Getting MoM to run properly

[Nightrnr]

Oh, I can run the game just fine. I just have to have sound disabled (in Windows or Dos) and that kind of takes some of the heart out of the game for me. Sound has never worked for me anyways in dos though (with that computer). If someone could help me set my sound card right, I may just have a workable solution. My mouse driver takes up quite a bit, but a guy on Gamefaqs referred me to a driver called "cutemouse" that's only supposed to only take up 3 or 4k of system ram. So depending on what my sound card takes out, I might be able to still load the game.

I don't have Word and no WinMSD...
but I did find MSD.EXE on that Win95 CD
YAY! I have found purpose in being a packrat

-EDIT-
Uploaded a report file generated with MSD. I'm not sure if that's what you were after, but it seems to have most of the info from the program.
As for memory addresses in the C000-CFFF range, it looks like its my Rom Bios.

[grazzy]

I was playing around with win98 in virtualbox, and god, its hard to free conventional memory, especially when loading ems. I could not get enough free memory that would satisfy mom with sound.

One last ditch effort you could try (if nothing else). try qemm. Latest version supposedly supports win98. A lot of work just for one game though.

Or go back to win95 and use qemm.

[Nightrnr]

Okay! It took some experimenting, but I was able to free up about 18k of upper memory. It required finding several small spots to put "I=xxxx:yyyy" memory addresses on the EMM386 line (which MSD was very helpful in locating). For some reason, I was only able to utilize each area up to 4k (4+4+4+4+2=18 ), but hey, it worked. That only got me to 581k (enough for the Wizards.exe), but if I forgo some of the other items in windows "step by step" start-up process (including a mouse.vxd apparently that's not my mouse driver), it bumps me up to 589k.

I'm still listening if anyone has any better advice (or help with sound in dos), but I can run the game with sound in windows now, so I'm happy.

Many Thanks goes to I Like Serena for her help and Catwalk for creating this topic.

I'll look into qemm, Grazzy, but I'm definitely sticking with Win98; it's too convenient and compatible with more games.

Thanks for putting up with me guys. I'm usually quiet in forums, but maybe I'll stick around.

[Nightrnr]

Oh hey Grazzy, I just realized that you're the guy who pointed me to this forum in the 1st place. Thanks a lot!
I thought the name looked familiar, but I just thought I saw it in passing on this board or something.

BTW, I'm still blaming my video card for my ordeal. I don't think that I ever had any upper memory from the get-go, but there must be some video drivers that load up with Windows that eats more memory than my onboard one used to (5k to 23k for vmm32).

Anyway, just wanted to let you know.

[I like Serena]

it bumps me up to 589k.

Thanks for putting up with me guys. I'm usually quiet in forums, but maybe I'll stick around.

The MSD report was indeed what I was looking for.

However, everything seems to be just fine, except for the 2 lines in the TSR programs:
t.< r$w 0629 544 tõ</uç¬<
pyright 064C 464 Block Device
that I can't place. Never seen those before.

You can probably free up a little more memory by not loading IFSHLP and DBLBUFF.
I believe you can do this with:
DOS=HIGH,UMB,NOAUTO
in config.sys

[Nightrnr]

I can stop Dblbuff at the step by step-by-step startup phase, but I have to leave IFSHLP (and consequently "Noauto") alone or Windows doesn't even start up. It gives me a blue screen message:
"Invalid VxD dynamic link call from CDUDF(03) +0000019D to device "0488", service .
Your Windows configuration is invalid..." restart and so on

But I slightly changed my Sound configuration in Master of Magic's install and now MoM only needs 581k (my exact available Conventional memory as of now). So I think I'm going to stop messing around with stuff and be thankful it works (still looking for proper sound setup in true Dos, but I'll manage with what I have now).

I hope My memory imputs on the EMM386 config line aren't screwing anything up, but I could just skip loading it if I ever ran into weird trouble on my system. Seems fine so far... (smilie looks like fingers crossed to me.., or the bird)

I can't tell you how utterly awesome it is playing this game on a 32" TV while laying on a bean Bag. It's nostalgic bliss. (playing with death magic, warlord, and Trolls atm).

[Csimbi]

Here's your problem:

Code:

Modules using memory below 1 MB:

  Name           Total           Conventional       Upper Memory
  --------  ----------------   ----------------   ----------------
  MSDOS       17,232   (17K)     17,232   (17K)          0    (0K)
  HIMEM        1,168    (1K)      1,168    (1K)          0    (0K)
  EMM386       9,856   (10K)      9,856   (10K)          0    (0K)
  DBLBUFF      2,976    (3K)      2,976    (3K)          0    (0K)
  IFSHLP       2,864    (3K)      2,864    (3K)          0    (0K)
  WIN          3,680    (4K)      3,680    (4K)          0    (0K)
  vmm32       23,728   (23K)     23,728   (23K)          0    (0K)
  COMMAND      7,408    (7K)      7,408    (7K)          0    (0K)
  Free       582,176  (569K)    582,176  (569K)          0    (0K)

You need to get rid of these:

Code:

DBLBUFF      2,976    (3K)      2,976    (3K)          0    (0K)
  IFSHLP       2,864    (3K)      2,864    (3K)          0    (0K)
  WIN          3,680    (4K)      3,680    (4K)          0    (0K)
  vmm32       23,728   (23K)     23,728   (23K)          0    (0K)

If you want to use Win98 instead of real DOS (DOS 6.22a or equivalent), you need to delete these from the OS manually.
DBLBUFF and IFSHLP is easy, dunno waht WIN and vmm32 are - are you sure it's a DOS boot?
But, instead of screwing up your system, you might want to create a rescue disc (or, whateven it is called in Win98), delete everything from it but the required system files (io.sys, msdos.sys, config.sys, autoexec.bat, himem.sys, emm386.exe and your mouse driver) and boot from that.

