Copyright (C) 1986-2008 by Daniel H. Hudgins, All Rights Reserved.
No part of "This Web Site" (HTML document), including associated files, may be: distributed, sublicensed, transmitted, copied, archived, mirrored, modified, bundled, embedded, sold, given away, rented, loaned, or shared in any form without express written permission in a formal Vendor agreement contract dated and signed in ink obtained directly from Daniel H. Hudgins by registered postal mail. All agreements for permission to distribute expire after a period no greater than one year from the date of the signing of the agreement by Daniel H. Hudgins. See the current "EULA" for information regarding limited copying and storage for the purpose of "Beta Testing" "This Web Site."
To view or use the current version of this Web page you may need to reload or refresh the display of this page by your browser. Just clicking on the browser's [Reload] or [Refresh] icon may not be enough to insure that all of the page's most current contents have been cached and displayed. Some browsers may have additional commands to help display the page's most current contents such as: holding down the [Shift] key and clicking on the [Reload] icon, holding down the [Control] key and clicking on the [Refresh] icon, holding down the [Control] and [Shift] keys and clicking on the [Refresh] icon, pressing the [Control] and [F5] keys, pressing [Control] and the [R] key, or some other combination of keys or clicks. Check to see which commands your HTML browser uses to load the most current page contents into its cache and then to display them onto the screen.
This Web site is dedicated to the thousands of "users" of my programs, those who have helped test my programs over the last 22 or so years, and especially those who shared their experiences with me.
You must read this notice: This is a licensed Web site (HTML document and associated files). You must read and agree to be legally bound in contract by the Terms of Use and conditions given in the End User License Agreement ("EULA"), Legal Notices, Instructions, Warnings, Disclaimers, and all other text in "SECTION: 0" of "This Web Site" (HTML document and associated files) before reading or using any of the information, software programs, and or files, contained in, linked to, and or associated with, "This Web Site" (HTML document and associated files). Any use or "Beta Testing" of "This Web Site" constitutes your acknowledgment of your full agreement with the current End User License Agreement ("EULA") and your decision to have this current license supersede all prior and contemporaneous agreements and understandings. Information and files in "This Web Site" (HTML document and associated files) have been placed here so that long time users of "The Author's" programs DANCAD3D.COM (tm) , DANCAM.EXE (tm) , or DANPLOT.EXE (tm) could help proofread the text of the documentation files or screens displayed, and also help test data files, example files, and or any software programs that might be made available from time to time, to aid "The Author" in finding mistakes, bugs, and other errors, omissions, defects, mistakes, and faults. Everything in "This Web Site" (HTML document and associated files) is "Beta Test", "Beta Code", Experimental, Preliminary, requires proofreading, or is being evaluated for possible revision, and is NOT warranted to be free of defect. To help "The Author" report any bugs, foul-ups, defects, or mistakes that you find, see "SECTION: 8" for instructions. "This Web Site" (HTML document and associated files) and all other files and programs by Daniel H. Hudgins are made available "AS IS" without warranty of any kind express, expressed, or implied. All offers and specifications are subject to change or discontinuation without notice of any kind. Please read "SECTION: 8" of "This Web Site" (HTML document and associated files) before trying to contact "The Author."
The text in this section has been revised to include some of the developments for a revision of version v2.7B, program versions, updates, or revisions prior or subsequent may work differently and so what is stated here may not apply to the particular version, update, or revision you might have, i.e. those other versions. The documentation is only generally descriptive of the programs, you should check the operation of each particular program that you will be "Beta Testing" since operation of the programs is subject to change without notice.
This HTML documentation section has documentation mostly about my CAD programs DANCAD3D.COM (tm) and DANCAD87.COM (tm). Most the discussion about DANCAD3D.COM (tm) also applies to "Beta Testing" DANCAD87.COM (tm), the math co- processor version, as well, except for some differences in some of the files saved and the need for a math co-processor. See also the other documentation in this Web site for additional information, particularly the CAM program documentation and the supplemental documentation, tutorials, and appendices. The disclaimer, and most of the other legal text is currently located in SECTION: 0, therefore you must read the disclaimer, End User License Agreement (EULA), legal text and other text in SECTION: 0 before you read any of the other documentation or use any part of this HTML document, this section, or associated files and programs.
I may expand or revise the documentation someday, so check back from time to time to see if any new or revised files have been up-loaded to the Web site.
You may not distribute, sell, rent, share, or give away these HTML documentation files or printed copies of them. You may not extract text from these HTML documentation files for distribution, sale, rent, sharing, or giving away. You can use the [Print] option in your browser to make one copy for yourself to mark up in order to help me proofread the text for mistakes.
