Windows XP Pro for programming

This forum is for discussions regarding all aspects of Motorola radio programming, including hardware, computers, installation and use of RSS/CPS, firmware upgrades, and troubleshooting. There are subforums for discussions of codeplugs, and also for software/firmware release notes and issues.

Moderator: Queue Moderator

Post Reply
constable105
Posts: 2
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2006 11:27 am

Windows XP Pro for programming

Post by constable105 »

Ok, I am sure this question has been asked before but I am new to both this forum and to radio programming. I have a laptop with windows xp pro and no DOS program. Can I download Dos on this computer and be able to program my radios or do I need an old PC with another windows.
Ihave the most recent version of RSS ( so motorola told me so ). They are as follows:
RVN4176S CD for MTS2000
RVN4097V floppy( dos ) for MT2000

Can someone please settle this once and for all????
motorola_otaku
Posts: 1854
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2004 7:03 am

Post by motorola_otaku »

Luckily for you, MTSX software is very tolerant of newer, faster computers. However, you'll need to be able to boot the computer into pure DOS. The easiest way to do this is with a USB flash drive, and the instructions for doing so are located here.

If you're feeling brave enough to re-install the entire operating system, you can configure it to dual-boot into DOS or XP off the hard drive. Search this forum.. the instructions for doing so are located a few pages back.
User avatar
kb0nly
AKA: The Computer Doctor
Posts: 3370
Joined: Tue Apr 01, 2003 1:15 am

Post by kb0nly »

If the laptop has either a cd-rom or floppy drive than there is no need to reformat and install a dual boot. Just make a stripped down bootable floppy, there is even images of such on bootdisk.com that don't load any drivers, etc.

Boot up with the media of choice than put in the RSS you need to run. If the XP formatted the hard drive as NTFS then your not going to be able to access it from DOS. You could however copy the RSS and Boot files to one CD-ROM and boot from that, i've done that before and it's easier than trying to boot from USB devices, a lot of older computers won't boot from USB anyway.

Another way to do is get Partition Magic, make a small partition after the XP partition and then use that for your DOS location. Partition magic installs a boot manager that gives you a screen to select which operating system you want to run. The first time you select the DOS partition have the first install disk in the drive and run through the install as normal. Then you can boot either partition as needed later on. This is nice because you can use hard drive space for saving stuff, and if you go into the PQBoot options you can set the DOS partition as unhidden from XP, which will allow you to copy and paste to it from windows since XP can read the FAT32 partition.
Duct tape is like the force, it has a dark side and a light side and it holds the universe together.

"I Reject Your Reality And Substitute My Own!" - Adam Savage
0rlando
Posts: 47
Joined: Fri Mar 17, 2006 6:07 am

Post by 0rlando »

If you have RSS version RVN4176S CD for MTS2000, you can run it from XP Pro, I do with a Dell 1.7 Ghz laptop, it works great.

If you must use DOS, goto http://www.bootdisk.com and create a DOS 6.22 boot disk with NTFS drivers so you can read/write to your XP file system from DOS.

--Orlando
constable105
Posts: 2
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2006 11:27 am

Post by constable105 »

Thats alot guys. I think i have this thing whipped now. I will let you know how it turns out.
Post Reply

Return to “Radio Programming”