[comp.windows.ms] Win3.0 - More questions

pcb@gator.cacs.usl.edu (Peter C. Bahrs) (06/12/90)

Round 2 of questions/comments:

In general WIN 3.0 is awesome! (wrt win386, and all of my X envts.)

1) Does win3 give each dos application a virtual 8088 machine when in
   enhanced mode?
   I have 9 mb memory (2 real and 8 swap) available and can only
   run 1 copy of edix and 1 procomm...then is says out of memory,
   kill an application.  Sooooo, the answer to this questions appears
   to be :  ?? no, they still share 640k. 

2) Comment:
   I wish that when I exit program manager, the entire state would
   be saved...i.e. protocol such that an application gets a save
   message and a restart message.

   Changing the background pattern with desktop, If I edit the current
   background, it will not take effect unless I select another and
   then reselect the one I want !

   So Far winword 1.0, and designer 3.0 work fine (no warnings) in
   enhanced mode.
  
3) Are there drivers/monitor configurations that win3.0 will run in
   super vga mode (i.e. 256 colors simultaneously) without dithering?

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| Peter C. Bahrs                                                         |
| The USL-NASA Project                                                   |
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| 2 Rex Street                                                           |
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markg@cbnewsk.att.com (mark.r.gibaldi) (06/12/90)

In article <9906@rouge.usl.edu> pcb@gator.cacs.usl.edu (Peter C. Bahrs) writes:
>Round 2 of questions/comments:
>
>In general WIN 3.0 is awesome! (wrt win386, and all of my X envts.)
>
>1) Does win3 give each dos application a virtual 8088 machine when in
>   enhanced mode?
>   I have 9 mb memory (2 real and 8 swap) available and can only
>   run 1 copy of edix and 1 procomm...then is says out of memory,
>   kill an application.  Sooooo, the answer to this questions appears
>   to be :  ?? no, they still share 640k. 
>

Hmm...  In systems (OS) that use paged virtual memory as does Win 3.0, virtual
memory on disk does have limitations.  Programs have a certain number of
memory pages which MUST be held in RAM in order for the processing to
continue, or be continuable.  This is called a "working set".  If the
working set of your active programs exceed the amout of RAM that you have,
all the virtual memory in the world won't do you much good.  The above
example does not prove that Windows 3.0 does or does not use virtual machines
as advertised.  It could be merely that the combination of Win 3.0 and the
active DOS apps had a total working set greater than could be held by
Peter's installed 2mb of RAM.  I think we need to hear from some people
who have large amounts of memory installed.  I have the same setup as
Peter on a 25mhz 386.  However, I plan to put in much more RAM shortly.

Mark R. Gibaldi
AT&T Bell Laboratories
mrg@cbhlp.att.com

patrickd@chinet.chi.il.us (Patrick Deupree) (06/12/90)

In article <9906@rouge.usl.edu> pcb@gator.cacs.usl.edu (Peter C. Bahrs) writes:
>1) Does win3 give each dos application a virtual 8088 machine when in
>   enhanced mode?
>   I have 9 mb memory (2 real and 8 swap) available and can only
>   run 1 copy of edix and 1 procomm...then is says out of memory,
>   kill an application.  Sooooo, the answer to this questions appears
>   to be :  ?? no, they still share 640k. 
>
Windows does give each DOS app a virtual 8088 machine.  Most likely the reason
you're getting an out of memory error is that there is some file that can't
be "shared".  What I mean by this is that these two program probably don't
support two copies of the program running at once.  The reason it says out
of memory is probably just an erroneous error message.

This is just my hypothesis.

>I wish that when I exit program manager, the entire state would
>be saved...i.e. protocol such that an application gets a save
>message and a restart message.

This can be done, sort of.  If you use the "load=" or "run=" statements
in the win.ini program you can set up programs that will be automatically
started when Windows is started.  True, it would be interested to have
an automatic mechanism to do this.  It could get tiresome after a while,
though.  I can think of a few reasons I wouldn't want it.  You could write
a simple windows app that would modify your win.ini everytime you exit
Windows.  Hmm, maybe I'll do it.

