Hi, I am needing some help in cleaning up my conventional memory. At start up I only have 367,920 KB of conventional memory left!! I cant even open some programs... =(

If I type 'mem /c' I get the following:

Name Total = Conventional Upper Mem
SYSTEM 31,424 9,600 21,824
HIMEM 1,104 1,104 0
EMM386 4,304 4,304 0
SETVER 848 848 0
VIDE-CDD 5,008 5,008 0
IFSHLP 3,952 3,952 0
PROTMAN 400 400 0
E100B 32,640 32,640 0
NDISHLP 1,440 1,440 0
TCPDRV 1,328 1,328 0
NEMM 672 672 0
NWLINK 10,144 10,144 0
PROTMAN 2,560 2,560 0
UMB 960 272 688
TCPTSR 76,784 76,784 0
TINYRFC 18,224 18,224 0
NMTSR 6,160 6,160 0
REDIR 110,240 109,936 304
COMMAND 7,424 0 7,424
KILLER 400 0 400
DOSKEY 3,968 0 3,968
DOSLFN 11,808 0 11,808
MSCDEX 28,032 0 28,032
SHARE 5,856 0 5,856
CTMOUSE 3,328 0 3,328
FREE 372,880 367,920 4,960

Here is my autoexec.bat file:

@ECHO OFF
PROMPT $P$G
SET DIRCMD=/4
MODE CON RATE=32 DELAY=1
REM MODE CON CP PREPARE=((437)EGA.CPI)
REM MODE CON CP SELECT=437
REM KEYB US,,KEYBOARD.SYS
LH KILLER
LH DOSKEY
LH DOSLFN /Z:C:\DOS71\CP437UNI.TBL
LH MSCDEX /D:IDE-CD
LH SHARE /L:30
REM LH NLSFUNC
REM LH SMARTDRV
LH CTMOUSE
REM For compatiblity purpose:
LH CTMOUSE > NUL
ECHO.
REM For locking volumes to enable "direct disk access":
CALL LOCKDRV.BAT
BREAK ON
LFNFOR ON
ECHO Now you are in MS-DOS 7.10 prompt. Type 'HELP' for help.
ECHO.
LH c:\sound\envmastr.exe /l winbootdir=
LH c:\sound\ctcm.exe
PATH=C:\DOS71\NET;C:\DOS71;..;;C:\DOS71\norton
LH C:\DOS71\NET\net initialize
LH C:\DOS71\NET\nwlink
LH C:\DOS71\NET\netbind.com
LH C:\DOS71\NET\umb.com
LH C:\DOS71\NET\tcptsr.exe
LH C:\DOS71\NET\tinyrfc.exe
LH C:\DOS71\NET\nmtsr.exe
LH C:\DOS71\NET\emsbfr.exe
LH C:\DOS71\NET\net start
LH C:\PCIAUD\SETAUDIO
SET BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 H5 T4
LH C:\PCIAUD\C3DMIX /MFF000 /FFF400 /WFF400 /LFF5FF /EFF4FF /AFF4FF /CF0470 /P30000 /400000 /R1f0ff /D660ff /Q0

Some of the files listed in mem are some of the files I loaded through autoexec.bat with LH which should load it into extended memory, shouldnt it? So I am pretty confused on what is going on...
I am using MS Net Client for networking which I heard is a huge memory hog so I am figuring that is what is being a major part of the problem.
Please reply back with any suggestions you might have. Thanx everyone for the help!!!

This bears a striking resemblance to your previous post.

I don't personally have much experience with that baštardized DOS package, although I have tinkered with it in the past.

The autoexec.bat seems excessively complex, full of unnecessary 'REMs' and duplicate lines - things like CTMouse and Smartdrv loaded high (when that is the default behaviour anyways).

DOS network drivers are notorious hogs - you may be better off ditching all of that and installing WfW 3.11 which is a network ready version of Win3xx.

Can't really tell from your memory 'dump' - page formatting here doesn't do justice to tables - but not everything may be loading high either - there is only so much Upper Memory (not Extended), and some TSRs require quite a bit to initialize.

It really is the 'Art' of memory management

Life is hard; it's harder if you're stupid. -John Wayne

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Hi, this post is kinda like my previous post if you disreguard my sound card questions that is. I have done much research since then too and found that dos only really has very little memory which you need to manage..

If the big part of the problem is the ms net manager then why would they even make such a program if it zaps away a huge chunk of your precious memory?

From reviewing my 'mem' log, I would say the following are being a problem:
E100B - 32,640 kb (networking driver)
NWLINK - 10,144 kb (part of the net manger I believe)
TCPTSR - 76,784 kb (part of the net manager)
TINYRFC - 18,224 kb (dont know this one)
REDIR - 110,240 kb (dont know this one)
MSCDEX - 28,032 kb (dont know this one)

Does anyone else use ms net manager? If not, would someone suggest to use something else. I dont have win 3.11. I just wanted to use dos for some dos games. I also read that you should usually have 500 kb of free conventional memory..which I am no where near.

"I have done much research since then too and found that dos only really has very little memory which you need to manage.."

