Stygian-Abyss | Underworld Configuration Help

This help page is for getting both games to run with sound, mice and CD-ROM, through the use of a boot-disk. The advantage of using a boot-disk is that it is safe to use and you don’t have to worry about the memory problems associated with running certain DOS games in Windows.

The first thing you need to do is to grab yourself a blank floppy disk. To make a bootable disk with only the necessary system files on it, go to the section below which lists you’re current operating system. For Windows 2000 users, go here first.

Windows 9x

In Windows, open up a DOS box. At the prompt type:
format a: /s

Windows ME

Unfortunately Microsoft makes it a little harder to make a boot-disk through ME as the one that is produced via Add/Remove Programs isn’t sufficient for running the underworld games. To get around this, you can make a boot-disk on a W9x machine and use it on your Me machine. If you don’t have access to a W98 machine then download this zip file (13k). Simply format a floppy disk and unzip the files into it. Windows will complain a little about incorrect DOS version, but you can safely ignore this message.

The next thing you will need is a workable version of config.sys. Open up Notepad (or some other basic text editor) and cut and paste the following:

Config.sys

	FILES=20
	BUFFERS=20
	DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\HIMEM.SYS
	DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\EMM386.EXE 1024 RAM
	DOS=UMB
	DOS=HIGH
	SHELL=C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND.COM /P
	DEVICEHIGH=C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\EBD\OAKCDROM.SYS /D:MSCD001 /M:10 /L:G

Save this file as config.sys to you’re A: drive. On the last line I have loaded up a generic CD-ROM driver that will work with most CD-ROMs, both old and new. If you have a DOS driver for your CD-ROM that you wish to use instead of oakcdrom.sys, then change the last line to

Devicehigh=x:<path>/<driver> /D:MSCD001 /M:10 /L:G

Change X: to whatever drive that your driver is found on. However, the beauty of using the oakcdrom.sys is that it is already available on your system and it won’t read your CD too quickly, as is a common problem in Windows with old games.

Now, before we create autoexec.bat file, we should set up our soundcard to work in DOS. The one that we will look at here is the SB-Live card (I will add others later). Many cards today feature legacy emulation which provide drivers which emulate the early cards such as the SB16 and Adlib cards, so please check your soundcards’ documentation. If your card features legacy emulation but is not a SB-Live card, all you will have to do is to modify the paths and parameters listed in the following autoexec.bat file. But more of that later.

To check whether you have already got your dos drivers set up for your SB-Live,

right click My Computer
Choose Properties
Go to the Device Manager tab
Expand the Creative Miscellaneous Devices entry and look for Creative SB16 Emulation
If this is here, then double-click it and check Device Status to make sure that it’s working properly.
Go to the settings tab and copy down the following info: SB Port; IRQ; and 8 bit DMA

If your DOS drivers have not been installed then put in your original installation disk, this time choosing a custom install and only selecting DOS drivers from the selection list.

The other thing that you should do is to check that the necessary utilities are available on your system. On a default installation to the C: drive the path will be as follows:

C:\Program Files\Creative\SBLive\DOSDrv

Here you should find some programs such as SBEMIXER.EXE, SBEINIT.COM, SBELOAD.EXE, SBECFG.EXE, SBESET.EXE and SBEGO.EXE amongst others. These files are mostly necessary and we will use some of these tools later.

Okay, its back to good old notepad. The following information will work on most machines. If you have a different soundcard then you will need to modify the appropriate lines. Also, if you have installed your SB-Live DOS drivers into a different path then you will have to point the path in autoexec.bat to the relevant directory (just make sure that you follow the DOS restrictions about not allowing any file/folder names to be longer than 8 characters). Otherwise just cut and paste the following.

