be /dev/hdc1 and /dev/hdc2, in that case. Finally, for the installation method, select slakware, which is the standard installation method.

Now we select which disk sets to install. What you install is entirely up to you and what you may need. Only set A (Base Linux system) is required.



Time to install the packages now. First, you must select the prompting mode. NORMAL will prompt you for each non-required package in the sets you selected earlier. This can be cumbersome, so MENU is a better option, as it let's you select most of the packages before installing them all at once.



After all the packages have been installed, you then need to install a kernel. You can choose from the kernel on the boot disk, one from the CD-ROM, or a kernel image stored on a DOS floppy. Using the kernel from the boot disk will do fine, so unmount the root disk, and mount the boot disk in flop1 once more, then select bootdisk from the menu. The kernel from the boot disk will now be installed to the HD.



Now on to the final phase, configuration. First task is making a boot disk. This is different to the boot disk created earlier, in that it will boot straight to your installed system, in case the HD image ever fails to boot for some reason. You'll need another copy of a disk image to turn into a boot disk, but this is entirely optional. The format option will format the disk image you have in flop1, simple will copy a kernel image on the floppy, lilo will make a more flexible LILO bootdisk, and continue will skip the whole process and continue on.

Select No to setting up a modem, MESS does not support modems at this time.

Select Yes to setting up your mouse, and choose option 1 (MS compatible serial mouse). Set ttyS0 (equivalent to COM1) for the mouse port.

Now you can choose some funky screen fonts, if you so wish. Select a font from the list, and it will change to that font for you. Then select No if you want to choose a different font, or Yes to set this one.



Next option is to install LILO to the boot sector of the HD. LILO (LInux LOader) is a common boot loader, which is run when booting the HD, and can provide boot parameters or load other OSes you may have installed on the HD.

To install LILO, first select Begin from the menu. The first screen will ask for any extra parameters. This is typically not needed, so just press Enter to continue. Next screen selects where LILO is to be installed, the Master Boot Record of the HD, the superblock of the partition you've installed to, or to a floppy disk. Select MBR. Next screen is for the boot: prompt delay. The choice is up to you. 5 seconds is plenty.

Next select Linux from the LILO menu, to add your Linux partition to it's config. Enter the partition you've installed to (it will be listed, but typically will be /dev/hda2). And finally, add a name for the partition. This can be anything you like, so long as it's a singe word.



Now select Install, and it will install LILO to the HD.

Next is gpm configuration. gpm is a program that allows you to select and copy text with the mouse while in console mode (ie: when not running X-Windows). It's up to you if you wish to enable it. Selecting Yes will add it to your system startup script.

Now select your time zone. Again, the choice is yours.

Finally, it will ask if you wish to replace /etc/fstab. Choose No.

And that is it. You can now exit setup, unmount any floppies, and reboot. Slackware will boot from the HD, and you can login as root.



Step 5: Hardware Setup.

As MESS only properly supports ISA (PCI is only available in 586+ drivers, and is rather incomplete at this stage), hardware drivers will need to be loaded manually.

For network cards, you will need to have installed the networking disk set when you installed the OS. If you haven't, then you can mount the CD-ROM (mount -t iso9660 /dev/cdrom /cdrom), run setup again, and start from selecting the source media. Remember that your system is already installed, so after installing the packages you want, you don't need to go further with the configuration as you have already done that before. After exiting setup, reboot and re-login.

To set up networking addresses, run netconfig. First, it will ask for the hostname, which can be pretty much anything you wish. Next, is the domain name. On a local system, this isn't all that important either, so you can enter what you want. When asked if you want to use loopback only, select No. Next, is the local IP address, which is the IP either assigned to or used by the emulation. This will likely be in the 192.168.x.x or 10.x.x.x ranges. Next, is the gateway address, which is the IP address of the TAP interface (or PCAP if you're using Windows or OS X). Then, enter a netmask of 255.255.255.0. When asked if you are using a name server (DNS), select Yes if you are, then enter the IP address of said DNS server.

Next step is to set up the driver for your network card. It is strongly recommended that you use the NE1000 or NE2000 with the IRQ set to 5, as IRQ3 seems to conflict with other hardware. You'll need to edit a file now, using vi, which can be confusing for those not used to it. At the # prompt, enter vi /etc/rc.d/rc.modules and press Enter. Press down until you see the line "#/sbin/modprobe ne io=0xNNN". Move the cursor to the # character at the start of the line and press x. Then, move the cursor to the start of the NNN and press x three times. Now, press a and type "300 irq=5" (without quotes), then press ESC. Hold Shift and press Z twice. Now reboot again, and you should have a functioning network. You can test internet access with Lynx, if you have it installed.



For sound, only the SB16 or AWE32 is supported at I/O 0x220 and IRQ5. You'll have to build your own modules from the kernel source to use other setups. Thankfully, MESS does support the SB16, so uncommenting the #/sbin/modprobe sound line in /etc/rc.d/rc.modules using vi should work (untested).

Installing Xenix 8086:

1. Create a chd as above but with "-chs 613,4,17". AFAIK, that is only geometry that will work with the MFM device.
2. Start MESS with an XT or PC driver: ibm5150, ibm5160, pc, pcmda etc (as of right now, the default pcmda bios won't boot floppies). Personally, I prefer the MDA video to CGA for text mode stuff. xtvga will have corrupt video. Put the N1 floppy in fd drive 1.



2. Put the in N2 floppy when it says "Insert filesystem floppy".
3. Press 'y' when asked to overwrite the entire disk and '2' for "Use Entire disk for XENIX" then 'q' to exit program.



4. Press 'q' to skip the bad sector table generation, just select the default swap size and 'n' to "control over the layout of the XENIX partition".



5. "Making filesystems" will take a minute or two. Insert the N1 floppy and reboot.



6. At the XENIX Boot prompt type: "xenix rootdev=hd(40,0)" and it will boot with the hdd as the root filesystem.



7. It'll run fsck after starting the kernel.



8. It'll ask for your serial number and activation key then it'll have you swap floppies as it installs the bulk of the OS.



9. Give your time zone.



10. You'll now have installed the N-install and B-base disk sets. If you have more, press '2' to install them here.

11. Press '1' to install the X-extended disk set and press '1' to select the package.



12. Type the package name or ALL for all.



At this point you can install all your additional sets than select "Stop installation now" when done. Reboot and the OS will start. Default username is "root" and password is blank.

installing QNX 4.23

Driver: at486, ramsize 15MB, 128MB hard drive (type 32 in BIOS)

booting with the boot floppy:



starting installation (type install at the prompt)



if we answer "n" to the U.S. keyboard question, we get to select the keyboard language, and then move on to the next screen...

getting prepared to partition drive



We answer "y" to the EIDE controller question and again answer "y" if the drive geometry the system informs us is correct.

partitioning

Here I executed fdisk (select e option), deleted the DOS partition and created a new QNX partition using all the space available in the hard disk.





