Running Windows 95/98 On A Pocket PC

[Janak Parekh]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.pocketgamer.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=3660' target='_blank'>http://www.pocketgamer.org/showthre...=&threadid=3660</a><br /><br /></div>Believe it or not, it <i>is</i> theoretically possible. Due to a successful port of the <a href="http://bochs.sourceforge.net">Bochs x86 emulator</a>, a few enterprising Pocket PC users managed to get Windows 98 running inside a Bochs session on their Pocket PC.<br /><br /><img src="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/images/web/2003/parekh-20040523-BochsWin98.jpg" /><br /><br />The full details are in a post on PocketGamer (and you can get more screenshots from the <a href="http://www.pdai.org/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=12&t=1312">original thread on PDAi</a>, and more <a href="http://pocketmatrix.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=16727">discussion on PocketMatrix</a>). Kudos to the guys who figured this out, but before you think this is a practical application, be forewarned: Bochs is <i>very slow</i>. Slow even on a desktop PC, and bound to be quite a bit slower on a Pocket PC. Emulating a CISC processor (i.e., the x86/IA-32 instruction set) via a small RISC processor (i.e., the ARM instruction set) is a very heavyweight task. While there is some interest in speeding it up, the Computer Scientist in me hints that we're not going to see this implemented practically anytime soon. Still, it's eye-opening as to how much processing power Pocket PCs have nowadays. 8)

[jake080]

let me know when all 4 main windows solutions come in one package! (like now would be: XP Pro, Tablet Ed, Media Centre Ed, and WM2003se)

:roll:

Really cool though, just wish it was meant to be...

[Ecks]

now that is cool! def a killer on the geek scale for me!

[lapchinj]

While the Bochs x86 emulator is really cool 8) - 95/98 is not :( . But if there is anything that 95/98 is good for (or to be used for) I guess it would be to hack away with them and to get them to running in an emulator 8O .

Jeff- :wink:

[Kacey Green]

That would be awesome, dual boot with tablet PC, where you default to WM, but selecting a shutdown and boot to tablet option would be cool, where when you shutdown tablet, WM just thinks it was soft reset and resumes at the next poer on.

[danesh]

Impressive! Definitely one for the geeks to rejoice. But I am not sure how useful it would be otherwise.

On a similar note, looks like the DOS console is already available at
http://www.symbolictools.de/public/pocketconsole/index.htm

[Zack Mahdavi]

No, not bochs! Hehehehe... I just finished my undergraduate operating systems class (I'm a CS major as well).... I think I spent about 30 hours a week last semester working on that operating system we had to build from scratch...

Seeing the word "bochs" on this web site scared me at first. I thought my OS Professor was out to haunt me or something... 8O

[manywhere]

*checks calendar* Nope, not 1st of April today, is it? :lol:

OK, nice, now I don't have to buy a laptop: I can use the x86 emulator for Pocket PC instead... :mrgreen:

[bjornkeizers]

Some people should really seek professional help. You could, in theory, run this on your PC, then run a Palm emulator on the emulated windows - though you definitely need to rethink your life if you were to attempt such. :mrgreen:

[OSUKid7]

Some people should really seek professional help. You could, in theory, run this on your PC, then run a Palm emulator on the emulated windows - though you definitely need to rethink your life if you were to attempt such. :mrgreen:
Or better yet (worse?) run x86 emulator on a Pocket PC, then the Pocket PC emulator on Win 95/98 (and then x86 on the emulated PPC, etc. ;)).

[foldedspace]

What about running 98lite on a ppc? Still have to run the emulation...I guess. Hell, I suppose you could put it on a CF card and run the whole thing locally. The images for 98lite are real small...as small as 9mb.

[Ethan]

Wonder if BOCHS supports the new VGA devices like the Tosh 800 and the upcoming HP 4700? Seems like this experiment would work a lot better if you could actually see the Win 98 desktop.

Also I remember someone came up with a mouse driver hack to provide a visible mouse pointer in PocketPC for (I think) the Tosh 740 which had a USB host capability and let you plug in an external mouse. Seems like that would be quite useful in this scenario as well. Not sure if any of the VGA devices also have that USB host capability tho.

Ethan

[Janak Parekh]

Wonder if BOCHS supports the new VGA devices like the Tosh 800 and the upcoming HP 4700? Seems like this experiment would work a lot better if you could actually see the Win 98 desktop.
Probably, but I suspect it's a waste of time, seeing as how slowly this would run on even faster XScale processors...

Not sure if any of the VGA devices also have that USB host capability tho.
The e805 does. It even has an optional VGA-out.

--janak

[T-Will]

Definitely deserves a W?BIC! (http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=7144&highlight=w+bic) award! :lol:

[Steven Cedrone]

Definitely deserves a W?BIC! (http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=7144&highlight=w+bic) award! :lol:

I can remember in the early years of Pocket PC :wink: we were using a DOS based Assembler program at school. I downloaded Pocket DOS (http://www.pocketdos.com/) and did all of my programming using my Pocket PC. I think the Prof was more impressed with the W?BIC? factor than my programming skills!

I say, more power to the W?BIC? folks!

Steve

[iPaqDude]

Definitely deserves a W?BIC! (http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=7144&highlight=w+bic) award! :lol:

My comments exactly.... although, I played around last week with the Citrix client on my h2210 to run some XP & SAP apps on the Metaframe server.

Hmmmm.... that might not be a bad thread for Thoughts to run with.... Anyone else doing this?

[hopeful797]

i've run the citrix server for years on my ipaq 3600 to connect to my firm's mainframe when out of the office. it works like a charm and whenever i need to access a website that doesn't work on pocketexplorer i just boot up the citrix server and use the mainframe's explorer. same with outlook, etc. a little slower than a blackberry but much more useful as i can open attachments easily, etc. i am eagerly awaiting the new 4" landscape ipaq so i can have even more space toedit docs in ms word, particularly if i can find a bluetooth phone to use 1rxtt with verizon to access the network.

[spinedoc]

Anyone know of a tutorial to get this working?

[mscdex]

How about running using the bochs on a PocketPC, installing DOS/Windows, and then installing a UMSDOS-based version of Linux? :D

[freitasm]

While I don't want discret the original post, here goes some background information.

Have a look at http://iq3630.fc2web.com through http://pocketgames.jp/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=2750&mode=thread&order=0

They have the original idea, posted a few of weeks before the Slashdotted version came out. The problem is that it was in Japanese and they did not use landscape. OF course the English version is easier to understand and make more sense, but credit should be given to the Japanese guys... :idea:

[Janak Parekh]

How about running using the bochs on a PocketPC, installing DOS/Windows, and then installing a UMSDOS-based version of Linux? :D
Why not just run Linux directly on the bochs environment? ;) UMSDOS isn't an emulation interface, so you're not even nesting the emulation.

--janak

[mscdex]

How about running using the bochs on a PocketPC, installing DOS/Windows, and then installing a UMSDOS-based version of Linux? :D
Why not just run Linux directly on the bochs environment? ;) UMSDOS isn't an emulation interface, so you're not even nesting the emulation.

--janak

It was a joke, like the other suggestions in the thread ;)

But yeah, running Linux within bochs could be neat

[CME2C]

Awesome, now I will be able to play Leisure Suit Larry on my pocket PC.