Jonathan Hutchins wrote:
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: Jason Clinton [mailto:clintonj@umkc.edu]
> 
> 
>>Win 9x is just a new graphical core over the top of MS-DOS 
>>6/7. 
> 
> 
> Um, no, not right at all.  3x was a GUI over an OS like XWindows over Linux,
> but W9x provides an additional layer of program functions, not just API's
> for the GUI.  There is a DOS compatibility mode available, but true 9x
> programs will not run without the full 9x system loaded.  Microsoft refers
> to the 9x extensions as "32 bit mode", which is not an accurate distinction
> but provides a clue about what's happening.

32bit protected mode (A.K.A. EMM386) with is basically a graphical 
kernel with a ton of direct memmory mapped calls that run through the 
MS-DOS core to the hardware and back again. Up until Win98 first-edition 
you could shutdown the graphical side and return to DOS without 
rebooting. Win98 SE changed that (but not many people had Second Edition 
-- it was OEM only).

So, if you're in one of those systems, like I said before, just click 
shutdown and "Restart in MS-DOS Mode" and the computer will dump the 
Win9x kernel and return to DOS w/o rebooting. If, however, you have 
entries in your msdos.cfg file in C:WindowsSystem, the system will 
reboot to load the contents of that file in the MS-DOS environment. 
(Things like MSCDEX and your ATAPI Cd-ROM driver).

> 
> Last time I looked, the Linux Loader for W9x forced a reboot to DOS mode -
> clearly not necessary if what you say were true - but it may have advanced
> since then.
> 

Forcing a reboot to MS-DOS mode was the safest way since Microsoft could 
never guarentee in anyway that the Win9x kernel would shutdown properly 
and return control to the MS-DOS prompt.