Select Save, and we get to the next step...

checking hard drive. This takes a while. If everything is fine, we get a "Disk is OK" message



starting license installation and file copy



Just keep changing the installation floppies as instructed...



more file copy




second part coming...

finishing installation



we answer "n" to the 16-bit drivers question, then select the default logical node number QNX gives us, and after pressing two or three more times the enter key, we get to the next screen...



last step



we select the timezone, and the number of consoles, and answer y to the mouse question...

I haven't configured the networking, so I answered "n" to that question. That takes us to...

installation complete



rebooting (we can type shutdown in the prompt or close MESS and reopen it)



logging in



installing photon microGUI

we do this by inserting the Photon MicroGUI Disk 1 and typing install /dev/fd0. There is no need to mount the floppy. In fact, you'll get an error stating that the filesystem in the disk is corrupted if you try...



more installing photon...

Change the disks when asked



configuring photon display

we load photon by typing ph in the prompt



More in part 3...

photon desktop



applications (puzzle)



applications (Moire!)



applications (File Manager)



applications (System Info)



applications (CD Player)



applications (DayMinder)



and that's it!

To install Intel Xenix 286 on the ISBC 286/12.

1. Obtain the install floppies. The ones I have are numbered by Intel product IDs.

2. The floppies are raw images which is fine for all but the boot floppy. Get the ImageDisk software and use BIN2IMD.EXE to convert the boot floppy to the correct format. Here's the option file that will do it:

0 N=40 DM1=2 SS1=128 SM1=1-16 DM0=5 SS0=1024 SM0=1-4 /2
1 DM=5 SM=1-4 SS=1024 /2

3. Create a chd image with "-chs 512,8,9 -ss 1024"

4. Start MESS with the isbc2861 driver and the boot floppy in flop1.



5. At the * prompt press shift-u and enter . when asked. If the floppy is correct it should say READY.



6. After the "Interrupt 3" and the . prompt type "b :wf0:xenix.f".



7. Booting will take a minute or 2. Type "/etc/mksys" at the bootsys> prompt.

8. Insert disk 2 when prompted.



9. Select disk type c - Q540 and press enter at cyl-sur: prompt. It will now low-level format and copy the files to the disk which may take 5+ mins.



10. Remove the floppies and reset when it says shutdown.



11. Don't press anything this time and just press "b" at the . prompt.

Apollo Domain/OS "bare metal" startup guide

Prerequisites:
- SVN #30981 or later. The steps work for bare 0.153 and probably 0.152 even, but some options changed names.
- Delete any .cfg and nvram files for 'dn3500' as that's the specific model we'll be using
- Start up the dn3500 with no media, go to partial keyboard, enter the Tab menu, go to System Configuration, and make sure the options are as follows (these should be the defaults as of SVN #30981):

Normal/Service: Service
Graphics controller: 8-Plane Color
German keyboard: Off
20 Years Ago: On
25 Years Ago: On

Exit MESS and download the 5 cartridge tape images from Bitsavers at this link. On Linux/MacOS X you can use command line "gunzip" to remove the .gz compression. On Windows, 7zip should be able to handle it.


Part 1: NVRAM setup
1) Run the dn3500 driver again, this time with -ctape 019593-001.CRTG_STD_SFW_BOOT_1-REV.A.ct (or mount that file as ctape in QMC2) and -disk1 apollo.awd (make sure no file by that name exists; it will be created/overwritten).
2) Press enter 3 or 4 times to wake up the system
3) Type di c and press Enter to select the cartridge tape as the boot device
4) Type ex config to run the machine setup program

NOTE: cartridge tape is super ultra slow. Each load from it will take in excess of a minute at 100% emulation speed and may take several minutes. This does not mean the emulation has died. I recommand unthrottling the system during these loads.

5) It will ask if you want to reconfigure this node: press Y and Enter.
6) It will ask if the memory configuration changed. Press Y and Enter, then for each of the 4 memory boards enter 4 and press Enter for a total of 16 MB.
7) For the node ID, the usual default is 12345 although you don't *have* to do that. Note that the node ID is locked to the HDD after the OS install though.
8) For the display type, type DISP8C.
9) For the next set of questions: Y for MC68881/MC68882, N for floating point accelerator, Y for floppy disk, Y for Winchester. Winchester controller type is 0, and both disks are type C.
10) Answer Y for cartridge tape, N for SCSI cartridge tape, N for magnetic tape, N for 8mm tape, N for Serial/Parallel board, and N for PC Compatibility board.
11) Network type is 4, and N for unknown devices.
12) Answer N for "Anything more to do?"


Part 2: Calendar setup
1) When the prompt comes back, type RE to reset the system and press Enter 3 or 4 times.
2) Type di c and press Enter.
3) Type ex calendar and press Enter, then wait through another tape load.
4) When it asks to select a disk, press N and Enter.
5) For the time zone, you can pick any of the US time zones or GMT or UTC, it doesn't matter for our purposes really.
6) The system will show today's time and date but in the early 1990s. This is fine, answer N when asked if you'd like to reset it.


Part 3: Hard disk formatting and setup
1) When the prompt comes back, type RE to reset the system and press Enter 3 or 4 times.
2) Type di c and press Enter.
3) Type ex invol and press Enter, then wait through yet another tape load.
4) Choose option 7 to create a "bad spot" (bad sector) list. There are none because we emulate a perfect drive, but this is necessary anyway. Pick Y for automated bad spot entry, and Y for "Anything more to do?"
5) Choose option 1 to partition and format the drive. Choose w for "Select disk" and enter APOLLO (or something else if you want) for the volume name. Choose verification option 1 (no verify) and press Enter to accept the default average file size.
6) For the size of volume 1, enter all and press Enter to use the entire disk. Choose Y to use pre-recorded badspot info, and Y for "Anything more to do?"
7) Choose option 8 to create a swap file. Enter w for the disk select and 1 for logical volume number. Press Enter to accept the default 640 kB size of the file, and finally choose N for "anything more to do?"

(continued in next post)

Part 4: Install Domain/OS

1) When the prompt comes back, type RE to reset the system and press Enter 3 or 4 times.
2) Type di c and press Enter.
3) Type ex domain_os and press Enter, then wait through the longest load yet. Eventually the kernel will come up.
4) If it says "the calendar is more than a minute slow", just choose Y to proceed, it's harmless.
5) It will ask if you wish to replace the system software on your disk. Choose Y to continue, and the system will copy the installer files to the HDD.
6) You'll see the message "Apollo Phase II Environment Revision 10.4 RBAK version Jan 25, 1992 12:58:22 pm" and a ) prompt. Type go and press Enter to start up the installer, or shut to cleanly shut down the system and continue later.
7) An HP logo will appear and the windowing system will come up. Login as user and just press Enter for the password.