-- 
"Organized fandom is composed of a bunch of nitpickers with a thing for
 trivial pursuit."  -Harlan Ellison

Patrick Deupree ->	patrickd@chinet.chi.il.us

joel@peora.ccur.com (Joel Upchurch) (06/12/90)

> 3) Are there drivers/monitor configurations that win3.0 will run in
>   super vga mode (i.e. 256 colors simultaneously) without dithering?

Paradise has released their 640x480x256 driver I believe. I wonder if
pbrush will work in 256 color mode? I wish Paradise would release a
driver for their 640x400x256 mode that they have on the VGA+16 card.
-- 
Joel Upchurch/Upchurch Computer Consulting/718 Galsworthy/Orlando, FL 32809
joel@peora.ccur.com {uiucuxc,hoptoad,petsd,ucf-cs}!peora!joel (407) 859-0982

marshall@wind55.seri.gov (Marshall L. Buhl) (06/13/90)

pcb@gator.cacs.usl.edu (Peter C. Bahrs) writes:

>Round 2 of questions/comments:

>In general WIN 3.0 is awesome! (wrt win386, and all of my X envts.)

I agree.

>1) Does win3 give each dos application a virtual 8088 machine when in
                                                  ^^^^
                                             it's 8086
>   enhanced mode?

Yes.

>   I have 9 mb memory (2 real and 8 swap) available and can only
>   run 1 copy of edix and 1 procomm...then is says out of memory,
>   kill an application.  Sooooo, the answer to this questions appears
>   to be :  ?? no, they still share 640k. 

Put each program in a separate window.

>   So Far winword 1.0, and designer 3.0 work fine (no warnings) in
>   enhanced mode.

I have done much WP yet, but WfW did work well for me.  I haven't tried
any large fonts yet.  With Win386, I was always getting out of memory
errors, so I went back to Word 5.  I was really p*ss*d at MS before
beacuse of this.  "What is the use of WYSIWYG when it can't display the
fonts?"  Now I see what they were up to.  I sure wish Win3 had come out
first.  Now I'm going to have to give WfW another try.
--
Marshall L. Buhl, Jr.                EMAIL: marshall@seri.gov
Senior Computer Engineer             VOICE: (303)231-1014
Wind Research Branch                 1617 Cole Blvd., Golden, CO  80401-3393
Solar Energy Research Institute      Solar - safe energy for a healthy future

thaler@shorty.cs.wisc.edu (Maurice Thaler) (06/13/90)

In article <4210@peora.ccur.com> joel@peora.ccur.com (Joel Upchurch) writes:
>> 3) Are there drivers/monitor configurations that win3.0 will run in
>>   super vga mode (i.e. 256 colors simultaneously) without dithering?
>
>Paradise has released their 640x480x256 driver I believe. I wonder if
>pbrush will work in 256 color mode? I wish Paradise would release a
>driver for their 640x400x256 mode that they have on the VGA+16 card.
>-- 
>Joel Upchurch/Upchurch Computer Consulting/718 Galsworthy/Orlando, FL 32809
>joel@peora.ccur.com {uiucuxc,hoptoad,petsd,ucf-cs}!peora!joel (407) 859-0982

I downloaded these drivers off the Paradise BBS and loaded it on my
system which has a Paradise PRO VGA with 512K. I then opened up a 256
color PCX file in the Windows 3.0 Paint program and it looked as it
should.

If anybody is interested in downloading this driver set, I have it
posted on Power Board 608-222-8842 which has an HST modem on it. The
file is named WIN3_0.exe (great name eh?). It has drivers for all the
Paradise VGA video cards.




