From owner-freebsd-questions Sun Jun 2 17:13:44 1996 Return-Path: owner-questions Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.5/8.7.3) id RAA20763 for questions-outgoing; Sun, 2 Jun 1996 17:13:44 -0700 (PDT) Received: from tir.com (sun.tir.com [205.138.41.6]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.5/8.7.3) with ESMTP id RAA20753 for ; Sun, 2 Jun 1996 17:13:41 -0700 (PDT) Received: from alpha (shianet.org [205.138.41.9]) by tir.com (8.7/8.7) with SMTP id UAA12584 for ; Sun, 2 Jun 1996 20:12:55 -0400 (EDT) Received: from an32ow.tir.com (an51ow.tir.com) by alpha (5.x/SMI-SVR4) id AA04560; Sun, 2 Jun 1996 20:10:28 -0400 Date: Sun, 2 Jun 1996 20:10:28 -0400 Message-Id: <9606030010.AA04560@alpha> X-Sender: flemingo@shianet.org X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Version 1.4.4 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: flemingo@alpha.shianet.org From: flemingo@alpha.shianet.org (flemingo) Subject: Re: Can I Keep my old OS? Cc: questions@freebsd.org Sender: owner-questions@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > I am very interested in learning Unix, but I want to keep using > DOS as a primary operating system, since all of my programs are DOS/Win3, > and my father has no interest in using Unix. Can I "run" FreeBSD but > still use DOS primarily without long, hard conversion, explosion, etc. You must allocate diskspace for the new OS (be it NT, OS/2, or FreeBSD). If you don't have free space to do this, don't pass go, do not collect $200. Assuming you allocate disk space, you probably *don't* want to install the boot manager so your dad doesn't get annoyed each time he turns the machine on, since he probably wants it to jump straight into DOS. You can either build a boot floppy (a long process that was described today on the -questions list -- see the archives at www.freebsd.org), OR you can run the DOS program "fbsdboot.exe", which will, from a DOS prompt, reboot the machine from the second stage boot loader in the BSD parition. You will have to copy it to the DOS disk somewhere, and run it when you want to switch to FreeBSD. Terry Lambert terry@lambert.org --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers. chumpo!