NOTE: the windowing system has very odd keyboard and mouse focus behavior; it's best to avoid moving the mouse during the install procedure lest you lose keyboard focus. In general if you do lose it, move the mouse to right after the MINST> prompt and click once.

8) It will ask if you wish to continue with MINST, type continue and press Enter.
9) It will ask if you want novice or expert mode, type novice and press Enter.
10) It will ask for the pathname of the Authorized Area, press Enter to accept the default.
11) Also press Enter to accept the default for the target pathname.
12) When asked if you wish to install Domain/OS type yes and press Enter.
13) When prompted for media type, type ct and press Enter.
14) It will give instructions for reading the release notes, just press Enter at the MINST> prompt to skip that.
15) When asked what package configuration to install, type 11 and press Enter to get a full install of both the traditional Domain/OS stuff and the BSD userland they'd been merging into it (not always comfortably).
16) It will ask "Are you sure?". Type yes and press Enter.
17) Use MESS's File Manager in the Tab menu to insert tapes 1, 2, 3, and 4 and press Enter as prompted. (The boot tape is not one of those 4).
18) It will then ask if you want to read the online manuals; press Enter to skip.
19) When asked if you want to select or quit MINST, type select and press Enter. This will run for several minutes creating the main filesystem via hard links to the various files the previous steps dumped onto the HDD.
20) When it says the install is finished, click where it says "Command" and type shut and press Enter. The system will shut down cleanly and exit back to the boot PROM prompt.
21) Quit MESS and restart without mounting a ctape, just -disk1. Press Enter a few times and type ex domain_os to launch Domain/OS, or change the System Configuration Service/Normal switch to Normal to autoboot.

Using Domain/OS is beyond the scope of this guide (and I don't know a lot about it myself), but good luck ;-)

Bitsavers has manuals, and there are some tips on the MESS wiki.

The default login is user with no password. See "How to create the registry in Domain/OS" on the MESS wiki page to enable the root account and have some real fun.


WARNING: If you ever shut down the system without using 'shut' and waiting for it to end, the hard disk will be corrupted and need fixing. You do this by mounting the boot ctape again and doing di c and ex salvol to run "Salvage Volume", which can usually fix the errors.

Installing Amiga OS 2.05 on the Amiga 600 internal IDE HDD

Note: Floppy image filenames are the same images as used by the softlist.

Step 1: Create appropriate empty HDD image. You can use your own values here, but you should keep the size below 2 GB. I've used the Conner CFA-170A as template here:


Step 2: Boot the Amiga with the hard disk and Install disk attached


You can press 'Enter' at the keymap setup question, or setup an alternative keymap (if you do, you need to swap in the Extras disk, then replace with the Install disk again).

It should now look like this:



Step 3: Prepare HDD. Double-click on the Install2.0 disk:



Then start the PrepHD utility. Answer "y" to the question:



Shutdown MESS now and restart it. Your Workbench should now display two HDD partitions:



Step 4: Format HDD and install Amiga OS. Double-click on the Install2.0 disk, then start the "FormatHD" utility. Answer "y" that you want to format your partitions, and "y" again at the question to install the system (and to all subsequent questions). The installation will now start. From time to time you will be asked to insert the "Fonts", "Extras" or "Workbench" disks. At the end it should look like this:



Shutdown MESS now and start it with just the HDD image attached:


It should now boot into your new 2.05 system:



You have two partitions, "System2.0" with your base system and "Work" for applications and other data.

Installation of Red Hat Linux 6.2
Driver: any PC-compatible driver with an 80386(not SX) or better CPU. at386, at486, ct486, at586 and clones should all work.

Software needed:
Red Hat Linux 6.2 installation CD-ROM - https://archive.org/details/Linux_Red_Hat_6.2_CD-ROM_Walnut_Creek_April_2000

Smart Boot Manager (for BIOSes that aren't able to boot from a CD) - http://mahlemiut.marpirc.net/SmartBootManager.zip

Other requirements:
A lot of spare time. This will take around a few hours, depending on your system speed.

Step 1 - Create HD image to install to
Create a blank HD of the size you'd like (1GB is enough).
Increase the cylinder count (first CHS value) to increase the overall disk size. -c none denotes no compression to be used. This allows direct writing to the CHD.

Step 2 - Boot from the CD-ROM
You'll need to start MAME with the appropriate commandline options to load the disk images needed. You'll want to use at least -cdrom /path/to/Linux_Red_Hat_6.2_CD-ROM_Walnut_Creek_April_2000.iso. at386,at486 and ct486 don't attach a CD drive by default, but you can attach one by adding -board3:ide:ide:1 cdrom to the commandline *BEFORE* the image switch. These drivers also require you to boot from Smart Boot Manager, which is a floppy-based application that will boot a CD-ROM on systems with BIOSes that otherwise cannot, so add -flop1 /path/to/SmartBootManager.zip. You need more RAM than default, so also add -ramsize 64m. Some drivers (ficpio2, at586) can support more RAM than this.
Also consider adding any additional hardware you want to use.
The default video adapter is the Tseng ET4000, but these examples use the S3 Trio64 (svga_s3).
Example commandline:

If you're using Smart Boot Manager, then select CD-ROM from the boot menu, otherwise, go to the driver's BIOS menu and enable booting from CD-ROM.

You'll then be greeted with the installation boot menu.
Enter text and press Enter to continue. This will force text-based installation (graphical doesn't work for some reason).


Step 3 - Installation setup
Controls are keyboard only in the text installer, but they are common enough to use easily. TAB will switch to the next dialog item or button, Space or Enter selects/"clicks" button, and Space will toggle option items.

First, it will ask for a driver disk. This is for network or SCSI hardware drivers, but since we're using neither, just select Cancel. Then it asks for drivers, since we don't need any, select Done.

Now you'll have the first rather long wait. I recommend you disable throttling, as there are plenty of idle periods which will run fast on most half-decent systems. Just be careful of the Scroll Lock key when toggling UI controls, this key can suspend console output, suspending any running application.

Eventually, you'll get this screen:

Select the language you wish to use.

Next, select the keyboard layout. US will do the job.


Next, select what sort of installation you want.

Gnome and KDE are different graphical environments. Server is likely to lack any graphical environment (haven't personally tried it). Choose whichever option suits you.

