Inanis.net

I was bored. I had extra hardware. I had old software. I put Windows 3.11 on steroids.

Specs:

• AMD Athlon 64 3200+ Processor
• 512MB DDR400 Memory
• 1.6GB Hard Drive
• CD-ROM and Floppy
• SIS 6326 PCI Video Card
• 3Com 3c905 Fast Ethernet Card
• Microsoft DOS 6.22 w/SmartDrive
• Microsoft Windows 3.11 For Workgroups
• Internet Explorer 5.0 for Windows 3.11

Goals:

1. Get it to boot DOS and load Windows without errors.
2. Get it to recognise (relatively) modern hardware and utilize it.
3. Get it to use DHCP to bootstrap the network.
4. Get it on the Internet
5. Get it to recognize my Windows 2003 network.

Results:

1. It boots, no problem!
2. It recognizes the video and ethernet cards and the CD-ROM. I didn’t try sound because the motherboard doesn’t have ISA slots, and I dont have any PCI based Win3.11 compatible cards. Although the BIOS has no problem recognizing all the memory, Windows would not recognize more than 256MB of RAM. I didn’t check to see if DOS did. I suspect this has something to do with the nature of DDR memory architechture. I didn’t have anything besides a single 512DDR 400 stick with which to test.
3. It grabs an IP from my firewall without a hitch.
4. It surfs the Internet, albeit a bit buggily because of the older browser. I was not able to find anything newer that works with Win3.11. If I surf too many pages consecutively, or have too many IE windows open, IE will crash and take the venerable Windows 3.11 right along with it. I suspect this has something to do with the 256/512 RAM issue stated above.
5. It cannot access any of my “Win2k style” machines on the network: it simply says it cannot find the machine, however, if I share a folder on the Win3.11 box then the “Win2k Style” boxes can access it. This is actually how I got some of the software and drivers over to the Win3.11 box.

Pictures:

The Muscle

The BIOS POST Screen

The Windows 3.11 Splash Screen

Logging On

On The Network (Sorry about the camera shake)

Surfing the ‘Net

High Color Goodness

Shared Folders (The entire drive, really. It says not shared, but it is… trust me.)

Server 2003 Gets a Reply

Server 2003 Gets a Folder List