COPYING a Win3.1 CD ROM TO 3 1/2" DISK in WIN 10

[mrs r]

Hi Guys I am new to this forum but have used C_HOPE  a few times and didn't know it had a forum etc.
I have a 486DX 33 in use since 1990 and last year the hard drive went. I have finally found the time to get it going again and found that the IDE CD ROM Drive has bought it also.
I remember seeing a program that allows 16 bit dos run in 64 bit windows.
I am trying to copy the WIN 3.1 drivers for an EPSON 600 printer from CD ROM to 3 1/5" floppies.The Fpd is A:  USB on my Lap Top, can any one HELP???

[DaveLembke]

DOSBOX can run 16-bit in a virtual environment on 32 and 64bit Windows systems. But some games and software dont like the virtual environment.

https://www.dosbox.com/

Ran into an issue like this many years ago and ended up transferring files over a serial connection between 2 systems and a null modem cable using a software trial called filevan.

Given how cheap IDE CD-ROM's are, i'd suggest just replacing that drive and find one for sale that is good used that has a date of manufacturing before the year 2000. In the early 2000s there were some optical drive internal chipset changes and I can into some issues with MSCDEX not liking newer drives for my Windows 3.1 system. Putting in an old Mitsubishi IDE Drive worked while a brand new LG CD-RW drive it didnt like.

Are you stating that you have an original Epson 600 Printer Driver CD - or - are you trying to get them off of a Windows 3.1 Installation CD?  ( For Windows 3.11 I never had it on a CD, it was a stack of Floppy Disks to do the Windows installation and one of them was loaded with drivers for a number of printers.

Looking online for the driver i see its 1.98MB, if this is the driver for your printer its too big for a single floppy unless you can span it between floppies or compress it somehow to 1.44MB https://epson.com/Support/Printers/Single-Function-Inkjet-Printers/Epson-Stylus-Series/Epson-Stylus-Color-600/s/SPT_C200001?review-filter=Windows+3.1

Here is the Mitsubishi CR-584-B CD-ROM I had years ago. Others out there of about the same age should work fine as well. The $35 the person wants for this is a bit much. I wouldnt spend more than $15. https://www.ebay.com/i/200992555970?chn=ps&dispItem=1

[mrs r]

Thank you for the info.
Yes I have the CD and expanded the files in DOS 6.22 then tried to get Win.3.11 to copy them but every time it tried to read the driver file it came up with not enough memory. The CD has a file to expand them into 2 Floppy Disks
I have looked for a new ROM Drive but haven't found one in  Oz. there are a lot for sale from Soviet countries but not willing to put my trust in them, plus it would take 6 months to get here. lol.
I will try your suggestions and also try again to find a compatible CD Drive.

THANKS
Rachael

[DaveLembke]

every time it tried to read the driver file it came up with not enough memory.

How much RAM does your computer have? This message may mean that no matter what means of installation you will have not enough memory as an error. 

Other thing to be aware of is depending on how you have your autoexec.bat and config.sys files set up you can run into an old problem of base memory being too low which usually can be adjusted to increase the base memory count. The MEM command at DOS prompt will display Base and Extended Memory count. I use to have problems with some software when my available Base Memory was lower than 592k of 640k. http://web.csulb.edu/~murdock/mem.html

[BC_Programmer]

Some things I'm noticing looking over your situation.

The first thing I'm noticing is that all the models I can find that could be the described as an "Epson 600 printer" are (relatively) recent models. They do not provide Windows 3.1 drivers; many don't even provide drivers for Windows XP. Given that I highly doubt that the CD-ROM for the printer provides anything that is of any use to your Windows 3.1 system.

Second thing is that those models of Epson 600 don't even have connectivity capabilities to connect to an older system, as they only offer connectivity via USB or through your network, and network-connected printers require specialized drivers from the manufacturer to function which as I mentioned isn't likely to be on the CD given the age (or lack thereof) of the printer itself.

This is also consistent with your more recent mention that "every time it tried to read the driver file it came up with not enough memory."; in many cases attempting to run executables designed for say Windows XP and later will give a "Program is too big to fit in memory" error.

For compatible Drives, by the by, you don't need a CD-ROM drive; you can use a CD Burner drive or even a DVD drive.

[DaveLembke]

Hi BC... My search for a Epson 600 that supported Windows 3.1 found an Epson Stylus 600 color ... My guess is that this is probably their model as for there are no others found on google in relation to Windows 3.1 support for "Epson 600". https://epson.com/Support/Printers/Single-Function-Inkjet-Printers/Epson-Stylus-Series/Epson-Stylus-Color-600/s/SPT_C200001

Looking online for the driver i see its 1.98MB, if this is the driver for your printer its too big for a single floppy unless you can span it between floppies or compress it somehow to 1.44MB https://epson.com/Support/Printers/Single-Function-Inkjet-Printers/Epson-Stylus-Series/Epson-Stylus-Color-600/s/SPT_C200001?review-filter=Windows+3.1

This printer has LPT1 ( Parallel port ) connectivity which Win 3.1 would support. Specs here: https://files.support.epson.com/pdf/sc600_/sc600_sl.pdf

For compatible Drives, by the by, you don't need a CD-ROM drive; you can use a CD Burner drive or even a DVD drive.

Some newer drives work legacy backwards to old systems like this but i ran into problems about 14 years ago with modern IDE optical drives not happy with older systems, however when pairing up an older date code drive with my 386 SX 40Mhz running Win 3.11 then all was well. The newer drives worked fine on my Windows XP system at the time and it wasn't an oops with the Master/Slave/CS jumper setting. 

[BC_Programmer]

Oh OK, that's good. The Epson search results give a list of models but they don't give much information without actually going to every page and there are quite a few models, so all the ones I looked at were in the 2010+ range.

Obviously because of that it has the appropriate interfaces for older systems.

Regarding Drive compatibility, My understanding is that the limiting factor is the interface (PATA in this case) and system support for ATAPI. As  long as that checks out, the drive should work fine with proper drivers. Personally I've not had any problems using OAKCDROM.SYS for all the PATA CD-ROM drives I own (as long as the system has an IDE Host Controller, of course!). Quite useful for transferring data to older non-USB systems with DVD-RWs. I seem to r emember reading KB articles discussing support issues with some of the included generic drivers on various Windows Boot diskettes, though.