Malik wrote:

I remember a similar Dos disk caching utility in Norton Utilities. […]
Show full quote

I remember a similar Dos disk caching utility in Norton Utilities.

Are there any other similar disk cache utilities available?

Smartdrv seems to be the most compatible with dos games so far but does take quite a lot of memory. UMBPCI and QEMM configs take care of this base memory problem, but under pure Himem only, non-umb configuration, it eats a considerable portion of the 640K.

I also remember one or two games unable to run concurrently with smartdrive. Can't remember which. Some require different switches to work with smartdrive.

What type oif computer are you using smartdrive on?

With today fast harddrives and fast hd controllers like VLB controllers or built in hd controllers on late 486 motherboards it feels like smartdrive isn't needed

Right now I'm using my Pentium 133 (P54C) system with 40MB EDO RAM + 5GB Fujitsu Hardrive partitioned to 2+2+1GB.

I've always noticed quite a substantial changes in speed when using smartdrv. Especially when reloading a game, during gameplay and during file management. Very noticable when deleting a directory by using deltree command or even del *.*

Game loading time is significantly reduced. This is evident when comparing the HDD LED activity as well as actual time experience.

I've even noticed the improvement brought out by smartdrive even in my previous DOS machine which was a PIII 450MHz system with 256 PC100 SDRAM.

And once I even was using my P4 1.7 GHz system with 256 DDR RAM booted into pure dos with SB Audigy and the SBEINIT utilies. The improvements brought out by the disk caching is very much noticable.

There is also a "sweet spot" for the number of MBs to cache beyond which, increasing the allotment of memory to smartdrv won't improve further. I think 2MB is the one for most machines with 8MB and above, I think.

Try seeing the difference when using defrag.

I'm still waiting for my 486 boards to arrive. Yeah, two of them. One has PCI slots in it.

I've also used pc-cache and ncache. Eye of the Beholder 3 and Mortal Kombat 2 certainly became faster then.

Disk caching makes a huge difference in DOS regardless of how fast the drive is. I've always used Smartdrv because it's probably going to be the most compatible option. Disk caching will cause problems with some apps and drivers though. For example, the DOS driver that comes with Ensoniq AudioPCI and SBLive! does not like to start up after smartdrv.

Actually, when I was on a 286, I used something called Lightspeed Disk Cache. Smartdrv wasn't around back then AFAIK. DOS 3.2.

hyperdisk (hyperdkx.exe) is a good alternative. it is part of the abandonware "speedkit", last version was v4.78.

there is a 2003 release of smartdrv.exe v5.10 from ibm pcdos v7.10 in their freeware bootdisk.

you can also use the newer DMA enabler in uide.sys and other variants but these do not cache the floppy drives.

remember to turn off VERIFY and use only one disk cache at a time.

tikbalang wrote:

hyperdisk (hyperdkx.exe) is a good alternative. it is part of the abandonware "speedkit", last version was v4.78. […]
Show full quote

hyperdisk (hyperdkx.exe) is a good alternative. it is part of the abandonware "speedkit", last version was v4.78.

there is a 2003 release of smartdrv.exe v5.10 from ibm pcdos v7.10 in their freeware bootdisk.

you can also use the newer DMA enabler in uide.sys and other variants but these do not cache the floppy drives.

remember to turn off VERIFY and use only one disk cache at a time.

Thanks a lot, tikbalang!! That is very helpful. I'll try it.

Does DMA really benefit DOS at all? I can understand that it might if you have a UDMA controller, a fast HDD, and a fast sys. I don't know if the UDMA controller itself will configure for the proper UDMA speed. So maybe it gets you out of PIO4 (16MB/s) and up to UDMA xxx? However, it seems to me that it could be another potential conflict waiting to happen. On older systems though, 16MB/s isn't going to be much of a bottleneck for anything other than a HDD-to-HDD copy.

I have noticed that one of the biggest benefits of Smartdrv (probably any cache) is that it will do write behind caching. So the DOS prompt will come back before the disk is done doing its thing. This is a serious boost for DOS cuz it almost makes it feel like it's multitasking.

Of course, the read and write caching in general is a huge improvement in general. DELTREEing your Windows directory with and w/o a cache will show you this in a hurry.

MS smartdrive has issues with some hardware. the quantum fireballs back then failed to work at all when smartdrive is loaded. some dos audio drivers will not load after smartdrive.

i use uide.sys from jack r. ellis and is has built-in cache of 5mb minimum, up to 1023mb. it uses less than 2k of high memory, as opposed to ~20k for 4mb cache with smartdrive. it isn't much but it such optimization matters to those who truly used dos. the downside with uide is the fdd is left uncached. i still keep smartdrive as a backup though.

I've used almost every alternative to Smartdrv over the years and while some were slightly faster or perhaps consumed less memory, none were as compatible.

FreeDOS LBAcache:

http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/fre … s/dos/smartdrv/
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/fre … s/dos/lbacache/

swaaye wrote:

I have noticed that one of the biggest benefits of Smartdrv (probably any cache) is that it will do write behind caching. So the DOS prompt will come back before the disk is done doing its thing. This is a serious boost for DOS cuz it almost makes it feel like it's multitasking.

Come to think of the write-behind cache there were one or two games I came across where I had to disable the write-behind cache to make them work. Sigh, couldn't remember what was the game(s) name.

Most games manuals will mention if smartdrv is compatible or not. Some manuals recommend you to use it while others discourage.

Whatever's the case, if a game or program supports caching like smartdrv, the improvement is tremendous if not stellar (relatively).

might be startflight. I had to add special code in dosbox for those games as they are real picky about having the file contents+ file date updated after issueing a write to file command

Daft question, are you using DOS=HIGH in your config.sys?

I used to run a config.sys of
DEVICE=C:\DOS\HIMEM.SYS /TESTMEM:OFF
DOS=HIGH
FILES=30
BUFFERS=20

And autoexec.bat of
@echo off
c:\dos\smartdrv.exe 2048
c:\dos\lmouse

With that setup I could get Ultima 7 and Serpent Isle to run ok.

teamster1975 wrote:

Daft question, are you using DOS=HIGH in your config.sys?

So far, since Dos 5, I've used the Dos=High, Umb in my configs all the time.

One thing good* (*-for old timers anyway) about dos games is that : The game BEGINS even BEFORE you install the game. There were so many machines, video cards and sound cards combinations that the problems arising from these are phenomenal. Windows' DirectX APIs and other APIs are designed to tackle this problem in one way.

Yet, the classic dos configurations are still irresistable to play around with and the moment you see a real "troublemaker" game finally run makes you feel you already half-won the game!

teamster1975 wrote:

c:\dos\smartdrv.exe 2048

Yep, it's a sweet spot (Depending on your total RAM,) for dos - the 2MB.

Qbix wrote:

might be startflight

I've played Starflight in my XT 8088 system in the late 80s. I couldn't remember if I was using a cache utility back then.

I think I have more fun configuring machines than playing games. Seriously. I'm bored once the hardware is working fine, tweaked and doing everything. 😉

swaaye wrote:

I think I have more fun configuring machines than playing games. Seriously. I'm bored once the hardware is working fine, tweaked and doing everything. 😉

Amen.

swaaye wrote:

I think I have more fun configuring machines than playing games. Seriously. I'm bored once the hardware is working fine, tweaked and doing everything. 😉

Amen to that too 😁