Step 4 - Partitioning the HD
The next screen will let you partition the HD image. There can be issues with creating partitions over 500MB, but a way around that limitation is to have a small boot partition.
So, first add a new partition, set the mount point to /boot, the size to 16MB, and type to Linux native.
You can add a swap partition if you wish, it can help performance. Add a new partition, leave the mount point blank, set size to 128MB (or whatever you want, double your RAM is usually good), and set type to Linux swap.
And now, add the main partition, where everything is going to be stored. Add a new partition, set mount point to /, leave size alone, set type to Linux native, and toggle the expand to fill disk option so that it is enabled.
If all has gone well, you should get this setup:


Step 5 - Further setup
Next dialog asks for mouse type. The default mouse used in all PC drivers in MAME is a serial mouse.

Generic 2 button serial mouse should be selected by default, so just select OK to continue.
The next screen ask for the serial port the mouse is attached to. Again, the default of /dev/ttyS0 is fine. Select OK to continue.


Step 6 - Account setup
First, it will ask for the root user password.

Enter your root password in both entry boxes. Nothing is displayed as you type, this is normal. If both password entries match, you can continue. Passwords must be 6 characters long or greater.

Now, you can enter a regular user ID and password. You may skip this if you wish, it can be done later.

Step 7 - Patience...
Next dialog asks for the video adapter you're using. Select whichever is appropriate for what adapter you are emulating. Some 2D accelerator cards (Mach8/32, Trio32/64) will work with the appropriate X-server, although may be a bit glitchy.
Now the system will start to install packages from the CD onto the HD. This may take a couple of hours, so disabling throttling may again be a good idea. Once complete, you have a bootable system, so if something goes wrong with the steps after package installation, you can boot from the HD, and complete them from there.

Step 8 - Create a boot disk
Now you will be asked if you want to create a boot disk.

This is optional, but useful if you screw something up, and you can't boot into your system from the HD.

Steo 9 - X-Windows setup
The final setup step (finally). You will be asked for the monitor you are using. Select custom. Next, select a resolution the emulated monitor is capable of.

1600x1200@70Hz works, so select that.
Now select the vertical sync range. (50-100 will do, or 40-150, it's not like you can blow out MAME's screen with invalid CRT parameters ;))


Now the system should start to shut down. It's possible that MAME may lock up when it reboots, so once the HD is unmounted, close MAME. Restart MAME with the -cdrom and -flop1 parameters removed (no longer needed). Red Hat should now boot from the HD, and eventually, you'll get a login screen.


If you didn't create a regular user, login as root, entering the root password you gave during installion. To create a user, use the command adduser <username>. To set the user's password, use the command passwd [username], then enter the password twice.

You can change the video adapter type again by running Xconfigurator (as root).

If you chose to boot into a graphical environment, then you'll get a graphical login. If not, you can start X-Windows by typing startx.

Excellent tutorial

For mame you'll want to use the isbc28612 driver. The irmx86 install disks come from http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/bits/Intel/iRMX86 .

Instructions for isbc 286/10-12 with default system monitor and 214 or 215/218 HDD/FDD controller.

HDD type Quantum Q540 chs 512,8,9 bps 1024 (formatted drive can be any size unformatted must be a type from http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/...eractive_Configuration_Utility_Mar89.pdf page 103, Note: the images from bitsavers only support W, IW, CM, CMB, QMA and an unknown type IWB)

Insert disk 147025
Start machine wait for . prompt.
Type "b :wf0:" (0 is the unit number, wf1 for unit 1 etc.)
Enter date dd/mm/yyyy
Enter time 24 hour hh:mm:ss
Type "super" with empty pass
Type "submit /instal.csd(qma0, 1, 6750)" (first is device name, qma0 is for quantum q540 others are listed on page 111 of above doc, second is interleave, third is max files on fs, intel suggests 125 per MB)
The drive will then be low level formatted then the base system will be copied.
You will then be asked to reboot.

To mount a floppy use "attachdevice wmfdy0 as f0" then "dir :f0:" to access and "deatchdevice f0" to umount.
Install the rest of the cli commands with by mounting 147113 and running "super" and "submit :f0:instal.csd(:f0:)".

PC-98の世界へようこそ

The PC-98 series can be pretty daunting to work with, mostly because, much like its IBM counterpart, it's a platform that lasted for a really long time (around two decades), and in that time it changed gradually while an immense amount of software and hardware was developed for it. This guide will try to make sense of some of that insanity.

First off, you need to choose a platform. The PC-98 series is mainly divided into two "generations": the original models which use NEC's μPD7220 "GDC" as their video controller (limited to 640x400 with 16 colors), and later models (mainly, but not limited to, the PC-9821 series), which add an enhanced GPU called EGC that can handle 256 simultaneous colors, among other things.

As of the writing of this guide, the recommended "old" model to work with in MAME is the PC-9801RS, and the recommended "new" model is the PC-9821Ce2. Those run reasonably well for our purposes.

Also, running old games from floppy is easy enough, but if you want to run post-1990 stuff, you will probably want to install DOS into a hard disk image, so the first thing to do is creating it with CHDMAN. For example:

chdman createhd -o path_to_your_hdd_image.chd -chs x,y,z -c none

...where x, y and z are the disk geometry (cylinders,heads,sectors). The machine won't care too much about the exact numbers, so you can just put something that lands you in the ballpark of the size you want. For example, "2048,16,63" will get you a 1 GB CHD. PC-98 DOS handles large HDDs pretty well, so don't worry about going too high.




Installing MS-DOS

To start the installation, we need to do a couple things:

First, run MAME with just the basic parameters for a PC-98 driver. For example, "mame pc9821ce2".

It will fail to boot but we don't care about that yet. Go to the TAB menu and select "Machine Configuration". You will see an option named "Load IDE BIOS", enable it and press ESC a few times until you exit the emulator completely.

Now the driver is configured to be able to use the HDD image. Run MAME again but this time mount the HDD image and the first MS-DOS 6.2 floppy from the software list:

mame pc9821ce2 -hard1 path_to_your_hdd_image.chd -flop1 msdos62:flop1

If everything is OK, you will see this:



This screen is asking if you want to install DOS on a hard disk (固定ディスク) or floppy disks (フロッピーディスク), so choose the first option.



This says that the disk isn't initialized, so you need to initialize (初期化) it. Just press ENTER.

(By the way, this is a good time to remind you that you can use the F10 key to unthrottle the emulation and let it run as fast as your host computer can handle. Trust me, you will need it.)



