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Problem make G4D bootable ISO image with DOS programs

grub4dos memdisk iso image

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#1 rebot

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 12:18 PM

Hello,

My friend has a old DOS application which is not supported anymore and require DOS (realtime real/v86 mode OS)

and he need run this sw several times per a year. 

Virtual machine is not good option becouse this is somethink like Logic analyser (LPT time critical access is required)

 

I would like to create bootable ISO for him but I am not successfull.

 

My tools setup











ImDisk Virtual Disk Driver for Windows NT/2000/XP/2003.
Version 1.5.3 - (Compiled Nov 12 2011)
Grub4dos 0.4.4 windows binaries
Oracle VirtualBox v4 (legal version)
OS Windows 32bit SP3 (patched upto aprill/2014)

I made ISO image with UltraISO 9.5 and used grldr as bootloader (+generate boot catalog option enabled)

After booting image I have GRUB prompt but I cant load any kernel I see all files in my minimal iso

any attempt to set root or direct load memdisk or io.sys fail with error

What I am doing wrong I spent 2 days with this without any success.

I am old DOS user from DOS3 so commandline is my friend but so many changes are with booting

process last 20 years..... I feel like newbie now.

 

 

vmboot.jpg
 

vmgrub2.jpg

 

vmgrub3.jpg

I would like create ISO image with MS-DOS/FreeDOS with aplication 20mb is required for it.

And seem to be harder as 20years ago! :-(

 

I tried make also large Floppy image in IMDISK with WinXP DOS7.0 but this image never boot

So I am verry flustrated and wan't to help to my friend and provide him single file ISO which he can burn on CD.


Edited by rebot, 09 November 2014 - 12:36 PM.


#2 steve6375

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 01:28 PM

did you try

 

root (cd)

chainloader (cd)/io.sys

boot

 

P.S. try also   (cd)/IO.SYS   in capitals

 

http://www.rmprepusb...makegrub4dosiso may help


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#3 rebot

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 02:17 PM

Oh great, small step forward!

vmgrub4.jpg
 

System is loaded but command interpreter is not located. 

How to start COMMAND.COM prompt now? I hope after this i will be able start volcov commander and edit startup files.



#4 steve6375

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 03:05 PM

type

 

DIR

COMMAND.COM

 

??



#5 rebot

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 03:15 PM

I tried similiar commands before I asking but nothing helps.
This message is produced by IO.SYS DOS KERNEL
Seem to be similiar like bzImage is executing init in linux but fail when initrd is not present
here is probably similiar situation DOS kernel running but media is missing at default location

vmgrub5.jpg

I also type whole alphabet of drives from A to Z and without any success.

Will mapping isomedia as FD helps?
I will try FreeDOS eighter this is using other path as Wxp DOS to COMMAND.COM or not?


Edited by rebot, 09 November 2014 - 03:26 PM.


#6 Wonko the Sane

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 03:32 PM

Generally speaking, you are using a "wrong" (no offence intended :)) approach.

Though it is possible, DOS is NOT meant to run directly from CD-like device (as it will need the external MSCDEX or SHSUCDX to mount the CDFS volume).

It makes much more sense to use a floppy image (or - if really needed - a hard disk image) on the CD.

The floppy image can be 1.44 Mb or 2.88 Mb in size if you use the "common" El-Torito floppy image emulation, but this size can be extended with a couple tricks up to around 36 Mb.

But if you use grub4dos grldr as no-emulation boot sector, you can normally use any floppy, superfloppy or hard disk like images as you like.

What I would suggest you is to setup a Qemu virtual machine with a small sized hard disk image, install to it the DOS and all programs needed and test it, then simply add the image to the grub4dos based CD.

A number of programs "like" or are "designed to" run from the C: drive and this way you would have no issues whatever.

Since the *need* is for something very like "real time", i would consider using a mapped to memory (faster) image, which additionally allows to have the C: drive be read/write.

