Win3x.Org

I made a quick video with Windows 3.11 running fine on my Ryzen 9 3900X system.

Win3x.org renders very nice on Opera 3.62. (at the end of the video)

This is the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEbnzPDdF0E

I know it's annoying but maybe consider to subscribe to my channel. ( I have almost no subscribers... )

The specs:
Ryzen 3900X
32GB DDR4
Biostar X470 motheboard with 2 classic PCI slots
Voodoo 3 3000 PCI (PCI slot #1)
Ensoniq Audio PCI (ES1370) (PCI slot #2)
WD 120GB SSD connected to a PCI to SATA adaper (VIA 6421) (using some PCI-E to PCI adaper)
Intel Gigabit CT LAN with NDIS 2 DOS drivers
Microsoft Cordless Wheel Mouse Serial and PS/2 (using the serial port from the motherboard via a header)
PS/2 Keyboard

Awesome! I didn't know some modern mb can have real PCI slot today !
I thought it was many year these PCI disappeared

Windows 3.1 is certainly one of the most compatible windows "OS" with stability. Here, 95 or 98 will have difficulties with huge ram installed here.
Meanwhile dos will only recognize a small part and just ignore the rest

I'm visible on this video (my pseudo)

Are you from Romania ?

Bravo

(Sorry, bad English)

Support (at chipset level) for PCI disappeared around 2015. But many motherboards are using PCI to PCI-E bridge chips to implement 1 or 2 classic PCI slots. PCI-E standard was well implemented, and it is totally possible to use a bridge chip in reverse mode also, so you can put a PCI-E card into a PCI slot (1X speed).

Yes, from Iasi, .ro.

Yes, Windows 3.1 is fine with tons of RAM, no special settings needed, but it's more sensitive on the hard drive side... I had to use a PCI to SATA adapter to be able to boot in enhanced mode. With on board SATA it works only in standard mode.

Very nice, very nice indeed!

OMORES wrote: *

18 Oct 2022 22:21

Yes, Windows 3.1 is fine with tons of RAM, no special settings needed, but it's more sensitive on the hard drive side... I had to use a PCI to SATA adapter to be able to boot in enhanced mode. With on board SATA it works only in standard mode.

Yeah, I've noticed as well that AHCI controllers just don't work in Enhanced Mode. I have a motherboard from 2014, and Windows 3.1 works great if I put the SATA controller in IDE mode, but dumps me to an unusable blank commandline screen if it's in AHCI mode. I haven't managed to find any workaround for that… So basically it's impossible to run Windows 3.1 in Enhanced Mode on any motherboards newer than 2014 – unless you do your trick of using a PCI card!

I saw as well that you said on the video comments that networking support is really good for modern Ethernet adapters – so it's too bad that I'm using a WiFi card instead of Ethernet! I've been playing around trying to "tether" to my smartphone with the help of a null modem and a serial-to-USBC adapter, but it hasn't really worked for me…

Quote:

... so it's too bad that I'm using a WiFi card instead of Ethernet! I've been playing around trying to "tether" to my smartphone with the help of a null modem and a serial-to-USBC adapter, but it hasn't really worked for me…

You have a PC with WiFi only? Kinda hard to believe that. If you have some Realtek integrated NIC, there are DOS drivers. Realtek issued in 2021 NDIS2 DOS drivers even for 2.5Gbit cards. I did use on board gigabit from Realtek in Win 3.1 and it works.

If you have a Wi-Fi only setup at home you can always use a Wi-Fi to LAN adapter. A few years ago I had such an adapter from Netgear, quite expensive back then (like 80$). But now there are lots of Wi-Fi extenders and portable routers which can to the job for 15 euros or less.

Yeah, my motherboard has a NIC built-in, but after I went to all the trouble of installing a WiFi card (before I had the idea to install Windows 3.1…) I'd feel stupid switching to a WiFi-to-LAN adapter

It's a possibility though…

EDIT: Actually my NIC is a "Qualcomm Atheros Killer E220x Gigabit Ethernet Controller", which I'm not sure if a DOS driver exists for anyway…

Quote:

Actually my NIC is a "Qualcomm Atheros Killer E220x Gigabit Ethernet Controller", which I'm not sure if a DOS driver exists for anyway…

You might be lucky, there is a PCI-E NDIS2 driver from 2012 and your NIC is from around that time. (This driver might work with newer chips also, the NDIS2 driver from Intel is universal -> works with all gigabit cards, and there is a separate driver for all the 10/100 cards)

Quote:

ATNDS2.DOS

Atheros PCIE Ethernet Controller NDIS2.01 v2.1.0.10(09/11/12)

Check out this great and simple site: http://packetdriversdos.net/

Thanks for that, it's good to know that that driver exists if I'm ever in a position to use it! But…

PluMGMK wrote: *

19 Oct 2022 22:15

I've been playing around trying to "tether" to my smartphone with the help of a null modem and a serial-to-USBC adapter, but it hasn't really worked for me…

I finally got this working! I had to learn a lot more than I thought I needed to know about Linux networking to convince my (rooted) Android to send packets to and from this null-modem, but finally I was able to logon to Win3x.org with IE4 on Windows 3.1, running on my Core i7, "tethered" to my phone! Unfortunately I couldn't post though, I've had to reboot back into Linux to do that…

I'll try to post a tutorial here in the near future (at least in English). To the staff, should I do it here in "Retrocomputing", or in "Other Stuff"? It's retro since it involves Windows 3.1, but also very non-retro since it involves Android…

Tutorials written in English have to be located at the Resources section, just like the guide for Microsoft Virtual PC.

PluMGMK wrote: *

13 Nov 2022 16:54

I'll try to post a tutorial here in the near future (at least in English).

Well, I did it some time ago: viewtopic.php?t=27572 (I'll probably have to do a French translation too at some point…)

OMORES wrote: *

23 Oct 2022 22:51

You might be lucky, there is a PCI-E NDIS2 driver from 2012 and your NIC is from around that time. (This driver might work with newer chips also, the NDIS2 driver from Intel is universal -> works with all gigabit cards, and there is a separate driver for all the 10/100 cards)

Quote:

ATNDS2.DOS

Atheros PCIE Ethernet Controller NDIS2.01 v2.1.0.10(09/11/12)

Check out this great and simple site: http://packetdriversdos.net/

Since tethering is rather a pain, I decided to get a powerline adapter I had lying around and try this out. I was able to follow the NDIS instructions but I had to get the MSCLIENT stuff from the Internet Archive because I couldn't get at ftp.microsoft.com

Then it turns out that that NDIS driver only supports cards with ID 0x1090, 0x01091, 0x10A0, or 0x10A1, whereas mine is E091h. This wasn't really a problem because I could change the byte at offset 0x19, from 0x10 to 0xE0. But then, the whole thing freezes my system due to an IRQ conflict with the hard drive controller. Yes, apparently that can happen in 2022, with PCIe devices! (I guess that's what you get for using DOS in 2022! ) I'll keep at it and see if I can solve the problem…