Here you choose the size of the DOS partition. Since we're simplifying things, just leave the default (the whole disk) and press ENTER... but just in case you want to do more complex things later, you might want to know that PC-98 systems use a custom partition layout that is very straightforward and flexible: all partitions are equal (no primary/extended stuff), you can have up to 16 of them per disk, and any of them can be bootable. All PC-98 formatted HDDs include a boot manager embedded in the MBR that appears whenever you have more than one bootable partition, and you can use it to boot anything from anywhere, without any limitations!



Anyway, the installer will ask you to confirm that yes (はい), you want to create the partition, or no (いいえ), you want to go back.



It will create and format the partition...



And it's supposed to automatically reset the machine, but this doesn't work in MAME so you will see a rather scary "SYSTEM SHUTDOWN" message. Get used to it.

So just press F3 in partial keyboard mode, and the emulated PC-98 will reset and boot from floppy again.



The installer will run again and ask for an installation directory. You can just accept the default, ¥DOS.

(NOTE: due to some weird historical shenanigans, the standard path delimiter in Japanese DOS computers is "¥" instead of "\". Don't ask.)

Confirm again (はい), and it will start to copy files from disk 1.



After that, it will ask for System Disk 2 (システムディスク＃２), so go to the TAB menu, File Manager, Floppy disk 1 (you should see all MS-DOS 6.2 disks at this point) and choose Disk 2.

You will see the same screen for each of the 8 disks, so keep changing them as the installer asks.



When it finishes, this screen will gladly inform you that some OS features (like printer support or XMS memory) will be enabled by default, while others (CD-ROM support, HDD cache) will not, and you can customize that with the CUSTOM command, which is the first clear sign that this isn't quite like the DOS we are all used to. More on that later. For now, just press ENTER.

The installer is finished! Remove the floppy disk from the drive and press ENTER. You will get the SYSTEM SHUTDOWN screen again, so press F3 and boot from your shiny new DOS installation... into the "beloved" DOS shell that Microsoft wanted to push on everyone back then. For now, go to the File (ファイル) menu and choose the last option (終了, or Finish).



Now you're on the familiar DOS prompt. You could start running porn games on it right away (don't lie to me, if you're using a PC-98 that's pretty much a given) but in the next post we will do a few things to customize the system for our needs.

(continued on the next post...)

Customizing the system

Before we go any further, here's an IMPORTANT NOTE: drive letters don't work like in IBM compatible systems. They don't have a fixed order. The device you boot from (FDD or HDD, doesn't matter) is always A:, other devices of the same type are the following letters, and other devices of other types come after that (except CD drives, as we will see later). So if you boot from an HDD with two partitions:

- A: would be the first HDD partition
- B: would be the second HDD partition
- C: would be the first floppy drive
- D: would be the second floppy drive

And in the emulated system we have built, we have A: as the HDD and B: and C: as the floppy drives... as long as we boot from HDD, of course.

You will see how super fun this is when we get to the part where we install floppy + CD games and need to tell them how to find their files.

-----

As I mentioned before, it seems at some point NEC realized that configuring DOS systems can be a bit arcane, so they included an utility (CUSTOM) that at least tries to do some basic stuff for you. Just run CUSTOM on the command line, and you will see this screen:



For now we only need the first option, Create/Update the Environment Configuration Files (環境設定ファイルの作成/更新). It will show two options at the bottom, 新規作成 (create new) and 更新 (update). Choose the latter.



In this screen, items can be enabled (使用する) or disabled (使用しない). You can also see another page of items with the 次画面 option but I don't recommend changing anything there. For a standard MAME setup, I'd disable at least the following so they don't take up memory:

- Japanese input (日本語入力), if you're not planning on typing Japanese text.
- Printer support (プリンタ).
- DOS Shell (DOSシェル).

You *could* also, on a real PC-98 system with a supported CD-ROM drive, enable CD-ROM support here, but this doesn't work on emulation (and it doesn't even work on some real PC-98 computers), so leave that disabled for now and choose 設定終了 (Finish Settings).



You will see a preview of your CONFIG.SYS file, and three options: 次画面 (next screen), メニュー選択を戻る (return to selection menu) and 内容を編集する (edit the contents). Choose the first one.



Another preview, this time of AUTOEXEC.BAT. Choose the 作成を終了する (finish creation) to end the process, and exit the tool with 終了.

Reboot, and you will finally be free of the tyranny of DOS Shell.



Bigger and better hardware

MAME by default emulates a NEC PC-9801-26K sound card. This card is based on the Yamaha YM2203 (OPN) FM synth, which sounds good enough and is compatible with pretty much anything, but you also have two other choices:

- The PC-9801-86 upgrades the FM chip to a YM2608 (OPNA), which sounds *fantastic* on the games that support it, and adds a 16-bit stereo PCM DAC on top of it. The 86 is fully backwards compatible with the 26, so there is no reason not to choose it, outside of the higher system requirements for emulation, or the rare compatibility quirk.

- The PC-9801-118 is a later model mainly found on PC-9821 computers (it's also known as "CanBe sound source" because that was one of many commercial names that NEC used for the PC-9821 line). It further upgrades the FM chip to a YMF297-F (which is still compatible with both the OPN and the OPNA), but replaces the 86 PCM sound with a Crystal CS4232 codec (a.k.a. "Windows Sound System"). It is *not* directly compatible with the 86 PCM, so it works better with later games that support the 118 explictly.

To use one of the alternatives, simply plug it into the emulated C-Bus slot with "-cbus0 pc9801_86" or "-cbus0 pc9801_118".

Also, all PC-98 drivers have 1664 KB (640 + 1024) of RAM as a default, which might not be enough for later software. You can add more RAM with the "-ramsize" option. At the time of writing this guide, the supported options are 640K, 1664K, 3712K, 7808K, and 14M.



The CD-ROM conundrum

If you're familiar with how CD drives work in IBM compatibles, you will know that we have to load a CD driver and the MSCDEX program so DOS can access the drive. But there's a problem: none of the CD drivers included with DOS work with MAME, at least at the time of writing this. The only one that works (NECCDM.SYS) was distributed separately. You can download a disk image that contains it here:

http://r-09.net/neccdm.zip

So to make this work, you need to:

- Mount the floppy image (do this after you boot from the HDD).
- Copy NECCDM.SYS to the DOS directory, renaming it to NECCD.SYS (if you've followed my instructions, that would be COPY B:¥NECCDM.SYS A:¥DOS¥NECCD.SYS). The renaming part is important because a lot of installers expect it to have that name.
- Edit the CONFIG.SYS file so it loads the driver.

That last part needs some explanation. The classic MS-DOS Editor (EDIT.COM) is not included with NEC's version of DOS, instead they opted to include their own editor (SEDIT). Run SEDIT A:¥CONFIG.SYS and you will see the contents of the file:



Just add two lines at the end:

LASTDRIVE=Q
DEVICE=A:¥DOS¥NECCD.SYS /D:CD_101

(if you're having trouble with the keyboard, take a look at the keyboard mappings in the TAB menu)

The CD_101 part is just a device name and can be anything, but it's kind of a standard name so I recommend keeping it like that.

