-=PCTechTalk=- Re: pctechtalk MSCDEX

Thanks Wilson, Don and Wyatt,

"needed in DOS" suggests it might have been written by
one of the programs I have on CD; possibly an
'encyclopedia'.
I'll try each one with it disabled and see what gives
cheers
Ted

Hi Ted,
According to an old Creative CD-ROM drive installation
manual, the syntax
of the MSCDEX command is:

C:\path\MSCDEX.EXE /D:device /M:xx [/L:drive] [/E] /V

where:
path is the directory for CDROM software
/D:driver is the name of the CD-ROM drive, must be
identical to the device
name in the CONFIG.SYS file
/E allows the use of expanded memory, if available
/K directs MS-DOS to recognize drives encoded in Kanji
/S enables sharing of CD-ROM drives in Windows for
Workgroups or MS-NET servers
/V displays summary of RAM and memory allocation at boot
/L:letter is the letter assigned to the CD-ROM drive; if
not specified the
next available letter is used
/M:xx is the number of buffers for temporary storage of
data. xx ranges
from 2 to 30. CD-ROM performance increases with the
value of xx; too many
buffers may impact programs with large memory
requirements.

Keep in mind this refers to DOS memory (the first 640Kb)
and not to the
total RAM installed in the machine.
Best,
Wilson

By giving the DOS command mscdex /? I get an error plus
the
following.  It looks like /v is one of 4 choices and
can't
guess what they might logically be.  M relates to
buffers
but I don't know the details.  And as you said D is the
Driver.
I assume L is to assign a drive Letter but you did not
ask
that.

usage: MSCDEX [/E/K/S/V] [/D:<driver> ... ]
[/L:<letter>] [/M:<buffers>]

You have to remember that CDs, typically, were not
available
when DOS was used.  I never saw one until the big
bloated
Windows programs were created that could not be put on a
reasonable number of disks.  I remember one version of
MS office that was on 29? discs.

If you are not familiar with the notation - a brief
explanation:
[/M:<buffers>] is an optional part of the command (plus
others)
[/E/K/S/V] means that if this option is selected, you
can choose
                  from E or K or S or V

Sorry, this is the best I can do.  Look around on the
internet - the
information is out there somewhere, but I don't get on
the internet
until nighttime so I don't tie up my phone line.
Don Elias

Yes, the MCDEX file is the cd rom dos driver with
switches.  You shouldn't=
 need it in windows, but to use the CDROM in DOS you
definitely will
"Wyatt M. Portendt"


*********** REPLY SEPARATOR  ***********

On 8/29/2002 at 5:25 PM Ted Clark wrote:

>does anyone have any ideas on this;-
>
>I have this command in my 'autoexec.bat'
>
>"rem TShoot: - By Windows Setup -
>C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\MSCDEX /v /D:ECSCD003 /M10"
>
>the 'tshoot' is because I've disabled it in MSCONFIG
and
>I did this because, when booting, this command is
>followed
>by 'bad command'.
>
>what does the   '\v'   mean and  '/M10'   ??
>
>I have found [for general interest] that 'MSCDEX' is
the
>dos CD driver control and  'D:ECSCD003' is the driver.
>! anyone ! please correct me if I have got it wrong !
>
>all you old DOS veterans out there please set me
>straight on this
>
>cheers
>Ted
>

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