MS Windows Automatic Startup Parameters



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======================================================================
                WIN.COM AUTOMATIC START-UP PARAMETERS
======================================================================


WIN.COM starts up automatically in the appropriate Windows 3.00
operating mode for your machine and the amount of memory installed.
These modes are real mode (similar to Windows/286 2.x), 286 standard
mode (also known as 286 protected mode), and 386 enhanced mode (also
known as 386 protected mode). However, Windows may be forced into one
of the three modes through the following command-line switches:


      Command Line        Mode
      ------------        ----


      WIN /R              Real


      WIN /S or WIN /2    Standard


      WIN /3              Enhanced


REAL MODE REQUIREMENTS
======================


The requirements for WIN.COM to automatically start up in real mode
are the following:


* 8088 processor or above


* 384K of free conventional memory (393,216 bytes reported by CHKDSK)


STANDARD MODE REQUIREMENTS
==========================


The requirements for WIN.COM to automatically start up in standard
mode are the following:


* 80286 processor or above


* 192K of free extended memory


* XMS driver loaded (HIMEM.SYS)


   ACTUAL STANDARD MODE REQUIREMENTS


   Standard mode conventional/extended memory requirements are
   mutually dependent and are not fixed. A typical installation
   requires a minimum of 128K free at the DOS prompt to run standard
   mode, assuming sufficient extended memory is free. Standard mode
   requires between 384K and 512K combined conventional and extended
   memory to run (approximately).


   For example, if only the minimum 192K of extended memory is free,
   approximately 322K of conventional memory is required to run
   standard mode. However, If available extended memory is increased
   to approximately 208K or greater, only 128K of conventional memory
   is required. This example is intended to illustrate that memory
   requirements are interrelated and variable.



ENHANCED MODE REQUIREMENTS
==========================


The requirements for WIN.COM to automatically start up in enhanced
mode are the following:


* 80386 processor or above


* 1024K of free extended memory


* XMS driver loaded (HIMEM.SYS)


   ACTUAL ENHANCED MODE REQUIREMENTS


   See the above notes for standard mode regarding the
   interrelationship of conventional and extended memory requirements.
   A typical installation requires a minimum of 182K free at the DOS
   prompt to run enhanced mode, assuming sufficient extended memory is
   free. Enhanced mode requires between 580K and 624K combined
   conventional and extended memory to run (approximately).


   Note that enhanced mode can start up in low memory situations only
   because it provides virtual memory support. However, it may be
   extremely slow due to the large amount of disk swapping it must
   perform.


   All numbers are approximate and may vary widely depending on the
   configuration (for example, Windows device drivers chosen, DOS
   version, display adapter, etc.). 128K of extended memory is
   recovered from shadow RAM usage on COMPAQ 386 machines. Memory
   requirements take into account memory that can be recovered from
   SMARTDrive (down to the minimum cache size specified).











































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