I'll try to keep all this short and to the point.
I have labored over making windows xp run like a bat out of hell using bochs.

Here are some not so well known bochs faqs (I am working with the port author):

NOTE: mouse release keys are option+applelogo!

1) He had never run anything but windows 95 on this.
2) He cannot get pci to work on his system so the default config file has pci turned off.
3) Amiga file systems have file size limits. The windows version of bochs supports large hard drives. The mos version supports only 2gb hard drives.
4) A lot of the plugins were not compiled with bochs 2.6 (I am working on that).

Quirks during install of xp:
1) You should set the ram for the guest and the host to the same before installing. If bochs has to dynamically allocate ram you could lock up and most likely will. Preallocate all ram.
2) Going to 1024x768 resolution after installing will lock you up UNLESS you first turn on the 440fx intel pci chipset in the config.
3) If you install with ISA emulation only expect your hard drives to run in PIO mode only with no dma. The gui will seem fast but apps will take forever to load.
4) Turn that PCI stuff ON!!!! Its the difference between night and day!
5) There is a Vesa pci driver for xp that tops off the emulation by making your video update lightening fast:
http://www.navozhdeniye.narod.ru/vbemp.htm

I use the stable release version for 2007.10.19 for xp.


6) When installing set the ram for both guest and host to 128.
7) When installing copy your install CD into your ram disk and point the config file to it. Once again, the author warns the .iso image cdrom emulation is touchy., You need max speed to avoid delays and lockups.
8) Buy a morph os license. Your not getting this all done on the demo. You can't halt this and start over every 30 minutes.
9) Networking is not functional yet, but with the introduction of MorphOS 3.2 it can now be made to work with some code changes.

ok, here is the exact config I use:

NOTE: I turn off serial, gameport, and other stuff to get speed. Make sure there is a iso image in your ram disk named cd.iso. Only one hard drive controller is emulated.


#------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
plugin_ctrl: unmapped=0, serial=0, gameport=0
display_library: amigaos
romimage: file=bios/BIOS-bochs-latest
cpu: count=1, ips=25000000, reset_on_triple_fault=1, ignore_bad_msrs=1, msrs="msrs.def"
cpu: cpuid_limit_winnt=0
memory: guest=128, host=128
vgaromimage: file=bios/VGABIOS-lgpl-latest
vga:extension=vbe, update_freq=30
ata0: enabled=1, ioaddr1=0x1f0, ioaddr2=0x3f0, irq=14
ata0-master: type=disk, path="c.img", mode=flat, cylinders=4161, heads=16, spt=63
ata0-slave: type=cdrom, path="ram:cd.iso", status=inserted, biosdetect=auto, model="Generic 1234"
boot: cdrom,disk
floppy_bootsig_check: disabled=0
log: bochsout.txt
panic: action=ask
error: action=report
info: action=report
#debug: action=ignore, pci=report # report BX_DEBUG from module 'pci'
debugger_log: -
parport1: enabled = 0
mouse: enabled=0
private_colormap: enabled=0
pci: enabled=1, chipset=i440fx
#----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The line that says ata0-master must be replaced with your hard drive specs.
Run the bximage tool from the shell and answer all the questions.
Do NOT give the hard drive more than 2048 mb or the bios will reject it as having bad geometry.
After bximage is done creating the drive it will give you the proper ata0-master line.




NOTE: I do NOT turn on pcivideo till after the install. Causes some sort of issue.
After install I change the last line to:

pci: enabled=1, chipset=i440fx, slot1=pcivga

Start up again and xp will find the pci video.

Download the video driver from above and unzip it.
Point it to the vbemp folder under vesa 3.0\pnp folder (or something close to that).



Right now to get software over to windows xp I am using ImgBurn (its free) to convert folders on my windows machine into an iso image. I then rename the iso image to cd.iso, copy to the ram disk, and boot. Once again, the cd tends to lock up if the iso image is not in your ramdisk. The emulation has some sort of timing issue and needs max speed to read iso images.


