# win xp and finding dos prompt



## kono (May 22, 2003)

my dad bought a dos game. he has win xp installed. the game has to be installed using the dos prompt. i followed the directions in help and support to get to the prompt. start---programs---accessories---command prompt. i went there and there is no prompt available. so i went back to help and support and followed the instructions to make an ms-dos disk. i created one. then i restarted my his computer and an a prompt showed up. so i tried to change directories from the a: prompt with a number different tries. i used the following commands;cd d:---d: d:\ d:/ c: cd c: cd c:/ cd c:/ i kept receiving the bad command response. it seems like there is no drive d or c from the dos disk. so you proably have enough infomation here to give ma na answer? Can you help me find dos in win xp. i know i seen it before but i just cant find it anywhere, i even did a search and it doesnt seem to be there.

thanks 
kono


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## coderitr (Oct 12, 2003)

If you're using NTFS then you won't be able to access the C: drive from a boot disk. To see if you are using NTFS open My Computer and right click the C: drive icon and select properties. The file system installed will be displayed on the resulting window. I don't understand what you mean when you say there was no prompt displayed after you clicked Command Prompt in the start menu. You should have gotten a black window with the current directory like this:

C:\Documents & Settings\User Name>. 

That's the prompt you're looking for. If you're trying to install the game from a CD-ROM, type D: and press enter. The prompt should change to:

D:\>

Now type DIR and press enter. A list of files will be displayed. You're looking for something with an EXE or COM extension (the part after the dot in the file name.) Type the name before the dot and press enter. This should either load the program or begin the installation.

Note that many of these games that are built for DOS do not work well in XP. I've tried several of them and the graphics are poor and the sound doesn't work at all. This is because like Windows NT and 2000, XP contains what Microsoft calls the Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL.) This means that normal applications are not permitted to access hardware such as the sound card, video card, and game port. Windows 9x did not have this HAL and direct access to hardware was allowed (part of the reason that the 9x line has always been less stable than the NT/2000 track.)

If you are using an NTFS file system on your machine and want to run the game anyway, look for NTFSDOS on the web. This allows a DOS boot disk to access an NTFS partition with limited functionality.


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## kono (May 22, 2003)

thanks for your response. maybe i said it incorrect. i cannot find a command prompt in win xp. i went to start-progams-accessories-
andno prompt to be found. so i did a search and still no ms-dos, or command prompt can be found. thats why i made a boot disk following the instructions found in help. then i put the disk in the a drive and cannot get to a c or d drive. so i checked and sure enough my dad is using NTFS so now i know the disk wont work. also the sound as you stated will not work. my dad mentioned that. so know i know that the sound wont work either. i dont like dos games either but my old man had to have this war game. now our problem is that we cannot find a dos prompt to install the game. with all these troubles i would just bypass the whole install. once again my dad cannot give up so he has asked me if i can find out how to find a dos prompt. thanks

kono


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## kiwiguy (Aug 17, 2003)

Simply go Start - Run - type "command" in the Run box (no quotes though) and hit Enter.

A DOS Command prompt window should appear. Its a DOS emulator under XP, there is no DOS under XP.


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