 

Here you will find links to the available options:

http://www.911cd.net...topic=24618&hl=

 

And a quick set of suggestions if you wantto go through the (advised) no-emulation booting:

http://reboot.pro/to...able-dos-image/

 

A suitable grub4dos set of commands may be:





find --set-root /myraw.img 
map --mem /myraw.img (hd0)
map --hook
chainloader (hd0)+1
boot

you can use a gzipped image instead of the raw one, if you use --mem mapping.

 

:duff:

Wonko



#7 steve6375

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 03:33 PM

How did you prepare the ISO?

 

Did you specify DOS boot image?

 

Can you use a bootable USB instead - it would be easier.



#8 Wonko the Sane

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 03:52 PM

How did you prepare the ISO?
 
Did you specify DOS boot image?

He used Ultraiso 9.5 :w00t: :ph34r: using grldr as no-emulation bootsector (no DOS boot image) as it was stated in post #1. :whistling:
(otherwise there wouldn't be IO.SYS on the root of the CD device ...)

:duff:
Wonko

#9 rebot

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 04:03 PM

I was surrpised why is wonko not responding first one :innocent:
I am reading this forum few days and waitted another smiley from you wonko " -_- :whistling: "
(ok back to problem ;)

I am creating ISO with UltraISO SW + adding Grub bootloader I wrote this in 1th post.
I am not verry familliar with qemu so from this reason I am using Oracle VirtualBox as hypervisor
I think it's not important which hypervisor i am using (VMware/MS or Virtualbox)

You are using here Qemu. I see only one reason why you are using. Is it disk image format?
I am using many years ImDISK may I use it for creating last HDD/FDD image?

I found here only one thead about large HDD/FDD images booting but I was not verry clever from it :dubbio:

My absolutly first attempts make boot ISO was with floppy image and memdisk/isolinux but free space was
reason why I dropped this idea. I was able create only max 2.88MB image and I need OS+10-12MBytes image.
When I make larger it never boot up. I made FDD image with IMdisk or HDD image with ImDisk + created MBR+bootlace.com
Any attempt boot failled. incompatible image format?

Answer on Steve's question yep I found many tutorial how to create FLASH DRIVE bootable but any suitable DOS/large image + apps

Now. I am highly interested  finish my booting ISO image with DOS .

 This task is not hard geek's task I have to be successfull I dont want use  :white_flag: so easy.

 

 

Wonko could you paste here steps - I know that threads but I reading reading and digging deeper and deepr in

forum becouse all information are verry fragmented.

 

So 1th step is:

Create large file image which one FDD or HDD?

I think there is only geometry difference and HDD contain MasterBoot and partitions 

 

I don't want download 30mb image file as many other users recommending I want to know how to create it self

(again I found many booting images for download but no one said how to create it in steps.....oh,,,)


Edited by rebot, 09 November 2014 - 04:15 PM.


#10 rebot

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 04:18 PM

(reserved post for solution in future) 

when this thread will have many pages I will paste solution here



#11 steve6375

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 04:21 PM

The tutorial I posetd has a section

http://www.rmprepusb...ing-CD-drivers-

 

did you not want to follow that?



#12 rebot

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 04:31 PM

The tutorial I posetd has a section

http://www.rmprepusb...ing-CD-drivers-

 

did you not want to follow that?

Is it possible use RAMDISK (ImDISK) except physical USB Drive ? I dont have at home any usb dongle only one 500gb full USB HDD

and few SD cards but SD card reader is slot in HP Printer. If i may use ImDISK as flashdrive I will try.

But when I installed RMPrepusb yesterday I don't see any disk in this tool.



#13 steve6375

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 04:37 PM

You could create a large disk image and the map it using grub4dos as a floppy or hard disk and then boot from it, as Wonko suggested.

Does this help

http://www.rmprepusb...ge-floppy-image



#14 Wonko the Sane

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 04:40 PM

Qemu is advised because it can use "raw" disk formats and because it uses a virtual hardware that is "very common/simple", including the (Bochs) BIOS that is a very good and "strict" one.
In other words (generally speaking) something that works in a Qemu VM has more probabilities to work without changes on vaster array of real machines.

