For a combination of DOS and Windows 3.1, the size can be as low as 40 MB however there won’t be anything really left for virtual memory and installing applications. Select Next.įinally the last option is to choose where the hard disk file is to be saved, and the size of it. For the purposes of this VM, choosing Dynamically allocated will be sufficient. Again there’s no real wrong option here, they both have their pros and cons. Select Next.Ĭontinuing with the hard disk VirtualBox allows you to select either a dynamically allocated or fixed size hard disk file. Nevertheless there’s no wrong option here and largely depends on whether it will be ever used with a different emulator. For this we will just leave it on the default option which is VDI (VirtualBox Disk Image). When creating a new hard disk VirtualBox provides three choices on the file type that is to be used for storing the data within. Later in the wizard there’s also opportunity to change the size anyway. Alternatively you may select Do not add a virtual hard disk and create a hard disk to the desired size after the VM had been created. Again as we’ve chosen Windows 3.1, VirtualBox has suggested the recommended size of the hard disk to be 1 GB. As we don’t have one yet, we will select the Create a virtual hard disk now option and choose Create. Now the option is regarding a hard disk for the VM. DOS and Windows 3.1 will happily run on the lowest option of 4 MB, though anything above 32 MB is considered overkill. By default as Windows 3.1 had been selected, the recommended memory size is 32 MB. The following option now is to choose the amount of RAM. Setting up a new Windows 3.1 virtual machine. You may either select the Windows version as shown below, or type Windows 3.1 and the drop-down selection will automatically change. A Create Virtual Machine dialog box will appear allowing you to select which operating system it will be using for this virtual machine (VM). Microsoft Network Client 3.0 for MS-DOS Download.Unlike newer versions, Windows up to version 3.x would typically sit on top of some variation of DOS such as MS-DOS or PC-DOS which was the operating system. Windows 3.1 wasn’t technically an operating system in itself, though common perception is that it was. VirtualBox isn’t my first preference for emulation, however it’s free to obtain. For this guide I’m using Oracle VirtualBox 5.1.4 (the latest at the time) on a Windows 10 machine. Installing DOS and Windows 3.x is relatively straightforward, though configuring both to perform the best they can can be a little more tricky.

Msdos 6.22 disk image creator