DOS ain't dead

Hi everyone

I recently found out about Free DOS via the article on the Register and it made me want to try and set up my old LAN party network from the early 90s.

So I’m looking for advice for setting up a network to play early 90s classic DOS games in multiplayer mode, games like DOOM, Warcraft, Red Alert. Pre-WIN95 era where all the games were coded to use Novell IPX as opposed to TCP/IP. It would be really nostalgic to play these games on actual hardware for a change as opposed to in DosBox.

On my old mates-network we used Netware LITE as opposed to the full business version of Novell Netware. Everyone had to find NE2000 compatible network cards because it was the only card we had a driver for, it was a bit of a pain.

I held onto MS-DOS for as long as I could, I think I only gave in around 1999 when there wasn’t much choice left. I remember I had crafted a multiboot menu into my config.sys and autoexec.bat but I think a lot of that knowledge has leaked out of my brain over the last 20 years.

So any advice on what to do with hardware and drivers would be appreciated. I have looked on the Free DOS wiki pages and unfortunately there are a lot of broken links in them. As far as I know NIC manufacturers stopped making packet and ODI drivers a while ago – so does it mean I need to keep looking for vintage network cards like a RealTek RTL8029 or RTL8029AS?

Any advice about sound cards too? I don’t think I’ve understood Free DOS enough yet to know whether it can make use of modern drivers, but I presume there is support for new PC BIOS types than MS-DOS would support.

Any advice here would be welcome!

Many thanks
Dave

RealTek RTL8019 (ISA) and RTL8029AS / RTL8139 (PCI) have goods drivers.
There are many HTTP sites and FTP sites with these drivers.

For example, I had RTL8139(A/B/BL/C/8130) PCI/Cardbus Fast Ethernet NIC Driver Disk Version 3.70 (OEM)

> Alert. Pre-WIN95 era where all the games were coded to use Novell IPX as

+Duke Nukem

> So any advice on what to do with hardware and drivers would be appreciated.

I can give you a clue from the '90s: "if you want have a problem with drivers -> buy something other then NE2000/ISA".
As i see, nothing is changed last 30 years.

---
Make DOS great again!

Carthago delenda est, Ceterum censeo Carthaginem delendam esse.

Hi dggionco, many thanks for this! That's really useful - can you perhaps link me to some of these websites where the drivers can be obtained?

> +Duke Nukem
And Shadow Warrior! I also wonder whether the issues with NetBios have been fixed now? I remember all the Bullfrog games needed it - Dungeon Keeper, Magic Carpet etc - and when playing over IPX, after a while everyone would realise they were out of sync with each other. All the players eventually ended up in their own single player game where they were winning.

> As i see, nothing is changed last 30 years.
Okay understood. Any advice for good sound cards then?

> Hi dggionco, many thanks for this! That's really useful - can you perhaps
> link me to some of these websites where the drivers can be obtained?

Some links...

RTL8019AS / RTL8029 / RTL8139
https://ftp.zx.net.nz/pub/drivers/Realtek/


RTL8019

https://www.realtek.com/en/component/zoo/category/rtl8019as-software


RTL8029AS

https://www.realtek.com/en/component/zoo/category/rtl8029as-software


RTL8139

https://www.realtek.com/en/component/zoo/category/...-controllers-10-100m-fast-ethernet-pci-software

https://download.cnet.com/oem-8139-500-zip/3000-2112_4-166061.html

https://ftp.dlink.de/@archive/neteasy/drn-32tx/rtl8139/

> Okay understood. Any advice for good sound cards then?

What kind of sound card you need?
1. Most true hardware, from historical point of view? (in case if you want listen the same as 90% of people in 198x-199x, or another case - if you want develop new game in old-style)
2. Most "audiophilic" hardware (hifi), from historical point of view? (in case if you want listen the same as 5-10% of people or you want capture most quality sound)
3. Most new hardware working in DOS?
4. Hardware for demo scene.
etc

You will receive 4 different opinion.
Each of them will be true, but exclude (make false) other 3 opinions.

---
Make DOS great again!

Carthago delenda est, Ceterum censeo Carthaginem delendam esse.