Windows 98SE emulated on Pocket PC

David Horn writes "PocketGamer is carrying a story on the successful emulation of Windows 95 and Windows 98SE on the Pocket PC. This was made possible by a Pocket PC port of Bochs, a DOS emulator. If you're keen to try this yourself, you'll need a minimum of a 256MB memory card (or stream the image over a wireless network) and you'll need a program like Nyditot Virtual Display to increase your screen resolution. Oh, yes, and you'll also need the emulator. You can find more information and a selection of screenshots here. Following the porting of a full speed Playstation emulator and Pocket Quake, this really raises the bar for what the Pocket PC is capable of."

Comments

Limitations

[Raindance]

This is a very cool project.

Current limitations seem to include lack of DirectX support but, as Pocket Quake was ported, perhaps there's some OpenGL framework for the Pocket PC that wouldn't be too difficult to link up with this Windows 98 emulation.

So, it's not perfect for 'playing any PC game' yet, but there's hope.

RD

Re:Limitations

[Dan East]

Pocket Quake uses Quake's software renderer.

However ATI did comission me to port GLQuake to Pocket PC to conform to OpenGL ES. However the source code is not available (as we have not distributed - only demoed - the binary).

Dan East

Windows XP

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll stick to emulating Windows XP on my full size laptop, thanks.

Usefull ?

[Dozix007]

Is a Windows 95/98 port to the PocketPC a very usefull tool ? Win. 95/98 is designed to be usefull and (somewhat) functional for a desktop enviroment. The Pocket PC version of Windows is a far more usefull tool. It have features built in that PocketPCs are used for, and it does not drag down your resources nearly as much as 98/95.

Re:Usefull ?

[JeffHeatonDotCom]

Why do this? Like so many of these very cool geek projects, they do it because they can.

Jeff

Re:Usefull ?

[robslimo]

I'm with you. Maybe my imagination is just failing me today, but I couldn't think of a reason, other than to say "Hey, look at this!" to do this.

Beside, I'm pretty sure you can't buy a legal copy of 96/98/ME and, since a windows license is not transferable to another machine (I think), there may not be a legal way to run old Windows on a Pocket PC.

Re:Usefull ?

[Dan East]

The article contains several misleading statements. Bochs is not a Windows 98 emulator (nor is it a DOS emulator). It is an x86 emulator. Running Windows 98 within the emulator is just a way of showing off what it can do. Much better than boring VGA text mode screenshots of DOS, which would not have gotten mention here at SlashDot.

Dan East

Re:Usefull ?

[jpmkm]

Jesus christ, dude. Is there a use to ANY hobby? Is there a use to collecting stamps? I sure can't think of any. Is there a purpose to playing miniature golf? People playing mini golf certainly are not helping to cure cancer or fight drug abuse. Why do people play miniature golf? BECAUSE THEY FUCKING WANT TO. God damn. Why fucking do anything? Just because you do not find something useful or entertaining or beneficial DOES NOT mean that it is not useful or entertaining or beneficial to everyone else. Grow up.

Re:Usefull ?

[jpmkm]

If you buy a full retail version of Windows then you can do whatever the hell you want with it. It is not tied to any particular machine. However, OEM versions of Windows that come installed on computers are usually tied to whatever computer it was originally installed on. Although Microsoft isn't directly producing and selling windows 95/98/ME anymore, I believe there are still places that have legal copies for sale. There are certainly many many copies that people bought back in the day but they are not using anymore. Also, what is wrong with doing something just to say, "Hey, look at this!"? This may also pave the way for other, more useful projects, so this project may not be entirely useless.

Re:Usefull ?

[SoLoatWork]

Why do posts like this always come up when a neat hack is featured? How many times does it have to be said? Stuff like this isn't out there to be "useful", it's out there for people like me who think its just cool. Nothing more, nothing less.

Re:Usefull ?

[NanoGator]

"Is a Windows 95/98 port to the PocketPC a very usefull tool ?"

Not sure about the tool part, but I really would enjoy playing a bunch of my old DOS'ish games on it like the Space Quest series. Also, it'd be slick if I could run Photoshop on a handheld unit with a stylus. Though I ache for more pixels in the display.

The question shouldn't be "is it useful", but rather, "how can it be useful". More interesting results that way.

Slashspammed?

