Answers from e-Zine!

elcome back to "Answers from e-Zine!", your source for answers to all your OS/2 questions! Each month we bring you tips, tricks, questions and answers from our readers and contributors. If you've got a question or tip you would like to share with us, send it in!

Q -- In the dozen or so installs I have done, OS/2 always "greys out" the checkbox for XMS (it is checked, though). Why does it to this?

A -- XMS is required for WIN-OS/2 to work. If you have WIN-OS/2 checked, the XMS check box will be greyed. If you uncheck WIN-OS/2, you can also uncheck XMS. There's probably not a good reason why you'd want to do that, though.

- Brandon S. Allbery

Q -- I recently installed a new motherboard and when I booted OS/2 I got a trap in SINGLEQ$ right before the PMShell loaded. The system worked fine before and I didn't change anything but the motherboard. I can boot from my system disks and to other OS's. HELP!

A -- The error in SINGLEQ$ is a dead giveaway that the problem lies with your video drivers. When OS/2 first starts to boot, hit ALT-F1 to go to the boot menu, and reset OS/2's video driver to the default VGA driver. It should now boot correctly. Afterwards, reinstall your video drivers for your video card and you should be OK. When you installed your new motherboard it's likely that your video card was set up a little differently (it may have been assigned a different IRQ, for instance), so it's likely that after reinstalling it will work OK.

- OS/2 e-Zine! Staff

Q -- Is it possible to set the Icons and Frame Controls in the WPS to 32x32 (icons) and generally smaller (frame controls) while using the Matrox Mystique? The large 40x40 icons are a bit annoying, and it makes the desktop appear as if it were running at 640x480 instead of 1024x768.

A -- There is not a way to change these easily, unfortunately. Luckily there is a little program available on Hobbes called Small Fonts that should take care of your problem and make OS/2 much more pleasant to use at 1024x768. I used it under Warp 3 and assume that it will still work with Warp 4, but I would advise using caution when trying it out. The file can be found at:

ftp://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/os2/util/system/smallf13.zip
- OS/2 e-Zine! Staff

Q -- My problem is that my Minolta WinLaser printer has no driver for OS/2 Warp 4 or 3. I have a driver for Windows 3.1x. Can I make it work?

A -- Minolta's site doesn't admit to the existence of a "winlaser"; they have "PageWorks" printers, The PageWorks 6 series are, however, "Win-printers": all processing is done on the host, with only Windows 3.1/95 (and not NT and OS/2) drivers available. The other PageWorks printers are PCL5, and a LaserJet 4 driver should work with them.

- Brandon S. Allbery

Tip --

Q -- I would like to remove all dos and win support from my Warp installation. Do you know of a list of the files from the CONFIG.SYS that I can remove? One of my friends said that he had done it once (or someone had for him) and the performance pickup was great.

A -- OK, the easiest way to do it is to go to Selective Uninstall and remove DOS/WIN-OS/2 support. After that there may still be some DOS stuff in your CONFIG.SYS, but it probably won't load, it'll just give you errors. You can also remove any .VDD references (I'd just REM them out for safety's sake). Also, you can set PROTECTONLY=YES, which won't allow any VDM's (Virtual DOS Machines) to start; just remember that you'll need to set it to NO if you install any video drivers -- that's right, installing video drivers starts a VDM.

As for performance benefits, a good rule when installing anything is to not install things you don't need. In OS/2's case, don't install VoiceType and OpenDoc if you don't intend to use them, as both add a lot of overhead and create a performance hit. Also, there are many things hanging around in a typical OS/2 CONFIG.SYS that most people never need. Many of these deal with networking and DOS support, and some, like VDOSTCP.SYS and VDOSTCP.VDD, deal with both. If you don't access TCP/IP sessions from DOS or WIN-OS/2, you can REM out these lines.

- OS/2 e-Zine! Staff

That's it for this month. If you have a tip or question that you don't see covered here, don't forget to send it in!

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ISSN 1203-5696