I am currently starting to recomiple bochs to allow for all the other plugins.
BTW: It runs well on a powerbook g4, but amazingly well on a powermac g5.

NOTE:Tuning:
Don't forget to bump the ram when your done to whatever your apps will need like 512mb.
If you optimize xp after your done by turning off all unecessary services and setting the OS for best performace (turn off themes and special effects) you can get xp down to using 45mb on boot and it will be quite fast.
Also, when your done with cds, create a second hard drive and replace the cd entry in the config with the second hard drive (bochs is limited to 2 drives, you cannot have two hard drives and a cdrom) and then tell xp to use the second hard drive for a page file and turn off the page file for drive C.


l8r



[ Edited by bash64 13.01.2015 - 13:24 ]

Got through my first compile of bochs and got some errors at the end....
Working with port author.

> He had never run anything but windows 95 on this.

In http://www.pegasosforum.de/viewtopic.php?p=51236#p51236 (German) he talked about having successfully run Win95, WinXP and Damn Small Linux.

He did correct that in an email to me last night.
Apparently want he had trouble with is using pci with xp.
He has a Pegasos 2 machine.
I'd think maybe it was the version of Morph rather than his hardware that caused the issue.
He will be retrying using pci again.

bash64,
Quote:

Thank you for the infos. i tried earlier boot to xp, but because the 2GB barrier I tred only hirens cds. The result on PB is 24min boot time, I raised the memory for xp to 1GB and it booted about 11min. I knew it can be better but gave up. After the 3.2 release i tried it on G5 2.7Ghz. The result was 7min,
And i can confirm that the cdrom iso files must be on ram disk. or most of the time it crash. The most annoying thing about that G5 PowerMacs only support 1GB ram now. It is simply not enough.

Now i just reconfigured as you write above. Best boot time is 2.34min which is not bad. I had a client who has a vista machine long ago, that produced the same boot time result...
Anyway after i erase a ton of services it is quiet usable , Civilization II flies on in, but for example Alpha Centauri runs, but slow.

Another thing:

bash64,
Quote:

You can have more drives. Just simply add this line to the cfg file:

ata1: enabled=1, ioaddr1=0x170, ioaddr2=0x370, irq=15

and of course then you can add 2 more unit, which can be cdrom or harddrive etc. for example:

ata0-master: type=disk, path="dh2:emulators/bochs/hdd/c.img", mode=flat, cylinders=auto, heads=16, spt=63
ata0-slave: type=disk, path="dh2:emulators/bochs/hdd/d.img", mode=flat, cylinders=auto, heads=16, spt=63
ata1-master: type=disk, path="dh2:emulators/bochs/hdd/f.img", mode=flat, cylinders=auto, heads=16, spt=63
ata1-slave: type=cdrom, path="ram:alphac.iso", status=inserted, biosdetect=auto, model="Generic 1234"

is this faster than dosbox on morphos? I would only install this to play a few games like screamer or worms 2. win95 should be enough. i have a Powerbook G4 1,67GHz 1GB Ram.

Quote:

I asked the the same question in another thread recenty and was told that DOSBox is faster.

if you enable PCI with XP the end result is quite spiffy.
I don't think it will play DOS games though which is what you would use DOSBox for.

@derringer

Thanks for the tip on having more than 2 drives.
I will give it a shot.
That will really help.

I am running Comic Collector Pro v5.5 and it is so so.
The app is a database app so it eats a lot of resources.

I have not heard back from the port author about the compile issues yet.
He says I would not have known about the ones for 2.6 which involved OS4 specific stuff.
Why 2.4 won't compile, well, I am waiting for an answer.
It seems we do not have a stable release of the source available at this time.

> I don't think it will play DOS games though

Bochs can run DOS so DOS games should run too (but of course slower than with DOSBox).

Cego,
Quote:

win98se Hungarian version boots 17sec on G5, so it is quiet fast. Honestly i don't test win98 much deeper, but as main rule you will need drivers to respond the applications fast as on xp emulation.
With win95 the things much faster too than on 98.