IMDISK is NOT a "hard disk" driver, it is a volume driver, what you can create in it is (and can only be) a floppy or superfloppy or volume.

For making a bootable CD, the easiest would be to make an El-Torito floppy emulation boot CD (booting directly to DOS, no need for grub4dos or any other third party bootloader).

Traditionally the limitation of El-torito floppy emulation was that it was reserved to three floppy sizes: 1.2 Mb, 1.44Mb and 2.88 Mb.

After many years it was found by cdob and rloew (or viceversa) how the CD ROM ISO9660 specification was read wrongly by everyone, and that much larger floppy sizes were possible (as said up to roughly 36 Mb), as long as certain CHS geometries were respected.

The details are here (including tools to create suitable images, that can be later mounted in IMDISK):

http://www.msfn.org/...oppy-emulation/

review ALSO this thread:

http://www.msfn.org/...d-their-images/

 

Only a few selected ISO making programs can be used with such largish superfloppies (and seemingly UItraiso is NOT among them), a couple of them are given in the above thread, particularly the modified version of mkisofs by cdob is advised as it is very easy to use:

http://www.msfn.org/...tion/?p=1033412

 

The (only) disadvantage of such an approach might be that the DOS boot/system volume gets once booted drive letter A:, whilst a number of DOS programs might want to run from C:, hence the alternative hard disk image mapped in grub4dos was suggested, which has additionally the advantage that the hard disk image can be created and tested under Qemu before making the (grub4dos or syslinux based) .iso image.

 

:duff:

Wonko



#15 rebot

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 05:06 PM

I started using Qemu for making freedos booting image file

I have to note: Wow! how fast is Qemu booting.

I am curently following instructions from this link
http://www.rmprepusb...ge-floppy-image

There are some bugs in text. (someone should update and fix tutorial)

qemu.exe -L . -boot d -cdrom c:\fdbasecd.iso -fda c:\test.ima

This command is not working for me and produce error
After short investigation I found this.

-fda test.ima - FILE MUST exist and must be in valid format.

I made test.ima file with Winimage.exe tool - In Menu [New] -> format 1.44 or 2.88mb add any file
and save file test.ima


But Qemu still not booted. I altered command line parameters like this
 

qemu.exe -boot menu=on -cdrom fdbasecd.iso -fda test.ima

Now I have booted fdbasecd.iso with floppy disk and continue with creating
test.ima with Freedos

Here is also bug in text ImDisk is letter drive "L" and in text is drive
"U"

Wonko> I will  later read your post ;) - I am too old I must finish Freedos.ima and
then I will try check your post.

I am happy its not in myself its in tools not all tools are capable make
right formats. I was flustrated before know this.

 

 

PS: This bulleting system make me mad - sometimes is post crippled and I have to rewrite whole post!


Edited by rebot, 09 November 2014 - 05:28 PM.


#16 Wonko the Sane

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 05:17 PM

Good :), now that you have started using Qemu, you should forget (temporarily) about it :w00t: and try using Qemu Manager instead, as it was advised in the given link:

http://reboot.pro/to...able-dos-image/

 

:duff:

Wonko 



#17 rebot

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Posted 09 November 2014 - 07:35 PM

Stupid solution but deathline is tomorow.

I made FreeDOS.IMA 2.88MB image floppy disk in Qemu.
After complications with low memory with decompression CAB or non 16bit version of unrar.exe (oh so complication with exe)
I compressed all DOS aplications with RAR (10megabytes packet to 1.5MB)
After boot I have loaded himem.exe and creating with TDSK.EXE ramdisk(10MB)
and unpacking SW from floppy on ramdisk
Whole task is automated by autoexec and Volkov start MENU (F2)

So now I need create ISO use grub load image and test I hope no other complication will be with Grub loading



Heureeeka just created ISO is working fine!

Edited by rebot, 09 November 2014 - 07:54 PM.






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