A "Brief" Synopsis of PC Emulators and Virtualization Programs (Part 1)

June 05, 2021

What's The Best Emulator/Virtualizer Depends On Your Wants Or Preference

Windows 3.0 running under PCEM. PCEM is emulating a PC-AT clone with a AMD 386 processor running at 40Mhz. The configuration also has 8MB's of RAM and a Tseng ET4k SVGA adapter. The Windows 3.1 video drivers for the Tseng ET4k work under 3.0, which is what is shown in the screenshot. Windows is running at a resolution of 800 by 600, 256 colors.

Establishing Context

The IBM Model 5150 PC was introduced on August 1981. The world would never be the same again. While heavily influenced by the Apple II, the PC would build its own legacy that continues to define us today. PC gamers rejoice at the endless opportunities of expansion in the form of graphics GPU's while the PC continues to reign supreme in office productivity. While in more recent years, desktop computers haven't been as relevant due to the rise of smartphones and tablets, they're no were near obsolete. If anything, PC gaming is actually more relevant than ever before as the price point of building a powerful gaming rigs keeps falling in price, lowering the entry barrier. This is where one is reminded that the term "Post-PC" is a empty marketing term invented by Apple to sell iPads. (I'm going to do a separate article about this garbage/junk term in the future)

With that noted, there have been various incarnations of the PC platform as well. This would be expected when dealing with a platform that has been around since 1981, when the Apple II's still reigned supreme and home gamers were playing awesome titles on the C64. Yet, 16-bit processors became 32 and then 64 bit CPU's. We went from a base 16 kilobyte configuration offered by IBM in the Model 5150 to 32 and 64 gigabyte offerings that are becoming very common today.

The Birth Of Awesome! The IBM Model 5150 aka "The IBM PC" would define computing to this day.

When dealing with a platform with such a long and continuous history, there is a massive software library. A library includes various OS's and applications running under those OS's. The PC platform would have become a empty footnote in history if it wasn't for Lotus 123 putting the computers in millions of corporate offices around the world. The PC platform would have been forgotten if Tandy didn't make a low-cost IBM Compatible that allowed home users to upgrade from the 8-bit platforms like the C64. MS-DOS would reign supreme on these machines. As the processing and graphical capabilities of such machines improved, them GUI environments would become the norm. 386 and 486 processors brought Windows to the forefront. While IBM's OS/2 would compete with it, that platform would eventually fail in the marketplace. Despite this, the PC would find its way into the home setting to become an appliance like the toaster or TV. The PC would become that item that someone would keep until it failed, and then go out and buy another one.

Lotus 123 running under PCE-IBMPC. PCE is emulating a IBM PC/XT.

One area where PC's went from the laughing stock to the forefront was in the field of gaming. The IBM PC introduced the CGA standard, which paled in comparison to the graphics capabilities of the C64. The EGA graphics standard, while a vast improvement, was designed mostly for business applications and GUI environments in mind, not games. It wasn't until the early 90's with VGA graphics and that 486 processor that PC users could experience what gamers on platforms like the Commodore Amiga have been used too.

One day, two Johns, Carmack and Romero, released Doom on the PC. In the course of that one day, PC's went from being boring business computers to being on the cutting edge of gaming. Those on the gaming consoles and Amiga's that made fun of the IBM Compatibles now looked on with envy as PC users were blasting away demons using high-powered shotguns. The deathmatch started and the PC would show no mercy! That march of progress only continued with Quake 1-3 along with new games like Half-Life and Unreal Tournament. 3D acceleration would dominate PC gaming. The legacy continued with Doom 3, HL2/Counter-Strike source, F.E.A.R. Halo would be embraced by those that viewed the XBox as a magical unicorn crapping golden turds, while PC gamers roll there eyes while saying "whatever". Both consoles and PC users would eventually give in to Unreal Tournament for Adolescent Children.... I meant Fortnite.

Another place where PC's went from insignificant afterthought to dominating platform was the server room. When the IBM PC was introduced, it was a micro-computer comparable to the Apple II, commodore Vic-20 and later C64, Atari 800, and the TI-99 home computer. It didn't hold a candle to the powerful workstations and minicomputers in there day like the DEC VAX mini-computer running the either Ultrix (DEC Unix) or VMS (Created by software engineer Dave Cutler, who would later create Windows NT). No one spoke about PC Compatibles and the HP/DEC/IBM/Sun workstations in the same sentence. "They're out of my league" as one would be tempted to say .