After that, press F1 and choose the ファイルのセーブと編集終了 (finish editing and save the file) option.



Now do the same for AUTOEXEC.BAT. You should be getting the hang of this already. Edit it and add this line:

A:¥DOS¥MSCDEX.EXE /D:CD_101 /L:Q

(NOTE: if you're wondering "why Q: and not another letter?", it is sort of a de-facto standard for CD-ROM drives in Japanese computers. It probably started with the FM Towns, which has it hardcoded; maybe they were Star Trek fans or something.)

Reboot, and if everything is OK you should be able to access the CD as drive Q. You can mount CDs from the MAME command line with the "-cdrom" option.



(continued on the next post...)

Installing (some) CD software

Most people who are reading this will want to install CD software (i.e. fully voiced porn games) into the emulated HDD. There is no official standard or system-wide installer, but due to the peculiarities of the PC-98, most game publishers ended up implementing a similar method of installation, which involves these steps:

- Boot DOS from HDD and run an installer EXE
- Tell the installer where your DOS files are, and which floppy drive you will use to create a boot disk
- The installer formats the floppy disk, and copies DOS files and sometimes a few needed drivers (NECCD.SYS, MOUSE.EXE, AVGDRV.SYS...) to the disk.
- Boot the system from the floppy disk; the installer will appear again and ask which drive letter is your HDD (remember that thing about the letter order? this is where it comes into play). It will then copy game files into the HDD.
- Reboot again, and the floppy disk will now boot straight into the game.

To illustrate this, we'll see how to install the classic visual novel "Desire: Haitoku no Rasen" by C's Ware.

First, run MAME with all the hardware attached. For example:

mame pc9821ce2 -hard1 pc98.chd -cdrom desire -cbus0 pc9801_86 -ramsize 14M

(by the way, you can persist most of those options by putting them into an INI file; for example. create "ini/source/pc9801.ini" and add the line "cbus0 pc9801_86" to always have an 86 sound card attached)

Once DOS has booted, mount a blank floppy into the first drive as read-write, switch to the Q: drive and take a look. In this case there are two files called DESIREFD.BAT and DESIREHD.BAT.



These are the installers (one to just use the floppy and run everything from CD, and the other to also install the game into HDD). You will see similarly named files in a lot of PC-98 software, though sometimes the names are less intuitive (e.g. ZZZCDF.EXE and ZZZCDH.EXE). In this case, we run DESIREHD.BAT.



First it will ask for the kind of CD-ROM drive we have. This is needed in order to know which driver it has to copy. For the emulated drive in MAME you should always select anything related to a standard NEC drive, in this case option 1.



Now it's asking for the drive our DOS files are in, so we choose A.



And finally, it asks where the blank floppy disk is, so we choose B. It will warn you that all data inside the floppy disk will be lost. Just press ENTER.



Now it's formatting the disk and copying the system files. Just wait, and it will eventually show this:



It will send you back to the command line. Now reboot the PC-98 and let it boot from floppy. If everything is right, the installer will run again.



This is just a confirmation prompt to install the HDD part of the game, which will take up 6 MB of disk space. Press Y.



Now this is the mind-bending part. We need to tell the installer where the HDD is, but since we are booting from floppy, the HDD is now drive C: instead of A:. Yes, it's insane, but that's how it works.



Specify a directory to install into, and...



It's over. Reboot again, and you will be in the game.

----

Other possible situations:

In some cases (e.g. Data West games) you don't need a blank disk, and instead they include their own installer floppies, which modify themselves to include the necessary system files and drivers. Generally the user is expected to make a backup copy of that disk before running the installer.

In some other cases (a lot of Nihon Falcom games), there's no floppy involved. You just run the installer from the CD, it copies files to the HDD, and you are expected to run the game directly from your DOS installation. This isn't very common, though.

Sometimes, you also get additional options to select the type of graphics and/or sound hardware you have. Those are usually intuitive enough if you know the basics of how the platform works (which I just taught you!).

And in some other cases... well, there can be unexpected things. If you can read at least basic Japanese you should be able to make some sense out of them, but if not... well, good luck.

That's it for now! Good luck on your adventures in the PC-98 world!

Installation instructions for HP-UX 9 on hp9k360 (needs mame newer than 2018/10/23):

get the install images:

http://bitsavers.org/bits/HP/HP_9000/HPUX_9/CD/hpux9_install.iso
http://bitsavers.org/bits/HP/HP_9000/HPUX_9/CD/hpux_9.1_update.iso

./mame64 hp9k360 -sl2 '' -hard hpux9.chd -cdrom hpux9_install.iso

This will boot the installer:


Press <Enter> to continue:


Installer searching for disks:


It found our disk image:


Say 'y' to have long file names:


Press '1' to continue:


Accept the default swap setting by pressing enter:


And, once again, press 'y' to continue:


Installer starts creating the filesystem:


Installer extracting the minimum HP-UX system:

The installer is now asking for the update CDROM:


Enter the Menu, and select 'hpux_9.1.update.iso':



After that is done, the installer shows the main menu, press enter to select all filesets:


Press Enter once again to confirm that you to install these filesets:


And, 'y' to really install:


And this is the final install screen. After it finishes install, it will reboot into HP-UX from hard disk.


Have fun with HP-UX!

The CHD (hard disk image file) can be created with './chdman createhd -f -o hpuxtest.chd -s $[512*1048576]' where 512 is the size in Megabyte, and can be adjusted to your needs.

Install IRIX 5.3 onto an emulated Silicon Graphics INDY (using MAME 0.207)

1) Get the software ready:

a) Be sure you have the correct Machine in your roms folder; "ip224613.zip". It's for a Silicon Graphics, Indy with a MIPS R4600 CPU.

b) Get the Install IRIX 5.3 install CD-ROM disc image (IRIX 5.3). I renamed the .img file as "IRIX5.3forIndyR4400175MHz.iso" to make the later commands simpler.

c) Make a blank 8 GB Hard Drive using the chdman utility with this command:
chdman createhd -f -o irix8gbHD.chd -s $[8192*1048576]

I put all three files (zip, iso and chd) in my "roms" folder to make the later commands simpler.


2) Boot the machine using the CD-ROM image, and mount the Hard Drive. The command I used also sets MAME into windowed mode (with the default resolution of an INDY system) to make it easier to move back and forth between the tutorial and MAME. I'm using a Mac laptop, so I use "fn" + "delete" key to partially escape the emulated keyboard. Then I can "command" + "tab" to switch between apps. Double check this function in the MAME docs for your system, so you do not get locked into the emulation keyboard with no way to escape.