[42forty-two42]

There seems to have been a slight problem with the database.
Please try again by pressing the refresh button in your browser.

An E-Mail has been dispatched to our Technical Staff, who you can also contact if the problem persists.

I feel sorry for the technical staff. I thought we were supposed to be against spamming?

Re:Slashspammed?

[pdbaby]

I've never understood how the slashdot effect works: virtually nobody seems to rtfa, so the web traffic generated should be virtually null...

Unless, of course, people open the site on general principle -- and then close it?

Re:Slashspammed?

[ThomaMelas]

Well it's pretty simple. I've seen figures that put slashdot at 15 million or so readers at any given time. If 1% read the article, we're talking about 150,000 hits at one time. But I think the figure is closer to 4 or 5 % reading the articles. So that is three quarters of a million hits within 20 seconds. That's a pretty good DDOS attack. God help the site that has a story intresting enough for 50% of the readers to read the story.

What kinds of nerds are you guys?!

[smr2x]

I think the point of this may be just because you can... Not every little hack has to have a purpose. I'm impressed just because it's cool to have been done.

Re:What kinds of nerds are you guys?!

[Timesprout]

Exactly, today while watching the FA Cup final in England I mentally emulated a professional soccer player. In a dazzling 10 minute spell I scored a record six goals, 5 were wonder strikes and 1 was a simple tap in. Unfortuately my emulation ultimately proved to be worthless as the manc scum won 3-0 anyway.

Bochs is not a DOS emulator!

[Henrik S. Hansen]

Bochs (link in article is wrong!) is not a DOS emulator!

From the website:

Bochs is a highly portable open source IA-32 (x86) PC emulator written in C++, that runs on most popular platforms. It includes emulation of the Intel x86 CPU, common I/O devices, and a custom BIOS.

Bochs is not a DOS emulator

[pesc]

This was made possible by a Pocket PC port of Bochs, a DOS emulator.

Not quite. Bochs is a IA-32 (x86) emulator that allows other architectures (such as ARM commonly used in handheld devices) to emulate a IA-32 chip.

Welcome to the Bochs IA-32 Emulator Project

[Curtman]

Dos emulator?? Isn't that understating things a bit?

Bochs homepage

• Bochs is a highly portable open source IA-32 (x86) PC emulator written in C++, that runs on most popular platforms. It includes emulation of the Intel x86 CPU, common I/O devices, and a custom BIOS. Currently, Bochs can be compiled to emulate a 386, 486, Pentium, Pentium Pro or AMD64 CPU, including optional MMX, SSE, SSE2 and 3DNow instructions

nice tour de force

[InternationalCow]

But then I am using one OS I do not like to run another one that I do not like at all :) Seriously, I would have more use for a nice X windows client so I could remotely connect to my OSX and Solaris boxes at work. That would be really useful.

Re:nice tour de force

[Bastian]

What you're probably really looking for is an X Server (X clients are the applications that use X to display graphics).

A google search for "X Server PocketPC" gives me this site, which lists a WinCE port of a XFree86.

Alternatively, you could use a VNC, which would be more useful for OS X if you were wanting access to Aqua applications, too.

(No clue how well either of these work; I'm a PalmOS guy.)

What the pocketPC is capable of...

[JUSTONEMORELATTE]

So you've got win98 running on it now? Wow, with the functionality you just added to your device, I've just got one word for you:

PWN3D!!!1!

I can't wait to see....

[Prod_Deity]

a mini Blue Screen Of Death.

its a great idea..

[sentientbeing]

..every time it BSODs its easier to throw across the room and stamp on than a dekstop..!

I think their web site ...

[cpu_fusion]

... must be running on a PocketPC. (... notes MySQL error...)

People did that on zaurus ages ago! :)

[pangel83]

And here you go for screenshots: http://www.its.caltech.edu/~tzer-jen/zbochs/

Zaurus already had this.... in 2002

[pantherace]

And had quake running very rapidly after it was released.

Bochs on Zaurus Software Index.

I ran bochs (but not windows, not a large enough flash card at the time). It was slow (hey, no suprise there), & I wouldn't want to run windows, but it was possible, and didn't need some hack like increasing screen resolution (something sdl handled). Of course, with the new Zauruses, you wouldn't have to increase the resolution, either via OS hacks, or SDL scaling.

