SOFTPC040 RELEASENOTES.PDF

This document contains the release notes for DEC SoftPC Version 4.0 for VMS, providing essential information, restrictions, undocumented features, and corrections that supersede other documentation. It is intended for all DEC SoftPC users (system managers and general users) and requires VMS 5.5 or higher and MOTIF 1.1 or higher.

Key Notes and Restrictions:

• For System Managers: Hard disks can be mounted read-only, but some DOS applications might not function correctly if they expect write access.
• For General Users:
  • Do not use MS-Windows Express installation; use the standard procedure to avoid driver issues.
  • Previous C: drives (based on DOS 3.3) are incompatible with Version 4.0 (which uses DOS 5.0) due to directory changes (\INSIGNIA, \DOS).
  • When installing software from floppy disks, build applications on C: or D: drives first, then move them to E:, as some programs may not function correctly from E:.
  • Remove all floppy disks before starting SoftPC to prevent it from attempting to boot from a potentially incorrectly formatted floppy.
  • Avoid using the /E option with the MSCDEX command, as it causes sporadic operation.

New Features in Version 4.0:

• Motif-based user interface
• Support for protected-mode 286 operation (including Windows 3.1 Standard Mode)
• Super VGA (256 colors)
• Autoflush capability (1-50 seconds after buffer is loaded)
• FPU emulator (ability to toggle hardware floating-point emulation)
• Extended and expanded memory support
• Microsoft CD-ROM extensions and three window sizes
• Support for both A: and B: floppy drives and hard disks up to 300 Mbytes
• Support for MS-DOS 5.0