PeterHenryRoger

Hello there,

Does anybody know about DOS.

I thought I would resurrect an old computer which had a CDROM drive put into it. Unfortunately, when I “boot up” I get the following message:

ILLEGAL OPERATION ‘C’ USAGE MSCDEX [/E /K /S /V] [/D:<driver>….] [/L:<letter>] [/M:<buffers>]

The machine starts up OK but the CDROM drive is unavailable but the CDROM driver has been loaded and the BIOS knows the CDROM drive is there because it reports it as a secondary master.

The AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS files are as below:

AUTOEXEC.BAT

@ECHO Off
set mouse=C:\MOUSE
C:\MOUSE\mouse
PATH C:\MOUSE;C:\NWDOS;C:\3DMENU;C:\
PATH C:\NU;%PATH%
SET QBACKUP=C:\QBACKUP
PATH=C:\QBACKUP;%PATH%
SET SYMANTEC=C:\SYMANTEC
SET NU=C:\NU
KEYB UK+
VERIFY OFF
PROMPT [Novell DOS] $P$G
SET NWDOSCFG=C:\NWDOS
SET FBP_USER=Peter Henry Rogers
NWCACHE 7670 1024 /LEND=ON /DELAY=OFF
LH C:\NWDOS\MSCDEX.EXE /C:\NWDOS\SSCDROM.SYS /L:I /M:30
C:\NU\NDD C:/Q
C:\NU\IMAGE C:
3DM


CONFIG.SYS

DEVICE=C:\NWDOS\EMM386.EXE DPMI=OFF FRAME=NONE
DEVICE=C:\NWDOS\DPMS.EXE
DEVICE=C:\NWDOS\SETVER.EXE
SHELL=C:\COMMAND.COM C:\ /E:512 /P
BREAK=OFF
BUFFERS=30
FILES=99
FCBS=4,4
FASTOPEN=512
LASTDRIVE=J
HISTORY=ON,512,ON
COUNTRY=44,,C:\NWDOS\COUNTRY.SYS
DOS=HIGH,UMB
DEVICEHIGH=C:\NWDOS\VDISK.SYS 32760 256 64 /E
DEVICEHIGH=C:\NWDOS\SSCDROM.SYS /I:SSCD000 /1:I


If some kind person could shed a little light on my darkness I would be most grateful

Kind Regards;

Peter H. Rogers.

lensman3

It sounds like you put a "new" cdrom into it, meaning it was made since the millennium. Did the cdrom come with a dos driver? If it did put it in a directory and point the mscdsx.exe program at it. Hope for the best. The mscdex.sys line has the letters "LH" for load high. I haven't seen that command in 10 year. I bet this computer has a whopping 1 meg of memory too.

In the autoexec there is sscdrom.sys command that I think links back to MSCDEX.sys line in the config.sys file. The only part of DOS that is still around is the DOS file system. It is still used in the flash memory sticks.

I really think you are the proud owner of a "boat anchor"! Good luck.

af3

LH C:\NWDOS\MSCDEX.EXE /C:\NWDOS\SSCDROM.SYS /L:I /M:30

should be

LH C:\NWDOS\MSCDEX.EXE /D:SSCD000 /L:I /M:30

Good luck!