Replace <PATH TO MAME FOLDER> with your correct path:

<PATH TO MAME FOLDER>/mame64 ip224613 -cdrom <PATH TO MAME FOLDER>/roms/IRIX5.3forIndyR4400175MHz.iso -harddisk <PATH TO MAME FOLDER>/roms/irix8gbHD.chd -window -nomaximize -resolution 1280x1024

You will see the Welcome to INDY screen, then a warning will say "unable to boot" press "continue" (probably means the HD has no system yet). You will then see the main CD-ROM interface with 6 buttons.






3) Click the Enter Command Monitor button (or press 5)

enter:
setenv -f eaddr 08:00:69:12:34:56

Then click "done"



4) Enter Command Monitor again (or press 5)

Initialize the HD. In Command Monitor type this command:

boot -f dksc(0,6,8)sashARCS dksc(0,6,7)stand/fx.ARCS



it will ask if you want all options. Type:
yes

It will prompt you, just follow its suggestions:
fx: "device-name" = (dksc) <press enter>
fx: ctlr# = (0) <press enter>
fx: drive# = (1) <press enter>

It will create default sgilabel, boot info, partitions, and volume directory then present a menu with options.
Type "exit". It will ask to save changes, type "yes"


5) Click the "Install System Software" button (or press 2)


"Local CD-ROM" will be selected by default, click the "Install" button


An Alert will say "Insert the Installation CD-ROM now." It's already mounted so just click "Continue"

You will see a Copying Installation tools to disk progress bar.


A console will load and you will be asked to make a new file system. type "yes". It will prompt you to format the other partition/s keep saying "yes"


After several minutes you will see "Invoking software installation." and a menu with 12 choices.


At the prompt Inst> type "4" <enter> for install. It will check sizes then ask which subsystem. type "all" <enter>
At the prompt Inst> type "go" <enter>

It will check sizes for a good long while(10min?)

CONTINUED...

Install IRIX 5.3 onto an emulated Silicon Graphics INDY (using MAME 0.207) Continued

Then installation will begin with a %

Took about 1.5 hrs to install



It will ask if you want to install from another CD, type "quit" and the installer will build dynamic libraries for a while.



It will then ask to restart, type "y"

After reboot

click "root" icon and click login. There is no password set.





When shutting down, a notice will appear:
"The system is shutting down.
Please wait"


It never progresses, so the system doesn't shut down cleanly. You will need to use your escape key to close the emulation. It will repair itself on next boot(usually). Make a backup of the drive before you use it much. I've had the root account get corrupted or something and I was not able to fully recover, So I trashed the HD image and switched to a backup version.

To boot again use a simpler command without the CDROM:
<PATH TO MAME FOLDER>/mame64 ip224613 -harddisk <PATH TO MAME FOLDER>/roms/irix8gbHD.chd -window -nomaximize -resolution 1280x1024

NOTE: The CDROM drive does not appear to be useful after installation. I have not been able to install any other software.

Thanks to the genius MAME devs who have gotten the emulation to this point. It's in the very early stages but it's exciting to be able to use a system I haven't seen live in over 20years.

Install IRIX 6.5 onto an emulated Silicon Graphics INDY using MAME 0.211

This is basically an updated version of the previous post. Screenshots are not included because they are nearly identical to the previous post.


1) Get the software ready:

a) Be sure you have the correct Machine ROM in your roms folder; "indy_4610.zip".
There are some other ROMs we need for keyboard functionality.

kb_ms_natural.zip
ps2_keybc.zip

*Note: The "ps2_keybc.zip" files I found from my usual sources did not work. They were missing a file called "72x8455.zm82". I googled and found the file, then added it to my "ps2_keybc.zip".


b) Get the Install IRIX 6.5 install CD-ROM disc images from the Internet Archive (https://archive.org/) Search for "IRIX 6.5". I removed spaces and renamed the .img files as ".iso" to make the later commands simpler.

You need 4 disc images:
IRIX 6.5 Installation Tools June 1998
IRIX 6.5 Foundation 1
IRIX 6.5 Foundation 2
IRIX 6.5 Applications June 1998

c) Make a blank 12 GB Hard Drive using the chdman utility with this command:
chdman createhd -f -o irix12gbHD.chd -s $[12288*1572864]

I put all files (zip, iso and chd) in my "roms" folder to make the later commands simpler.


2) Boot the machine using the CD-ROM image, and mount the Hard Drive. The command I used also sets MAME into windowed mode (with the default resolution of an INDY system) to make it easier to move back and forth between the tutorial and MAME. I'm using a Mac laptop, so I use "fn" + "delete" key to partially escape the emulated keyboard. Then I can "command" + "tab" to switch between apps. Double check this function in the MAME docs for your system, so you do not get locked into the emulation keyboard with no way to escape.

Replace <PATH TO MAME FOLDER> with your correct path:

<PATH TO MAME FOLDER>/mame64 indy_6410 -cdrom <PATH TO MAME FOLDER>/roms/IRIX6.5ApplicationsJune1998.iso -harddisk <PATH TO MAME FOLDER>/roms/irix12gbHD.chd -window -nomaximize -resolution 1280x1024


You will see the Welcome to INDY screen, then a warning will say "unable to boot" press "continue" (probably means the HD has no system yet). You will then see the main CD-ROM interface with 6 buttons.

3) Click the Enter Command Monitor button.

enter:
setenv -f eaddr 08:00:69:12:34:56 <enter>
setenv monitor h <enter> (Tells system you have a high-res monitor)

Then click "done"

4) Enter Command Monitor again.

Initialize the HD. In Command Monitor type this command:

boot -f dksc(0,6,8)sashARCS dksc(0,6,7)stand/fx.ARCS


Then back to the Welcome screen, you can click "Install System Software". It will Say "Copying installation tools to disk"

It then loads the command monitor to ask permission to make a new file system on the hard disk.

Follow the prompts. It will ask you to choose Filesystem block size (I used "512")

After several minutes you will see "Invoking software installation." and a menu with 14 choices.

At the prompt Inst> type "6" <enter> for install. Press space bar to load all the text. You will see 4 choices. type "1" <enter> to install. It will ask if you want to check for old files type "no" <enter>

You will have a choice:

1/CDROM/dist
2/done

type "1" <enter> for install.

