Updated Feb 3 2000

The FreeDOS "Beta4" Distribution was released on 29 Dec 1999. On this page, I will track any issues that are raised with the distribution, and offer a way to download patches.

Broken

• The kernel distributed with Beta4 ("Lemur") still contains the bug for large disks. If your hard disk is bigger than 512MB, then you should not try to SYS your hard disk with the boot floppy. Do not even try to access a hard disk bigger than 512MB, or you risk corrupting the FAT. This is a kernel bug, so I can't do anything about this. One possible work-around is to create a disk partition that is smaller than 512MB, and install FreeDOS on that.
• The internal COPY command in FreeCOM still must have some bugs. You will want to alias the external COPY and use that instead.
• There seem to be memory problems with FreeDOS (possibly FreeCOM?) When you load programs and when the program exits to DOS, RAM may not be cleared properly.
• There are some problems with FreeCOM (our command.com shell). Trying to do DIR on a non-existent drive (i.e. DIR D:\MYFILES if the D: drive doesn't exist) causes the system to hang, instead of just printing an error message. Trying to change to drive D: yields the error message 'Invalid drive specification', suggesting that this is a DIR-specific problem.

Seem Broken, But Aren't

• Some anti-virus software, including Norton's, will report that the install boot floppies contain a virus (usually reported as the "Bloodhound" virus.) This is a false positive; there is no virus.
• Don't try to run RAWRITE from Windows NT. The hardware abstraction layer (HAL) doesn't let you make direct access to the hardware (in this case, the floppy device.) Windows NT will hang or crash your system. Boot directly to DOS to run RAWRITE, or do it from within Windows 95/98, or use 'dd' if you have Linux.
• The LSM file for FIND has an incorrect description (the one for CLS.)
• The boot floppy uses FreeCOM 0.76, not 0.78. The Base.1 floppy will install FreeCOM 0.78.

Changes And Updates

• A fix has been made available for the year '100' bug in command.com: the new version is 0.78b. [Download]