I am trying to install a truly ancient piece of software from files myself and friends still have backed up from the 90’s, its a voice chat program called “Battle Com” (so old I cant even find a reference to it online)
any way the issue seems to be that the install shell is so out of date it wont run on a modern pc. the error I get on my win7 machine is
unsupported 16 bit application
the program or feature blahblahblah cannot start or run due to incompatibility with 64 bit versions of windows. please contact the software vendor to ask if a 64 bit version is availiable
then
WinExec failed: return=216
there is no workaround I can find for 7, so I was wondering if anyone knows a way around this or has access to a win 98 machine, the files are small enough to email and I suspect the final install will also run straight from the folder. so a copy of the files should work.
Most likely, you will find that the program (as well as the installer) is ‘16-bit’ and will no longer run under Win7.
Other than an old PC, your best bet is to get a copy of Virtual PC (might be included in your Win7) and a set of Win9x install disks) and set up a virtual machine environment to install and run the game.
Anyway, it’s impossible to run a 16-bit application on a 64-bit OS. This isn’t a Microsoft thing; the architecture of 64-bit mode in x64 CPUs makes it a literal impossibility.
You have a couple of solutions:
Use a modern gaming voice communication software, Skype, Ventrillo, TeamSpeak, etc.
Run a 32-bit copy of Windows (which never uses 64-bit mode in the CPU, and thus it’s possible to run 16-bit applications.)
Install a VM and attempt running the 16-bit software in it. You might need to get a VM that does full-emulation (I think Microsoft’s VirtualPC does this?) as opposed to one that just virtualizes the runtime environment (which is what most of them do). DOSBox *might *be able to be twisted into this. There’s also an x86 emulator named Bochs that *might *work. Of course you’ll need to install an actual copy of Windows 95 or 98 on it.
thanks for the replies guys, sounds like its a lot of work for a program that we really just want to test out against skype and the like. I also used this think back in the tribes days and man what a huge advantage it was when so few people were using voice chat.
I may still try your suggestions though, might be fun
It could be that only the program’s *installer *is 16-bit. In which case, you can install it in a VM, monitor what changes the installer makes, then replicate those changes on a 64-bit OS and copy over the (presumably) 32-bit .exe and .dll files.
No guarantee that it works, of course. But it might be a way to get it on your Windows 7 computer.
I installed in a VM, and you’re correct. It’s a 32 bit program with a 16 bit installer. Still doesn’t work under Windows 7 though. It crashes when it tries to detect my sound card.
I zipped everything it installed and uploaded it here. Maybe it works under Vista or XP.
That’s your clue that it’s trying to do direct hardware access, which is a no-no on anything newer than Windows ME.
It shouldn’t work under XP or Vista, but you might get lucky.
no wait, it runs!!
one small problem, I told it to use my speakers and now it wont switch to the headphones. where do I find the configuration files to delete them so I can rerun set up?
Wow. Lucky man, you are.
Uh, try its C:\Program Files\ subfolder.
Unfortunately, there’s a chance that it’ll be in the registry, which would make it very hard to find the config.
Good luck.
never mind, found the settings tab, need someone to connect with and test but its working fine on my end.
** ExcitedIdiot ** its running fine under 7 in test mode. kinda weird that it will only work with the sound device you point it at but thats actually cool, music on the outside, voice chat on the inside
That may have to do with how Windows 7 compartmentalizes sound on a per program basis. I can’t remember if Vista did that, but I know XP didn’t. Unfortunately, I can’t check it since I don’t have a microphone.
I gave it a go, Windows 7 64-bit. It seemed to work, even got past the setup steps and correctly displayed the audio level from my microphone… but as soon as I hosted a new chat room, it crashed and burned. No amount of fiddling with compatibility settings made a difference.
Its level of compatibility might depend on what drivers you have installed, or on some other factor. I checked MS’s compatibility database, but apparently we’re the first ones to attempt running this program on Vista/Windows 7.