However the PC could connect to such workstations using terminal software. By the early 90's, the PC's were becoming more respected in the server room as low-cost alternatives to the powerful servers made by Sun, HP, DEC, and IBM. Low-cost meant low-regarded by those who had the privilege of using the high-end, proprietary UNIX workstations. The UNIX OS running on these systems could run circles around OS/2. MS-DOS wasn't even a thought for those running a server in the corporate environment. ("Wait, you want to run a single-tasking, single user OS as a server platform! Get the hell out of here!). MS-DOS would never gain any traction in this area. However, Dave Cutler, dissatisfied with DEC, left the company and joined Microsoft. The software expert who designed powerful multi-user, multi-threading, multitasking operating systems would now build one for Microsoft. His creation, Windows NT, is still the basis for millions upon millions of computers the world a few decades after it was conceived. The rock-solid foundation of NT would become highly regarded for those who use it.

While NT gave proprietary UNIX systems a run for there money, Linus Trovald would release his creation to the world that would be even a bigger contributor to PC's in the server room than anything Microsoft has done, both past and present. The computer science student enrolled at the University of Helsinki in Finland wanted to use UNIX. However, there wasn't a free alternative to UNIX, as expensive license fees dictated by AT&T, who owned it at the time, robbed him of the opportunity to use it. Linus, decided to write his own open-source alternative to UNIX and share his creation online for developers around the world over to contribute. Called Linux, this OS would propel high-end PC's into server rooms to replace the high-end, proprietary offerings from various companies. One didn't need ultra-expensive and unique hardware when one could resort to building a server from commodity parts. The PC would reign supreme in the server room.

The Various Compatibles

Since the PC platform has been around for a long time now, there are different families of PC's that have become a thing over the years. They include the following:

The PC/XT Compatibles - Introduced with the Model 5150 PC in August 1981, they're mostly 8-bit computers with a 16-bit processor in the form of the Intel 8088. This CPU is a 16-bit processor, but can operate on a 8-bit motherboard. Making 8-bit motherboards were a much more affordable alternative than making a 16-bit one in 1981. Due to the memory mapping assignments on the XT machines, the most amount of memory that these computers could use was 640KB of RAM (768KB in some systems, like those from Tandy). Some XT machines, like the AT&T PC 6300/Olivetti M24, were true 16-bit computers utilizing the Intel 8086 processor, which was a complete 16-bit CPU. These computer used 8-bit expansion slots for adding new peripheral devices. While CPM-86 was originally offered alongside MS-DOS, DOS would quickly become the gold standard OS on these machines. This was helped by the fact that Lotus 123 was written to run on DOS. While not that user friendly due to it being a text-based, command-line OS, one has to remember that these computers were quite limited by the hardware of the day. Running GUI environment would have been a marathon task for these computers. The character-based applications would win out. Many of these PCs shipped with the CGA (Color Graphics Adapter) adapter, which was rapidly embraced by game developers despite it's very limited capabilities (320 by 200, 4 colors on screen out of 16). Later builds conformed to EGA graphics, and then VGA by the early 90's. This was right before the XT platform faced its demise though. IBM also introduced the MDA (Monochrome Display Adapter) adapter for text-based applications. There were no graphics modes for this adapter whatsoever. However, this adapter was praised for its sharp rendering of text on the screen, which was of much higher quality compared to the text fonts in the CGA adapter.

Ford Simulator running in PCEM. This game utilized the CGA graphics capabilities of PC's at the time.

The PC/AT Compatibles - Introduced in 1984 with the IBM PC/AT. This platform had a complete 16-bit board and used the Intel 286 processor. This was also the platform that introduced the EGA graphics standard. These family of computers introduced ISA expansion slots, which is essentially a 16-bit expansion of the 8-bit slots used in the XT-clones. Due the motherboard, CPU, and BIOS capabilities, these computers could use a lot more memory than the XT-class machines. The 286 computers typically maxed out at 16MB's of RAM. Later on, AT motherboards started to accommodate the 32-bit Intel 386 processor. Compaq beat IBM to the market with a 386 desktop computer, the DeskPro, in 1986. As time went by, VGA graphics would become the standard on the PC's. A hardware arms race would eventually define the platform as these PC users typically became early adopters of new hardware like the Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audio Adapter, VGA graphics, and various network adapters. Most of these machines ran DOS. However, they were capable of running IBM's OS/2 as well. When introduced, they were well beyond the price point of a typical home buyer. As such, these computers were mostly found in the corporate setting running applications like Lotus 123 and WordPerfect. By The early 90s, these computers became more common in the home setting.