--
Maurice Thaler   SYSOP  Audio Projects BBS (608) 836-9473
                 SYSOP  Power Board    BBS (608) 222-8842  

poffen@sj.ate.slb.com (Russ Poffenberger) (06/13/90)

In article <1990Jun12.140525.7945@cbnewsk.att.com> markg@cbnewsk.att.com (mark.r.gibaldi) writes:
>In article <9906@rouge.usl.edu> pcb@gator.cacs.usl.edu (Peter C. Bahrs) writes:
>>Round 2 of questions/comments:
>>
>>In general WIN 3.0 is awesome! (wrt win386, and all of my X envts.)
>>
>>1) Does win3 give each dos application a virtual 8088 machine when in
>>   enhanced mode?
>>   I have 9 mb memory (2 real and 8 swap) available and can only
>>   run 1 copy of edix and 1 procomm...then is says out of memory,
>>   kill an application.  Sooooo, the answer to this questions appears
>>   to be :  ?? no, they still share 640k. 
>>
>
>Hmm...  In systems (OS) that use paged virtual memory as does Win 3.0, virtual
>memory on disk does have limitations.  Programs have a certain number of
>memory pages which MUST be held in RAM in order for the processing to
>continue, or be continuable.  This is called a "working set".  If the
>working set of your active programs exceed the amout of RAM that you have,
>all the virtual memory in the world won't do you much good.  The above
>example does not prove that Windows 3.0 does or does not use virtual machines
>as advertised.  It could be merely that the combination of Win 3.0 and the
>active DOS apps had a total working set greater than could be held by
>Peter's installed 2mb of RAM.  I think we need to hear from some people
>who have large amounts of memory installed.  I have the same setup as
>Peter on a 25mhz 386.  However, I plan to put in much more RAM shortly.
>

I have a 25Mhz 386 with 8Meg ram. I have been able to get 3 DOS windows and
two other windows running DOS applications at once, as well as a number of
windows apps. I did not try to open more, but probably could.

The statement that non-windows apps must reside entirely in RAM is probably
correct. It may be able to swap an ENTIRE virtual session to virtual memory,
but I don't know for sure.


Russ Poffenberger               DOMAIN: poffen@sj.ate.slb.com
Schlumberger Technologies       UUCP:   {uunet,decwrl,amdahl}!sjsca4!poffen
1601 Technology Drive		CIS:	72401,276
San Jose, Ca. 95110             (408)437-5254

gpsteffl@sunee.waterloo.edu (Glenn Patrick Steffler) (06/14/90)

In article <1990Jun13.152605.14354@sj.ate.slb.com> poffen@sj.ate.slb.com (Russ Poffenberger) writes:
>
>The statement that non-windows apps must reside entirely in RAM is probably
>correct. It may be able to swap an ENTIRE virtual session to virtual memory,
>but I don't know for sure.

The only memory which needs to remain resident for a DOS app would be
code which handles interrupts.  Otherwise it could be paged (of
course!).  Since Win386 handles all interrupts itself, and the DOS app
only sees the virtual interrupt, it would follow that most of the
memory allocated to the DOS app would not need to be resident.

The number of DOS apps which can be run would most likely be limited to
the amount of memory required to store the real-mode interrupt vector
handling code for each app.  DOS need not appear in every VM as a
memory hunk, rather it could appear in only one position in memory with
some clever memory mapping (logical mapping) on the 386.  I understand
this to be the case.  Otherwise 16Kb for every DOS app would need to
remain resident in the memory.

>Russ Poffenberger               DOMAIN: poffen@sj.ate.slb.com
>Schlumberger Technologies       UUCP:   {uunet,decwrl,amdahl}!sjsca4!poffen
>1601 Technology Drive		CIS:	72401,276
>San Jose, Ca. 95110             (408)437-5254

-- 
Co-Op    _____           "Bo doesn't know software" - George Brett
Scum   _/|__Q_\___ 
U of   | ww--+----#\    "Catch the mystery catch the spit!" - Tom Saywer (Rush)
Loo'91 ~~()~~~~~()~~                                     Glenn Patrick Steffler