Adding RAM to 286'er

[i440bx]

Hi,

i know, its a little late for 286ers Computers but i have build one.
Its a little i286-10 CLCC with 640KB RAM, 3 SCSi HDDs, one CD-ROM, a 3,5" and 5,25" Diskette Drive

Then i buyed a RAM-CARD on ebay, to attach some KB's.

But, how does i do that? I know to work with the "emm386.exe", but with the "emm286" i dont get more memory... Can you tell me, what i must write in the config.sys / autoexec.bat ???

Greetings, Robert

[JAC]

erm.. you really want to be using a 386, it has dedicated hardware support for the extended / expanded memory mapping dance you want to do. If you stick to the 286, you are going to have to run drivers to get it all working, and you 286 will be like 1Mhz. I am not kidding. .. and I Take it your application(s) have been written to support this memory?

Why are you doing this? you are mad. It was not fun at the time, and I can not see it being fun now!

This covers it very well.... I remember DR Dos well, playing Wing Commander and getting the extra graphics ( joystick graphics in the game ) to work. 12Mhz 286 with 1Meg ram. I still have it somewhere For u UK lot, I was doing my A levels in 1990. No idea how I passed, too busy playing computer games.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upper_Memory_Area

"The next stage in the evolution of DOS was for the OS itself to become aware of UMBs and the High Memory Area. This occurred with the release of DR-DOS 5.0 in 1990. DR-DOS' built-in memory manager, EMM386.EXE, could perform most of the basic functionality of QEMM and comparable programs.

Where DR-DOS scored over the combination of an older DOS plus QEMM was that the DR-DOS kernel itself and almost all of its data structures could be loaded into high memory, plus all of its associated components into UMBs. This left virtually all the base memory free, allowing configurations with up to 620K out of 640K free.

Configuration was not automatic - free UMBs had to be identified by hand, manually included in the line that loaded EMM386 from CONFIG.SYS, and then drivers and so on had to be manually loaded into UMBs from CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT. This configuration was not a trivial process. As it was largely automated by the installation program of QEMM, this program survived on the market; indeed, it worked well with DR-DOS' own HMA and UMB support and went on to be one of the best-selling utilities for the PC.

This functionality was copied by Microsoft with the release of MS-DOS 5.0 in June 1991. Eventually, even more DOS data structures were moved out of conventional memory, allowing up to 635K out of 640K to be left free.

For a period in the early 1990s, manual optimisation of the DOS memory map became a highly-prized skill, allowing for the largest applications to run on even the most complex PC configurations. The technique was to first create as many UMBs as possible, including remapping allocated but unnecessary blocks of memory, such as the monochrome display area on colour machines. Then, DOS' many subcomponents had to be loaded into these UMBs in just the correct sequence as to use the blocks of memory as efficiently as possible, allowing for the fact that some TSR programs required additional memory while loading which was freed up again once loading was complete. Fortunately there were few dependencies amongst these modules, so it was possible to load them in almost any sequence. Exceptions were that to successfully cache CD-ROMs, most disk caches had to be loaded after any CD-ROM drivers, and that the modules of most network stacks had to be loaded in a certain sequence, essentially working progressively up through the layers of the OSI model.

(It is perhaps interesting to note that conceptually similar lines of enquiry are today being followed in efforts to make modern multitasking OSs boot faster. See the External Links section for more.)

With the addition of a DOS multitasker such as Quarterdeck's DESQview, multiple sessions could be started at once, each with 600-odd K of free memory and all sharing access to DOS and its associated drivers and facilities."

[sammyc]

[Qwerty]

[i440bx]

Here is the Pic:

There are 45 Chips with the Printing "M5K4164-15"

[JAC]

ohhhhhhh I think I have something like that!

[i440bx]

GREAT!

Give me all Software what you have!!!

[JAC]

I have a pile of 8088, 8086 and 286 machines. some have HD .. I'll see what I can do!!!! give me some time. I dont have a big blockof time always.

[Elar]

What software? This card doesn't need any. This 8-bit memory expansion card is for PC/XT computers. It has 6 banks of 64KB. Starting memory address is selected by setting DIP switches.

[Qwerty]

This board is not suitable for a 80286 computer.

This is a 8 bit ISA board used to expand RAM in PC/XT 8088 computers.

[Alcochaser]

Intel made a product called the aboveboard or somesuch. AST made several products. And yest, that memory board is made for an XT. The part where the board drops down lower then the 8bit slot is a giveaway.

This is info for the IBM AT but this should apply fairly well to your machine.
http://www.timeguy.com/cradek/at

Seriously though, find yourself an old 386 or 486 board. The 286 is a braindead chip. And with the 386 or 486 you can use easier to find 30 pin or 72 pin simms