Keep researching, I don't think you've gotten a good grasp yet.

mem/c (which you've tried) will tell whether or not something has loaded in upper or conventional memory - no guesswork involved.

The idea of loading things into Upper Memory' (high) is to free up conventional memory. There is, however, only so much upper memory available - this is NOT the same as extended memory, generally only about 150K, so it too, must be parcelled out wisely.

mem/f will yield more info

"I also read that you should usually have 500 kb of free conventional memory"

Really? Depends on what you load, and how you load it. 600K free isn't that unusual - at least, without DOS network drivers.

Basically, load only what you need, or take advantage of the built-in 'multiconfig' feature and setup a menu for specific configurations

QEMM is more versatile, but it has its own learning curve

Life is hard; it's harder if you're stupid. -John Wayne

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I'm afraid it's not so clear to me why you need to depend on MicroSoft NetWorking under Plain DOS but i have these two advices: select a good memory manager (http://www.computing.net/dos/wwwboard/forum/15768.html) and choose the right tool for the right job (http://www.computing.net/dos/wwwboard/forum/14435.html)...

If it's just to tranfer files you might as well have a BBS running and use TelNet, or FTP, which would require resources i found to be quite reasonable in the past.

Salutations,

Michel Samson
a/s Bicephale

I think jboy hit this one on the head with QEMM I use to use it a lot, cant remember at the moment if the machine had a net work connection but I do remember having 704k of conventional memory available at the dos prompt, as for the learning curve it does indeed have a lot to offer, however when you first set it up and it does its magic I seem to remember that it would try 15-20 different configs during the set up.
What are the specs on the machine you are working on, the reason I ask is QEEM had the ability to use part of the unused memory in
the Video region, when I did use it, it was worth every dime I feel then and may be what
you need to get this the way you want....

Keep the old stuff running

Hi, thanx everyone for the replys. I was using the networking software so that I can play some dos games over the network, like Duke Nukem.
I did try QEMM and it when it booted the first time, it gave me plenty of memory, and was able to use ndiags! Ndiags showed that it detected my sound card, which I am still tinkering with to get to work with some games. Anyways, I when I rebooted the computer again, I cant even get into dos anymore, it just freezes.. =(.
I only have one line in my autoexec.bat file too!!:
@C:\QEMM\OPT3.BAT %1 %2 %3 %4 %5 %6 %7 %8 %9

So I might have to put back in my backup autoexec.bat and config.sys files because QEMM doesnt seem to be working at all... =(

I should have an over kill system for dos..:
P4 1.8 Ghz
512 MB Ram
16 MB Nvidia TNT2 Video card
40 GB hard drive

You appear to be over compliclating, did you read my suggestions about DOS GAMES NETWORKING in your other thread?

And yes your P4 killer system runs DOS Games at about the same pace as a 486PC..

Used QEMM7x quite a bit (years ago) and was able to boot up with only 6K of conventional mem used. It works differently than traditional DOS, but, of course, there can be compatibility problems.

Booting with more than the 640K of contiguous mem is possible under plain DOS as well, but at a cost.

Short answer - things are a lot simpler and there is more low memory available under DOS622, and without DOS network drivers. That autoexec.bat alone gives me a headache, and I've been writing DOS startups 'freehand' for more than 10 years now.

To achieve the desired configuration will require research & experimentation

Life is hard; it's harder if you're stupid. -John Wayne

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Sorry I can’t be of more help but it looks as though it is stuck in the discovery process,
If I were you I would trim down auto and config to the absolute minimum and then start building on that.....trim out the fat.....its been a long time since I was where you are at but after a couple of days grooming the system with QEEM I was very pleased and seem to remember having 5-6 different configs to choose from and was left with a very flexible and customized system in the end.....Later

Keep the old stuff running

... simplifying the startups is what I *did* recommend several messages back - multiconfig is a DOS feature, from v6 onwards. Unlike (crappy) memmaker, QEMM works with the DOS menuing system

Life is hard; it's harder if you're stupid. -John Wayne

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Thanx everyone for the suggestions. Does anyone have any good links that would have some type of tutorial that shows how to use qemm?

Do you not read the responses?
http://www.chsoft.com/dv.html

oh dear! came back this morning and the previous post was gone.

I appreciate this response is going to be off topic, but it appears the problem is running DOS Games Software Networked Multi-player Mode. WinDOS7 is really an aside.

If W2K, XP, W2K3 has at least one FAT16/FAT32 partition then this can be seen by a W98SE/ME boot disk. It is quite feasible to run DOS Software from a boot floppy providing the Sound Card adheres to the Sound Blaster standard, and the Network Interface Card has an available Packet Driver

Nearly all the older DOS games used the IPX (Novell) network protocol it is easy to find the IPX Packet Driver Shim, this should allow at least 550K base memory, without memory tweaking.

I hope this is OK otherwise please mark for removal. I have emailed are old friend X86 and asked him nicely to maybe write an addition to his web site as this comes up quite often, when people realise their new P4 Extreme PC does not do DOS.