Master of Orion, DosBox

[Stargazer-SG1]

Ok, i'm trying to run this thing with DosBox, and everything works fine untill after the race selection, then the game just quits, and this message is diplayed :

EMM reserved exceeded by 3 blocks [starmap.lbx]

Does anybody has a clue ?!?

I even installed the patch, so that should be the problem.

[vmxa1]

No clue, but I use 2048 for EMS and that works fine.

[Gilgamensch]

Make also sure that you protect this memory. But otherwise with a minimum of 1MB of EMS should be working.

[catullus]

Manual says:
System Memory: 2MB of RAM with 1040K of EMS free.

That would be just a tiny bit more than 1MB EMS.

C.

[vmxa1]

Well not quite. 2MB of ram is not related to EMS. I suspect that the post of 1mb of EMS is really XMS. I never seen any one with 1MB of EMS and I doubt that it is possible. It has been a long time, but EMS is extented memory above the 640K conventional, but within the 1MB. I don;t think you can allocate 1mb of EMS.

[bakalov]

You can try adjusting the properties of the MSDOS program shortcut in windows by giving the maximum possible conventional memory and 4 or 8MB for all other memory types in spite of declaration that 2 are enough.

If you are running Win 98 or ME you can try to add this in the CONFIG.SYS file:
DEVICE = C:\WINDOWS\EMM386.EXE AUTO RAM
or to change the line containing EMM386.EXE to be like the above one if it is in your CONFIG.SYS already.

BTW, Stargazer, I knew one Stargazer from the Planetarion ... Can you possibly be the same?

[catullus]

Originally posted by vmxa1
Well not quite. 2MB of ram is not related to EMS. I suspect that the post of 1mb of EMS is really XMS. I never seen any one with 1MB of EMS and I doubt that it is possible. It has been a long time, but EMS is extented memory above the 640K conventional, but within the 1MB. I don;t think you can allocate 1mb of EMS.

Well, actually.
1MB of EMS really IS 1MB of EMS, only that usually EMS was run inside XMS space.
EMS demands a 64K frame inside the 384 KB upper memory area (which is called exactly that, UMA or UMB for upper memory blocks). This frame I haven't been able to free on my newest laptop. Grrr. But I digress. That frame acts as a cache for the memory DOS really can't access above 1M. EMS is old tech. Meaning REALLY old tech, like pre-287 tech. True EMS needed special hardware memory boards.
When XMS was invented, that does the same thing (making more than 1M memory available only with a completely different approach,) XMS stubs (like QEMM and EMM386) were made to emulate the older standard EMS. So people could still run their old Lotus-1-2-3 on spanking new 386 machines.
When Simtex programmed MOO and needed more RAM, they had to take EMS, since EMM386 wasn't included in DOS before 6.0 (1994), and anyway, XMS needs a 386 chip, while the old hardware EMS runs fine on a 286.

So yes. 2MB RAM is related to 1MB conventional+UMA and 1MB of EMS, which was almost always emulated by XMS. These days, of course, XMS is emulated by a DOS emulator inside a true flat memory model.

C.
Had to read up on this bit when I experimented with running MOO on my latest PC. It's not something I usually bother to remember...

[vmxa1]

Yes I should have gone to bed instead of posting. You can emulate up 32648 or there abouts for EMS and that is in K. So when they say 2mb of ram they are saying you need 640K conventional 360 UMB and 1mb of EMS. Of the 640K conventional they need less than 600K free for the application, depending on what sound settings you are using.