[EDD]

Jtm offered (with one hand bent on his back) to type up something about how to get MoM to run properly. Until he gets around to it, feel free to ask questions here.

OK so i got MOM200 off the downloads here, i got DOS BOX and D-fend same way but so far I am clueless. I did figure out how to max the DOS Box cycles but i have no idea how to mount the program (It is on Desktop) or how to make it run. BTW I am so glad i found you guys; played this game years ago and I have wished for it back everytime I played a new one that just sis not have the same strategic and magic blend with an RPG twist.

[Csimbi]

Well, just auto-mount the damn thing via your config file ;-)
Config files are located here from 0.74:

Code:

%USERPROFILE%\Local Settings\Application Data\DOSBox\

Edit with your favourite text editor and modify the last few lines as such:

Code:

[autoexec]
# Lines in this section will be run at startup.
# You can put your MOUNT lines here.
PATH=Z:\;C:\SDD;
mount C E:\DOSDRIVE\ -freesize 512
C:
UNIVBE.EXE

'E:\DOSDRIVE' is the location that will become 'C:\' your local hard disk.
Adjust as needed for your own setup.

[Jtm]

EDIT: LOL I'm 1 year late it seems :O

OK so i got MOM200 off the downloads here, i got DOS BOX and D-fend same way but so far I am clueless. I did figure out how to max the DOS Box cycles but i have no idea how to mount the program (It is on Desktop) or how to make it run. BTW I am so glad i found you guys; played this game years ago and I have wished for it back everytime I played a new one that just sis not have the same strategic and magic blend with an RPG twist.

Installing D-Fend Reloaded:
0. Install latest D-Fend Reloaded (includes newest DOSBox).

Creating profile in D-Fend Reloaded:
1. Open D-Fend Reloaded.
2. Click "Add", then "Add with wizard...".
3. In "Create new profile"-window, the emulation type should be "DOSBox" and the wizard mode "Only setup game automatically if ..." by default. Click "Next".
4. Locate your game directory and set "MAGIC.exe" as "Program to be started". Set "INSTALL.exe" as "Setup program". Click "Next".
5. In "Use auto setup template that only matches by filename" should read "Master of Magic". If not, search for it. Also in bottom, disable fullscreen (we will enable it later if desired). Click "Ok".
6. Now the profile should be found in the main window.

Testing the game playability: (optional)
7. Double-click the profile. The game should open in separate DOSBox window. You should see and hear the intro by now.

Editing the profile:
8. Right-click the profile created and click "Edit...".
9. In Profile Editor, you may rename the profile. For instance, "Master of Magic (Insecticide)" for Insecticide patch.

Better graphics (optional but recommended):
10. In Profile Editor -> Hardware -> Graphics, look for "Scale". By default DOSBox uses "Nearest neighbor upscaling with factor 2 (normal2x)"-algorithm for scaling. This doubles the resolution in windowed mode.
11. Set "Scale" to "high quality with factor 3 (hq3x)". This triples the resolution in windowed mode. You may also try other scaling algorithms. Personally I prefer this scaling with windowed mode.
12. NOTE: Once you've completed "Finding optimal CPU cycles"-section and want to play with fullscreen, you may change it here. When using fullscreen, you might wanna enable "Keep correct aspect ratio" as well.

Finding optimal CPU cycles:
11. Idea is to increase CPU cycles until "DOSBOX.exe" CPU usage is around: 80-90% for 1 core (40-45% for 2 core, 20-22% for 4 core et cetera). Why? By default the CPU cycles are set to 10000 and this makes the game too slow. Try combat and see for yourself. Note: If CPU cycles are set too high, then the game will begins to slow again because DOSBOX uses all CPU core resources.
12. Open the game by double-clicking the profile. Create new game and enter combat.
13. Open Task Manager and sort by name. Search for DOSBOX.exe and highlight it.
14. Need to know:

• If in fullscreen, switch to windowed mode clicking ALT+ENTER
  
• To see current CPU cycles, look at the Master of Magic window title.
  
• To increase CPU cycles in-game, click CTRL+F12. Increases by 10%.
  
• To decrease CPU cycles in-game, click CTRL+F11. Decreases by 20%.
  

15. Make sure you see both Task Manager and Master of Magic. When ready, increase CPU cycles until the DOSBOX CPU usage is around: 80-90% for 1 core (40-45% for 2 core, 20-22% for 4 core et cetera).
16. Once ready, write the optimal CPU cycles down and close the game.
17. Right-click the profile and click "Edit...".
18. In Hardware->CPU, set CPU cycles value to OPTIMAL VALUE.
19. You may enable fullscreen now.

Playing Master of Magic:
20. Simply double-click the profile in D-Fend Reloaded main window. Enjoy your game