The IBM PS/2 Family of Computers - From a software perspective, there was nothing unique to these computers that couldn't be done on a standard clone. While the standard introduced VGA, it quickly got backported for the AT-class computers, along with the mouse and keyboard connectors. These family of computers used the proprietary, 32-bit MCA (Micro-channel Architecture) bus slots for expansion. The IBM PS/2 used both 286 and 386 processors. The PS/2 failed mainly due to poor marketing, prices, and general rejection by the PC community as the PS/2 was IBM's attempt at introducing a propriety PC platform. I covered the PS/2 family of computers in a series of articles. On one hand, I'm glad that I visited these computers, but on the other hand, I could understand why they failed in the marketplace. Despite that, the keyboard and mouse connectors, along with VGA, would become a standard on most motherboards for several years to come.

IBM's OS/2 Version 1.2 running PCEM. PCEM is emulating a IBM PS/2 Model 55SX with a 33Mhz Intel 386 processor and 4MB's of RAM.

The MPC's (Multimedia Personal Computers) - AT-class machines that incorporated VGA/SVGA graphics, SoundBlaster Audio Adapters, and the Intel 386 and 486 processors. When it came to SVGA video adapters, the market was dominated by Tseng and Trident in the early/middle 90's, with Cirrus Logic and S3 dominating it in the middle/late 90's. Many of the video adapters supported the VESA video standard which allowed a universal standard for high-resolution graphics in DOS programs. Game developers rapidly embraced VESA. It was during the MPC era that DOS gaming exploded (no pun intended) with Doom. By this point, Windows was much more prominent as well, as computers now had the computing power to drive such environments without (much) sacrifice. Windows expanded the capabilities of these computer as well by bringing multimedia to the forefront. Many of these computers came with CD-ROM drives. If one wanted to listen to the Beatles on there computer, then it was now possible. Windows 3.1 was the standard version of Windows during this time. Windows gaming gained prominence as many would find joy with titles like Civ2 and SimCity 2k.

The ATX/PCI-based compatibles - Referred to ATX due to these computers using a updated (extended) update to the PC/AT specifications that allowed the use of the universal PCI (Peripheral Component Interconnect) slot created by Intel, along with a new power supply standard. The PCI slot was a 32-bit bus that supported plug-in-play. Theoretically, the OS would automatically detect the card, and set itself according to the device in the slot. Previous cards required jumper setting to be adjusted according to the slot that they were plugged into. Most of these motherboards still incorporated the ISA slots for backward compatibility with previous adapters. However, these boards would incorporated the latest 32-bit Intel Pentium processor. 3D gaming accelerators started to show up for the first time during this time with the 3DFX Voodoo. Quake dominated the scene at the start, with Half-Life, Unreal Tournament later following suit to the chase the hearts and minds of PC gamers. Windows 95 and 98 were the common versions of Windows during this time. Later ATX boards incorporated a AGP (Accelerator Graphics Port) for supported video accelerators.

The "Modern" PC - A updated revision of the ATX platform that allows the use of high-speed PCI express adapters via its expansion slot. There are different PCI express slots. the 1x slot is though mostly designed for audio adapters and other devices like TV tuners, while the 16x slot is designed for the video accelerator. This standard incorporates multi-core processors that support both 32-bit and 64-bit operating systems. the primary versions of Windows used started with XP and continue today with Windows 10. 3D accelerated games went from being the niche to the norm as GPU's became much more prominent. One quickly became exposed to the joys that became Doom 3, Half-Life 2/Counter-Strike Source, F.E.A.R, FarCry, and Crysis.

Articles Of Interest (Establishing Context)

Articles Of Interest (The Various Compatibles)

The Independent Kixmiller Pigeon MrkII

A "Brief" Synopsis of PC Emulators and Virtualization Programs (Part 1)

What's The Best Emulator/Virtualizer Depends On Your Wants Or Preference

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