SCREENSHOT MIRROR

[peterprior]

Mirror of the screenshots here

They are actual size, due to small pocketpc screen I presume..

Limitations: Speed?

[Turtlewind]

The biggest limitation I can think of is the speed. I can't imagine that Win98 being run on an emulator could be anywhere near fast enough to play games, DirectX or otherwise.

Re:Limitations: Speed?

[homer_ca]

Bochs is already painfully slow on an Athlon XP. I wouldn't want to imagine running it on a 400Mhz ARM.

Re:Limitations: Speed?

[jrockway]

Yes. However, someone should try running Windows98 under QEMU. QEMU can emulate an x86 host now (I installed Windows Server 2003 under QEMU and it worked fine; it was usuable in speed), and it runs on ARM machines. Bochs isn't really good for much anymore, QEMU beats it in everything.

(In case you're wondering QEMU can emulate PREP and x86 hosts and run on ARM, PPC, x86, SPARC, and more. It can also translate (for example) Linux/x86 binaries to run on PPC so you can use wine on a PPC. As I said, it's really really cool. Take a look at their site or the OS Support Table. Have fun!)

Re:98 emulation is cool?

[njchick]

You are missing the point. Bochs is free software. Running Bocks on another platform (PocketPC) is an achievement of free software. It's not so important what operating system runs in the emulator. Actually, the fact that Bochs is good enough to run an close source, buggy OS only underlines the quality of PC emulation in Bochs. I'm sure Bochs will easily run other OSes as well.

uhhh

[ShadowRage]

Pocket PC port of Bochs, a DOS emulator.

uhhh, dont you mean x86 emulator?
bochs can handle more than just dos.

Re:The point?

[RTCW_Monkey]

The point is now I can play Star Control II, Wolfenstein and Scorched Earth on my pocket PC.

balls

Speaking as one of the PocketGamer webmasters...

[Mike Wagstaff]

... I really wish I'd cleaned that HTML up!

On the Linux issue

[enterpriserx]

Actually you can already run Linux on your favourite Pocket PCs (if there is such a thing), the hp/compaq iPAQs, generally the older Compaq H3600, H3800 and H3900 series accept it.

Unfortunately some of these (there are several) projects seem to be defunct, in any case I fail to see the reason to convert a perfectly normal PPC to a crippled handheld running linux with applications not designed for it. If you need linux, I'd go for the Sharp Zaurus, sweet machines albeit underpowered, and frankly, not NEARLY as polished.

Windows 98 emulation on run-of-the-mill PPCs such as iPAQ 3950, Toshiba e740 or Dell Axim 3xi is a bit impractical however in my opinion, since
1) low resolution
2) low functionality
3) too slow
4) did I mention low functionality?
5) expensive memory expansion (Secure Digital cards only for most iPAQs, and Compact flash for Toshiba/Dells)

I applaud the technical level at which this experiment was taken, but like the linux hacks, this is a waste of time on a practical level, unless you need to run Solitaire desktop edition...

To elaborate on speed, for those not familiar with the Pocket PC operating system (Windows Pocket PC 2002 and WMobile 2003), both are platforms based on Windows CE, 2003 being on CE.NET 4.2 and 2002 on CE 3.0; in short, 2003 is optimized for the Xscale CPUs, currently the top rated ARM-compatible cpus for handhelds, 2002 is not. Running Windows 98 in emulation mode would be a pain in 2003, much less in 2002, my 3950(PXA250, initial xscale cpu) can handle the TI-89 emulator, barely, so I'd hate to see what it would do with Windows. (gross generalization). Of course, there are faster models out there with better CPUs, PXA255 (Xscale with double membus), PXA262 (PXA255 with NAND mem 32mb) and PXA270 which hits up to 600mhz so far...In any case, to reiterate, praises to the developers

Are you kidding?

[Anonymous Coward]

You get the stability of Windows 98 combined with the speed and power of a Pocket PC... Sweet!!

Re:The point?

[Dunkelzahn]

http://sc2.sourceforge.net/

Its free as in speech (GPL), runs natively on Linux, Windows, BSD, and MacOSX now. :)

Sure its based on the 3DO Port, but with --cscan=pc --menu=pc it plays like an enhanced PC version.

Bochs is not a DOS emulator...

[TheBoostedBrain]

It's a PC emulator.

You cannot run Linux on DOS.