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DOSBox Slowdown

Discussion in 'Technical Discussion' started by saxman, May 7, 2009.

  1. saxman

    saxman

    Oldbie Tech Member
    I was using DOSBox to run an early 2006 DOS build of ProSonic, and I was appauled at how SLOW it ran. I could run that build without any slowdowns at all on my old Pentium II 300MHz laptop computer, and I can run it at nearly full speed in the command window of Windows XP on this computer. Yet it runs like total crap in DOSBox.

    I have used DOSBox to run various programs, like Duke Nukem 3D, DOOM, and a couple other things. They all run just fine. My question is, what could possibly be causing ProSonic to run so horribly slow if those other programs run fine and ProSonic runs fine in other mediums? And is there a way to help improve the speed?
     
  2. Nibble

    Nibble

    Oldbie
    If you're using version 0.72 of DOSBox, and you have core and cycles set to 'auto', it might be improperly autodetecting what kind of speed ProSonic needs.

    On the DOSBox prompt, try:
    core dynamic
    cycles max

    I don't know the full details, but I think when core/cycles are auto, it sets them based on whether an app goes into protected mode, which cpu-intensive games will often do.
     
  3. saxman

    saxman

    Oldbie Tech Member
    Okay, I tried that, but it didn't change anything =/

    I did notice that it improperly detects the CPU. ProSonic will show a warning message if the CPU isn't at least a Pentium processor. I am not sure if that has anything to do with the problems I'm having or not.
     
  4. TmEE

    TmEE

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    even with a very powerful PC, you'll not gain too much speed from DOSbox... I could get equivalent of 25MHz 386 from my 1.4GHz Celeron, and some P166ish speed from my gaming machine (AMD 64 X2 @ 2.3GHz).
     
  5. Stealth

    Stealth

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    Sonic Mania, HCGE, Sonic Megamix, SonED2, [...]
    Might want to try VDMSound unless there's some reason you need DOSBox in specific
     
  6. saxman

    saxman

    Oldbie Tech Member
    Well I wasn't using DOSBox for sound necessarily. I use it because I have found through experience that it does a better job than the Windows-native handling of DOS programs in terms of compatibility, speed, and things like that. ProSonic runs without DOSBox, with sound. However, I was hoping DOSBox would run it a bit more smoothly as it has done with other applications I have tried. However, that has not turned out to be the case.

    Also, interesting enough, I tried VDMSound, and ProSonic just closes out a few seconds after going full screen. o_o
     
  7. Overlord

    Overlord

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    Tried increasing the number of CPU cycles manually? My copy of Warcraft II won't run properly unless I do that.
     
  8. SMTP

    SMTP

    Tech Member
    Get Warcraft II BNE.

    :P
     
  9. Shibunoa

    Shibunoa

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    DOSBox is one of the slowest x86 emulators there is, it's probably at the same level of Bochs as for speed (or even worse?).
    But it's also the only one with decent midi emulation, if I remember well it also implements Gravis Ultrasound emulation, which is not found elsewhere at all.

    As for running DOS programs, ever tried Qemu? The procedure you have to do is not very straightforward, but it works.

    Downloading a FreeDOS floppy boot diskette, and run QEMU like this:
    qemu -fda <freedos_boot_diskette> -hda fat:rw:<directory where your program is> -boot a -L . -soundhw <sound card>

    where sound card is:
    pcspk PC speaker
    sb16 Creative Sound Blaster 16
    adlib Yamaha YM3812 (OPL2)
    es1370 ENSONIQ AudioPCI ES1370

    You can omit -L . (to specify where the bios image is, in this case, current directory) if you're running Linux, the package already takes
    care of that configuration bit.

    The directory you specified is now available as a FAT file system as C:.
    After that, it's normal plain DOS.

    The QEMU for Windows build I have, does not take Windows style paths ('\') correctly. Either use '/' or '\\' and it will work.

    Also, precompiled QEMU binaries for Windows lag a bit behind the last official release often, last time I checked, it was still on 0.9.1, while QEMU now
    is in the 0.10.x series.
     
  10. Sappharad

    Sappharad

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    Why would you suggest QEmu over VirtualBox or another free virtual machine?
    Just plain old QEmu without the accelerator is just an emulator. You'll get much better speed from an actual Virtual machine, unless you're intentionally trying to make it slow.
     
  11. Overlord

    Overlord

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    This IS Battle.Net edition. =P It just seems to run a lot easier under DOSBox than Windows...
     
  12. Shibunoa

    Shibunoa

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    Because QEMU can make a virtual harddisk with a FAT partition by just using a directory, and isn't 25MB+?
    VirtualBox is too much of an overkill for that.
     
  13. Black Squirrel

    Black Squirrel

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    I don't think DOSBox concentrates much on speed - it seems to have made bigger strides in sound emulation. It's probably a bit awkward for the team, as if you increase the speed at which DOSBox emulates games, it'll often make some of the earlier titles run too fast because there's no speed limits in place for them. It does notably struggle with some of the later DOS titles but I'm guessing that when the DOSBox project started, these titles ran perfectly under Windows' MSDOS. VDMSound is faster, but it isn't as compatible (and I'm not even sure if you can run things windowed)


    There's probably some common sense with DOSBox though. If that version of ProSonic works perfectly fine without DOSBox, it won't be a priority to emulate, especially when there's other games that are currently unplayable on modern hardware.

    But I'm sure it'll catch up eventually.

    and you could always give one of the daily builds a go and see if things have improved
     
  14. SMTP

    SMTP

    Tech Member
    Battle.Net edition is not a dos game, its straight Windows. You cant run it under DosBox.....
     
  15. Overlord

    Overlord

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    I shall take your word for it, as I cannot find the CD right now. =P