Have you some 16-bit dos based games you want to play Or any software to run? Is the software for example turbo c/c++ very important for you, so you are thinking to switch to Windows XP because they won't run in full screen or some won't run at all. This is the case with most Windows Vista & Windows 7 users. It is because the subsystem (Available in XP) which runs dos based applications has been removed in Vista & Win 7. We have a nice tool "DOSBox" which is an MS-DOS emulator that can be used to run 16-bit dos based applications and games in Windows Vista, Win 7 and many other Operating Systems.
If you want to use only DOSBox without any front-end application click here
Though Vista & 7 has a virtual system (XP) for running applications which have some compatibility issue. We need one for MS-Dos.
Before I start, I must tell you that DOS Box requires you to type some codes every time you start. So we are using another application DBox a front-end application written in Java using NetBeans which makes working with Dos Box a lot easier.
Follow These Steps to Use DOSBox with D-Box
1) Download & Install the DBox (DOSBox also included in the package) from the link at the end of the post.
2) Create a directory and name it "DOSFILES" preferably in the root/c: or any other. This folder will be mounted as C: in DOSBox, you will learn later in the next post.
3) Copy all DOS applications & games (eg dev) to this directory. For example, if you want to run Turbo C/C++ IDE, copy TC folder or extract from TC installer to this directory.
4) Run D-Box, go to start> all programs/programs> D-Box> D-Box
or from the program files in C drive.
5) You can find three buttons on top of D-Box. Click on the third icon and select "Preferences" from the drop-down menu. In the general tab, you have to locate DOSBox. Though it has been bundled along with D-Box and "Path to DosBox" is already filled.
You have to locate DosBox again. Click on the locate button, a dialogue box would open. Go to the directory where your windows/mac program files are stored > D-Box> DosBox> DosBox.exe (windows)
6) In the preference > General Tab select the checkbox "Play games in full screen" or you can press Alt+Enter to switch to Full-screen mode.
7) Return to the D-Box window, Click on the second button (Game Information) > new game.
In the general tab: write the name of the software/game in the name field and in executable field locate the dos program you want to run.
If you followed Step2 & 3 locate the executable file in the recently created directory "DOSFILES"
click on ok or
8) (Optional) In the same general tab Select the icon for the file and choose what at speed do you want your dos application to run? It's to downgrading
your system to best simulate the old systems.
Click on ok.
In this way, you can add multiple programs & Games to D-Box.
9) On the main window of D-Box, shortcuts to all programs are created. Clicking on the shortcut will run the program inside DOSBox.
A similar procedure will be followed for Macintosh & Linux. Because I haven't used this software on Mac, the tutorial is not included here.
Features of D-Box
☼ It provides an interface to DOS Box.
☼ It makes it easier to use DOS Box without writing any lines of commands.
☼ Supports Screen Shots for Tutorials etc
Limitations of DOSBox
The only limitation with DOSBox is you can't use some keyboard shortcuts like ctrl+F9 to run c programs. Because ctrl+f9 is one of the shortcuts of DOSBox itself. Pressing Ctrl+F9 will exit from the DOSBox, be aware of that. Instead of it, you will have to manually click on options.
Downloads
Download D-Box (include DOSBox Binaries)
since D-Box Requires Java you need to download it.
Download Java [link]
Download DOSBox (If you want to use DOS Box Separately)
for Windows [link]
for macOS [link]
for Linux [Download from Linux repository]
for other downloads visit official website [www.dosbox.com]
for macOS [link]
for Linux [Download from Linux repository]
for other downloads visit official website [www.dosbox.com]
Well, this article is posted for my friends and all other programming students who want to use Turbo C/C++ or such an application in Windows Vista/7/8/10. At an,y point if you find any difficulty to use D-Box or DOS Box you can use the comment field below to post your questions.
If you want to use only DOSBox solely, then click here.
If you have tried it successfully, then share your experience.
Shekhar Sahu
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2 comments for this post
nice application......but Im into Ms visual c++......I feel this is a good option for newbies who opt for game rather than hardcore programming :)
Thanks for sharing... :)
@Satyajit along with visual c/c++ there are many alternatives of Turbo c/c++ IDE, but the problems is textbooks & Universities don't support/allow new codes.