Autoexec.bat

SET PATH=A:\;C:\WINDOWS;C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND;C:\PROGRA~1\CREATIVE\SBLIVE\DOSDRV; 
SET TMP=C:\WINDOWS\TEMP 
SET TEMP=C:\WINDOWS\TEMP 
SET TMP=C:\WINDOWS\TEMP 
SET PROMPT=$P$G 
SET BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 H5 P330 T6 
SET CTSYN=C:\WINDOWS 
SBMIXER /P /Q 
C:\PROGRA~1\CREATIVE\SBLIVE\DOSDRV\SBEINIT.COM 
SET COMSPEC=A:\COMMAND.COM 
lh C:\dos\mouse
c:

Save this to you’re a: drive as autoexec.bat and your almost done. The other thing that we now need to look at is getting your mouse to work in DOS. If you don’t have a DOS driver for your mouse, then you can download this generic mouse driver (21k). I have tried it on a wide variety of mice, including USB and optical mice and have not had any problem with any of them.

What you need to do now is to create a folder called DOS on your C: drive and place mouse.com in it. Or, if your mouse driver is located somewhere else, point the path above to where your driver resides (just keep in mind that the windows drivers for your mouse will not work in DOS).

The other thing that you need to take into consideration is the SB configuration line:

SET BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 H5 P330 T6

The three parameters of interest here are the A220, I5 and D1 parameters. They relate to your cards’ setting for legacy emulation. You can check the parameters for Creative SB16 Emulation by going to the relevant section in step 3 and by modifying the autoexec.bat line accordingly. However, keep in mind that this may be different to the actual settings in DOS, which we will look into in Step 5.

If you’ve got this far then you should already have a working boot-disk, and are now ready to face the perils of the Underworld. However, before installing either game, you might like to run a few utilities in DOS to check on the success and configuration of your SB.

Make sure that your system is enabled to boot from a floppy and restart your system with a floppy
At the prompt type: sbego. This will check whether or not your card is working and what parameters have been chosen for port, DMA and IRQ setting.
If you need to change any of these, then you can exit sbego and type sbeset -? at the prompt to see available flags (the ones that your most likely to be interested in are –A , –I and –D). You may also prefer to use the same settings that are used within Windows. To do this type sbeset –w0
Then, if you have made any changes, make sure that you update the data in your autoexec.bat.

TROUBLE-SHOOTING FAQ

Q. I’ve tried everything but I still can’t get my CD-ROM to work in dos. Can I play off the HD instead?

A. Yes. You will need to go back into windows and at a DOS prompt type in:

For UW1 type: xcopy d:\uw c:\uw /e/s

For UW2 type: xcopy d:\uw2 c:\uw2 /e/s

If any of the above drive letters are incorrect for your system then you will need to replace the d: above with whatever letter your CD-ROM happens to be and replace the c: to whatever drive that you wish to install the games to.

Q. My USB mouse occasionally spins my characters’ direction into a wild-spin. Can this be fixed?

A. I’ve only ever experienced this a few times but it usually goes away if you try to move backwards whilst holding the forward key on your keyboard. If this problem persists for more than a few seconds, save your game, exit UW and reload your saved game. If your using a joystick press ctrl+j to configure it.

Q. I’ve changed some of the paths in either config.sys or autoexec.bat to reflect my personal driver set-up, but they don’t seem to be working in DOS. Have I done something wrong?

Probably! One of the main reasons why people have trouble making a useable boot-disk is because they have not set up paths to point at the correct place or they are pointing to windows? drivers, not DOS ones. Keep in mind that DOS can only handle 8 character length names for Folders and an 8.3 format for file-names. The way to get around the problem of using folders with longer names is to truncate them and add a tilde (~) symbol and number in sequential order. For example, you will notice that in the autoexec.bat file that you created the Program Files folder has been reduced to PROGRA~1. For example, if there was also a folder in you C: drive called Program Twisty then this would be truncated to PROGRA~2 as T comes after F in the alphabet.

Q. Where else can I get help?

You can always try the rather excellent ARX Fatalis and Underworld forum at TTLG

If you have any suggestions, questions, information, alcohol or comments please let me know. twisty@ttlg.com