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OT: DOS<=>Win98 Networking?

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Harry Potter

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Feb 8, 2013, 9:11:39 AM2/8/13
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I'm sorry about this OT post: I couldn't find a suitable group on Google Groups. At my mother's house, I have a laptop networked to a Win98 computer. The laptop is a DOS-based computer without a hard drive. I've been connecting the laptop to other computers for hard drive support. I have the two comuters connected via parallel cable using NetSoft LAN 1.40. Unfortunately, with this setup, the Win98 computer needs to be in DOS mode. I prefer to run the network from Win98 mode. Unfortunately, I have little money to do this and don't know where to look for this. Can anybody help me out?

JJ

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Feb 10, 2013, 5:00:38 AM2/10/13
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Try LapLink or Norton Commander.

Harry Potter

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Feb 11, 2013, 2:35:39 PM2/11/13
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LapLink was very expensive and seemed to only be useful for more modern computers, and Norton Commander desn't seem to support true networks. :(

Sjouke Burry

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Feb 11, 2013, 4:46:44 PM2/11/13
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Harry Potter <rose.j...@yahoo.com> wrote in
news:7b8c8a0e-82b5-45be...@googlegroups.com:

> LapLink was very expensive and seemed to only be useful for more
> modern computers, and Norton Commander desn't seem to support true
> networks. :(
>

I made my own cable(it came out the same as the laplink one),
and wrote my own transfer software.
Has not failed me yet.
Only restriction:8.3 filenames.
Operation:
side 1: receive.exe
side 2: transmit.exe <wildcard> transmit from current dir
all files and folders confirming to <wildcard>
and store them in the directory side 1 is sitting in.
Has worked without a hitch for 10+years and on 30+systems.
Software and cable description:
> http://home.planet.nl/~burry004/laplink.zip
Might work in a dosbox.
Certainly if you leave w98 to the dosprompt.
Oh, and by the way: Interlnk.exe and intersvr.exe from dos
also accepts that cable, as does norton utils 8.0 (the old one).

I also have that for ethernet and dos, but you need
the trs packetdriver, for my card in autoexec.bat:
lh C:\HARDWARE\ETHERNET\DISK2\PKTDVR\3C90XPD.COM /I=0x7e
which might be a problem in win98, you have to return to dos to do that.
If you want that,mail me(delouse my email adress).

Harry Potter

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Feb 12, 2013, 11:43:56 AM2/12/13
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Sjouke Burry: can your laplink.zip file handle true networking or just the transferring of files? I need the two computers to share data in the form of actual drives, not just transferring. If the Win98 computer can remain in Windows mode, I don't mind the DOS computer only handling 8.3 filenames for the other computer, i.e. the DOS computer can only see shared data in 8.3 filenames. Right now, NSLAN140 with a generic parallel cable does the job. The only problem--and this is a minor one--is that I want to keep the Win98 computer in Windows mode when setting up the network. BTW, I also want a peer network.

Sjouke Burry

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Feb 12, 2013, 12:45:44 PM2/12/13
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Harry Potter <rose.j...@yahoo.com> wrote in
news:8fabfab5-3a0d-44ff...@googlegroups.com:
Laplink cable is OK for msdo6.22 and dos7.xx interlnk and intersvr,
where you can use all drives + printer from machine 1 on machine 2.
The server computer in this case cannot then be used,
but the other computer has access to all the drives of the server.
I suspect that you need to disable win78 hardware support for that
printer port, or w78 wil keep polling that hardware every few seconds.

My software however is for file transport only.
My link subroutines have been used for years to exchange data between
2 computers in a simulator in both directions.
Later that was changed to ethernet, and laplink cable controlled
a sound computer only.

Harry Potter

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Feb 13, 2013, 9:24:57 AM2/13/13
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IMO, NSLAN is *much* better than InterLink and InterServer. As you said, Sjouke Burry, the latter requires that the server be useless for any other purpose during the network setup. I used to use it to connect to a server laptop that was in bad condition overall otherwise. NSLAN can allow peer networking and can run in the background during normal computer operations. As I said, the only problem with NSLAN is that it can only run in DOS mode.

DOS Guy

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Feb 17, 2013, 10:43:53 PM2/17/13
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Harry Potter wrote:

> I'm sorry about this OT post: I couldn't find a suitable group on
> Google Groups.

And you didn't think of microsoft.public.win98.gen_discussion or
alt.windows98 ?

> At my mother's house

ugggh.

> I have a laptop networked to a Win98 computer. The laptop is a
> DOS-based computer without a hard drive.

A DOS-based laptop computer - with no hard drive?

What are we talking about here? An Osborne?

> I've been connecting the laptop to other computers for hard
> drive support.
> Unfortunately, I have little money to do this

Nobody is that poor to be wasting their time with such an arcane setup.
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