About dosbox, it think the same as Andreas, Dosbox is faster, but i have a lot of troubles to get win95 under dosbox, and the key will be the emulation chipset and pci as Bash64 mentioned, whitout this dosbos will be slower with win95.
However earlier win95 games or late dos games which're runs under win95 perfectly runs under bochs. (like i said civilization II flies under xp.)

civ2:
http://i41.tinypic.com/bi00so.jpg

and Alpha Centauri:

http://i42.tinypic.com/2ewikv6.jpg

Doesn't try these recently on my PB, just on my G5.

bash64,
Quote:
thats's a pity.

Anyway Afaik you can have 4 controllers on bochs ide system so it means almost 16GB hdd space.

Quote:

Why bother running Civ 2 under Bochs when the 68k Mac version runs great under Basilisk II?

koszer,
Quote:
Yeah that's the point. Mainly because I haven't got the mac version, and on the net i cannot find it.

[ Edited by Derringer 28.08.2013 - 21:35 ]

@Wolf

There are many issues with running DOS based games inside of Windows XP.
Most all of the original DOS drivers for sound blaster and cdroms and everything else will not be there. Windows runs a pseudo DOS environment for compatibility reasons.

You could install Windows 98 and still have a full DOS environment.

>> Bochs can run DOS so DOS games should run too

> There are many issues with running DOS based games inside of Windows XP. [...]
> Windows runs a pseudo DOS environment for compatibility reasons.

I know. What I was talking about was runing DOS-based games on DOS, not on Windows or the DOS environment of Windows.

Just an update.
I booted bochs off of puppy linux 4.1.2.

http://i933.photobucket.com/albums/ad171/bash64000/10_zpsb2391307.jpeg

Works ok.

Gotta tweak the video refresh a little higher though.

It is an iso 105mb in size so i just boot live out of the ramdisk.

Anyone remember the key to press to release the mouse from the emulator window?

EDIT: key to release mouse is option+applelogo


[ Edited by bash64 13.01.2015 - 13:15 ]

I booted off of 256mb of ram.

I am now doubling the ram to get a faster boot and increasing the vga refresh to 20 frames per second.

Warning: puppy linux has a built-in screen blanker on boot.
If the screen goes black tap the ctrl key to make sure it is just sitting there waiting for you to make decisions.

Boot time for puppy linux 4.1.2 using 512mb is around 20min on a powerbook G4 1.67ghz.

Response time would be much better on a mac G5.

Now if bochs just had an emulated NIC....

Video of 1024x768 worked with pcivga turned on on boot.
Turning pcivga on during install of XP causes a crash.
No issue with Puppy Linux and no performance hit for using 1024x768, though no speedup for using pcivga either.


[ Edited by bash64 14.01.2015 - 21:54 ]

By defining a personalized storage area the boot time for Puppy Linux is now 8.5 min instead of 21min.
Kept crashing using 1024x768 regardless of use of pcivga option so had to go back to 800x600 which is quite usable.

I will be installing the WINE package and testing if I can run windows apps in Puppy.
Windows apps tend to run a whole lot faster and better in WINE than they do in Windows.
Windows XP performed quite slow for my purposes. I am hopeful that WINE can solve this.


[ Edited by bash64 15.01.2015 - 02:04 ]

Why Not have a jit and sound for bochs it could be awesome

Because no one did it yet

bochs has sound. I turn it off to speed it up.
the nic is more important.
I am using fileimgctrl to mount the bochs hardfile so I can copy over needed packages to it.

Bochs morphos has no sound ans noe network. On linux PPC i have used wine and qemu and its good to play StarCraft

[ Edited by acepeg 16.01.2015 - 20:36 ]

Puppy update:

My IPS rating for XP was 25million tops.
In Puppy Linux I am hitting 105million tops.
I noticed when using the keyboard that I got crazy repeat characters meaning IPS was too low.
Testing new config file...

keyboard is good at 70million IPS for Puppy Linux.
Powerbook G4 1.67ghz