eCS should also still be compatible with all DOS and Win16 software. In addition to being fully compatible with existing OS/2 software, Serenity Systems has been tirelessly converting open source programs to run on eCS, including Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird and. eCS includes IBM-supplied updates that had previously only been offered to customers with maintenance contracts, such as support for USB, and has added a number of features to improve compatibility and performance on modern computers, such as switching the default filesystem to JFS. Operating SystemsĮComStation is the new name of OS/2, which has continued to be developed by Serenity Systems since IBM discontinued development of OS/2. DOSBox has been ported to almost every modern operating system, and RGB Classic Games has an Advanced DOSBox tutorial that explains how to install Windows 1.0 through 3.11 in DOSBox. Due to its emulation of DOS and ability to emulate a wide range of video and sound cards, it is highly recommended that you use DOSBox to install a Win16 operating system. Such programs allow you to run DOS and other operating systems as a 'guest' operating system in a window on your 'host' operating system. If you are using a 64-bit Windows operating system, or any non-Windows/Unix operating system, the only way to run Win16 games is to install a real copy of Windows 1.0 through 3.11 in an emulation or virtualization program. Unix-like operating systems ( Linux, Mac OS X) can run many Win16 programs using a native implementation of the Windows API called Wine.īeOS/Haiku and 64-bit versions of Windows don't support Win16 software at all. Windows 95/98/Me/XP, and 32-bit versions of Windows Vista and Windows 7 use a system called 'Windows on Windows' to translate 16-bit Windows API calls to Windows 32-bit API calls, and should be compatible with most Win16 programs. If you want to run a real copy of Windows, but don't already own one, there is a free Windows-compatible operating system called ReactOS, which can be found in the operating systems section. Some Win16 games used a special library for speeding up video called WinG, which can be found in the miscellaneous section. If you're running a Win16 operating system, RGB hosts a number of drivers for video and sounds cards. Win16 runs on top of DOS, so any computer running DOS ( MS-DOS/PC-DOS/DR-DOS/FreeDOS) should be able to install a copy of Windows 1.0 through Windows 3.11.

How this is accomplished depends on what operating system your computer is running. Win16 software can be run on any x86 computer, as well as many non-x86 platforms.

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