The installer will remind you that The CD-ROM is part of a set and prompt for insertion of other disc. You must insert the other discs one at a time using MAMEs internal UI "File Manager" to browse and select the disc(IRIX 6.5 Foundation 1.iso). Return to the machine by using the tab key and press Enter. The system will check the files and again prompt for any other discs. Use the File Manager again and load (IRIX 6.5 Foundation 2.iso). Do the same for (IRIX 6.5 Applications June 1998.iso).

At the inst> prompt type go <enter>

It should now start installing. Occasionally, it will ask you to insert another CD-ROM. Use MAMEs File Manager to insert the correct CD. Then return to the MAME machine and allow the installer to run.

I'm not sure how long it takes for this installation. I let MAME run in the background and just checked it every so often to see if it was asking for a different CD. Probably about 2 hours later the install was done.

At the inst> prompt type quit <enter>

You will see a notice "Requickstarting ELF files" a percentage will count to up to %100.

Do not be fooled by the word "quick". This process takes an hour.

Then the machine will reboot and you will be able to log into the GUI. So far I just used the "demos" account. No password is needed.

Mac OS from scratch, on MAME 0.232+ (or a recent Git pull). (post 1/2)

Prereqs: the Apple Legacy Recovery CD-ROM, which you can get from Macintosh Garden. WARNING: Internet Archive has a version of the CD which does not work properly - it boots, but the file association with the .scr scripts doesn't work.

First, create a hard disk image. I'll give instructions for one that's around 500 MB, but you can go up to at least 1 GB without MacOS getting upset.
For an uncompressed CHD, enter chdman createhd -c none -chs 1023,63,16 -o myhdd.chd. If you're on Linux, BSD, or modern macOS, you can easily create a non-CHD raw image with dd if=/dev/zero of=myhdd.hdv bs=1000000 count=500.

Second, start MAME with the hard disk image you just created and the Legacy Recovery CD-ROM mounted on the Mac IIci driver: mame maciici -ramsize 8M -hard1 myhdd.chd -cdrom "Apple Legacy Recovery Oct 1999.iso" (use myhdd.hdv instead if you chose that route to create the image).

The system will start up and you'll see a Finder desktop like this:


Double-click the "Legacy Recovery" icon:


And then double-click "Disk Utilities" and then "Formatting Software":


Next double-click "Drive Setup 1.5":


Click your hard disk image, which will show as "<not initialized>" and then click the "Initialize.." button:


When this warning comes up, you can pick "Custom Setup..." if you know what you're doing and want to partition the hard disk in some special way, or just click "Initialize" to get a single partition the full size of the disk:


You should get this success:

MacOS from scratch (post 2/2)

Select File -> Quit to exit Drive Setup, and close the "Formatting Software" and "Disk Utilities" windows.


Double-click the "Mac OS" folder and then the folder for the System version you wish to install. I chose System 7.1.1 here as a good choice - it's reasonably up-to-date, but doesn't use a ton of RAM like 7.5, and runs all the way back to the Macintosh Plus. (If you are unsure what versions will work on a particular model, double-click the "System Software by CPU" folder and then navigate to the model you'd like to run).


Double-click the "Net Install.scr" file to launch Disk Copy and mount all of the installation disk images.


Click "Agree". After a few moments the installer will launch. This will look different depending on the version you pick, my screenshots here are for System 7.1.1.


Click Ok to get to the main installer screen (for some versions you may go directly here):


The defaults are usually OK. Make sure it's "Macintosh Family system software" or "System Software for all Macs" or something like that (the phrasing differs per System version) to ensure the resulting hard disk can boot on any supported Mac.


Once the installer is done, you should see this success:


Choose "Quit", and then choose "Shut Down" from the "Special" menu to cleanly shut down the system:


Quit MAME and then restart it without the Legacy Recovery CD-ROM mounted. It should boot up into your installed System version:

Reminder: this thread is for OS install guides only. Posting questions here may result in a ban, please create a new thread for support issues instead.

Installing OS/2 Warp 3 in pc9821ap2

Notes at the time of writing:
- Bleeding edge or upcoming MAME 0.272.
- Doesn't work in plain pc9821 (kernel panic during install), do not bother in anything beyond pc9821ce2 (will make use of PCI features, assuming you even get there)

1. Enable IDE BIOS in Machine Configuration thru TAB menu (step eventually to be removed)

2. Create a chdman HDD,
3. Startup the machine

4. You will be greeted with an █ █ OS/2 prompt then this, which just means to swap os/2 warp 3 with Disk 1 in Drive A then strike enter key


5. Loading from floppy drive, with an extra more laconical "loading" screen afterwards


6. Once done, OS/2 will ask to insert installation floppy again, and CD-Rom if it isn't already


7. Ask for user to select between Basic or Advanced configuration. The HDD partition is currently unformatted so need to choose Advanced here


8. Select 1 for formatting the HDD with one contiguous partition.


9. Partitioning complete, remove and reinsert the Install Disk media (?), then at "SYSTEM SHUTDOWN" soft reset the machine


10. Now redo step 4, until you reach this, select 1 if one partition is used


11. Asks you if you want the normal PC-98 letter scheme (1, A: will be HDD) or the more canonical DOS/V schema (where A: is floppy and C: is HDD)


12. install phase 1


13. At the end of it, will ask for removing floppy drive then strike enter -> "SYSTEM SHUTDOWN" -> soft reset


At this point once rebooted OS/2 will ask for the usual device select and what OS parts to install, at the time of this writing those screens are broken so delaying this (trivial) part for later.

Installing OS/2 Warp 3 in pc9821ap2 (part 2).
Press ESC to return back to a previous step.

14. Device select.
The ones on top row are Code Page and JIS arrangement
middle row is serial support (yes), keyboard (98 keys), graphic adapter (PEGC at 256 colors)
Bottom row is APM (none), PCMCIA (no), CD-ROM, Printer (do not install default printer), Music adapter (PC-9821 A Mate), SCSI (no).
ETA: at current time there's a bug that will list CD-ROM as その他 (others), eventually leading to the media missing when installed. Going in CD select and select PC CD-101 should fix this inconvenient.



Most of the stuff not automatically detected isn't supported at the time of this writing, so just click on bottom left button to go on.

15. OS component select. Bottom right box is available space (top) vs. required (bottom).
Pressing (R) button will go "Recommended", which gets rid of most fonts packages and マルチメディアのソフトウェアのサポート (Multimedia Software Support), (A) button will install everything. Going R then re-enabling the extra Multimedia pack will trim down installation to 38-ish MB.
Press (I) button to install.


16. "Expansion Options". Not sure what this setting does, the other two are always greyed out (open preference then modem service options?). Press left button to continue.


17. Ready to be greeted with the OS/2 install progress bar.


18. Once done, it will prompt to this screen, that suggests to change system defaults. Press left button to go "End" and soft reset.




19. Finally ready to use the OS