Specific VM requirements...
Posted: 3. Mar 2009, 20:53
Hi all,
I have a very specific set of requirements for a virtual machine and so far I've had no luck using MS Virtual PC 2007 or VMWare.
I have an old DOS based machine control system that basically runs on an old Pentium III chassis. The machine control software runs on top of an old multi-tasking peice of software called Desqview. Desqview also requires the QEMM memory manager to be running. As previously mentioned above we've so far not been able to get stable enough operation running on a VM. The system also has the following specific hardware requirements...
Needs four COM ports (at standard DOS hardware addresses)
Needs to be able to address a relay card at a specific hardware address.
The latter of those has been the most dificult to provide virtual support for. Basically the DOS program needs to be able to write to a pre-set hardware address (8 bits - 8 relays). Although this is a hardware relay card in the current system, we could actually just route this through to the parallel port if possible and use a parallel port relay board instead.
I haven't yet tried VirtualBox because I thought I'd first check if the above would be in any way possible. Any help greatly appreciated.
Chris.
I have a very specific set of requirements for a virtual machine and so far I've had no luck using MS Virtual PC 2007 or VMWare.
I have an old DOS based machine control system that basically runs on an old Pentium III chassis. The machine control software runs on top of an old multi-tasking peice of software called Desqview. Desqview also requires the QEMM memory manager to be running. As previously mentioned above we've so far not been able to get stable enough operation running on a VM. The system also has the following specific hardware requirements...
Needs four COM ports (at standard DOS hardware addresses)
Needs to be able to address a relay card at a specific hardware address.
The latter of those has been the most dificult to provide virtual support for. Basically the DOS program needs to be able to write to a pre-set hardware address (8 bits - 8 relays). Although this is a hardware relay card in the current system, we could actually just route this through to the parallel port if possible and use a parallel port relay board instead.
I haven't yet tried VirtualBox because I thought I'd first check if the above would be in any way possible. Any help greatly appreciated.
Chris.