Documents may be available to download from time to time, you can check SECTION: 9 to see what the current situation with regard to downloadable files is. The names of these documentation files may change, and they may be edited, combined, or eliminated in the future, without notice.
You may need to adjust your browser for best viewing of the pre- formatted text by changing the "font" size using the commands in your browser (see the help in your browser, or use the pull-down menus in your HTML browser.) If some letters in words on the screen appear to be missing or scrambled try changing the font size in your browser as this sometimes happens even though the words are spelled correctly in the HTML code.
Use the "Edit, Find in page Ctrl+F" or "Edit, Find (in this page)... Ctrl+F" command in your browser to search for keywords within the documentation text in this HTML page. You will need to search over again in the other pages in this HTML document for the same keyword since your browser may not search for a keyword beyond the current page that is loaded.
DANCAD3D (tm) v2.7 may run on some IBM XT (tm), AT (tm), or PS/2 (tm) compatible computers. DANCAD3D (tm) requires about 540KB to 640KB of DOS system memory depending on the version and display mode selected. DANCAD3D (tm) requires a harddisk, with from 10MB to 2.1GB of free disk space needed depending on which commands are being used.
In addition to the requirements of DANCAD3D (tm) the math co-processor version DANCAD87 (tm) requires that a math co- processor be installed, or the computer have a processor with a built in math co-processor. The math co-processor version of my CAD program may or may not run faster for any given application, it depends on your computer's hardware and what commands you are using.
Steps to set-up your computer for the CAD programs:
Check that you have more than about 540KB system memory free. Use the DOS external command CHKDSK to check the amount of free DOS main memory. Do not confuse the free RAM memory with the free bytes on your harddisk! You will also need more than 10MB or more free space on your harddisk to allow temporary files to be created while DANCAD3D (tm) runs.
Check that your DOS mouse driver is installed.
Check that you have put the DOS MODE command in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file to set up your serial ports (if needed.)
Make a directory on your harddisk for my programs to run in, e.g. MD C:\DC27
Download or copy the DANCAD3D.ZIP (tm) file into the sub- directory and unzip all of the files into the sub-directory.
Scan all of the files in the sub-directory for virus or other infection or problems.
Before you run DANCAD3D (tm), or any of my other programs, on your harddisk the first time run the batch file INSTALL.BAT and read the installation instructions. INSTALL.BAT makes some required sub- directories, and copies some files into those sub-directories, so you need to run it before you can use the programs, since the programs expect some files to be in specific sub-directories off of the directory the program files are in.
Set your video board to CGA, Hercules (tm), EGA, VGA, or SVGA video mode, according to your monitor type, and video board operation. Normally the programs start from 80 by 25 color or monochrome text mode. Your video board may have jumpers or DIP switches that need to be set, see your video board manual for information. Do not select video modes that your video board or monitor will not display properly. Do not select video modes that your monitor will not sync on, some of the higher resolution SVGA modes may require sweep rates faster than your monitor can operate at.
Run DANCAD3D (tm) or DANCAD87 (tm) and pick the current video mode you have set the video board to. Do not pick a video mode that your monitor and video board are not set up to do or you may damage one of them. If you video monitor loses sync when you run any of my programs turn the monitor off immediately, and reinstall my programs from the beginning being careful to only select modes that your monitor can display.
If you are using a printer port other than LPT1 you will need to change the printer port in the printer driver you are using to the port that your printer is on. If you need to use one of the COMx ports for your printer, use the DOS MODE command before you run my programs to set up the serial port, you can put MODE in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file to set up the serial port each time you boot your computer.
The choice of computer hardware to use with DANCAD3D (tm) or DANCAD87 (tm) makes a significant impact on the ease and efficiency with which you will be able to use the program. In general the faster your computer the easier you will find using the CAD programs. If you are doing batch work from a running macro, a somewhat slower computer may be usable. My CAM programs can be used on older junk computers, depending on your speed requirements. Version 2.7 of my CAM programs has an adjustment to allow operation on faster computers, an so may work on a wide range of computer speeds.
MINIMUM HARDWARE REQUIREMENTS FOR DANCAD3D.COM (tm) v2.7:
COMPUTER......100% IBM XT or AT compatible.
OS............DOS v2.1 required, DOS v3.21 to DOS v6.22 recommended.
Under Windows 95 (tm) the v2.7 CAD programs can be run
in the DOS shell, so long as only one copy is run in the
program sub-directory at a time. The CAM programs may
need to be run under DOS v6.22 or "DOS 95" floppy boot-
disk.
MEMORY........640KB DOS memory. DANCAD3D (tm) v2.7 moves drawing
information onto your harddisk automatically when the
drawing workspace fills up to allow you to work on
drawings larger than your computer's RAM memory. For
DANCAD3D (tm) v2.7 to work you need to have about 8MB to
2GB free on your harddisk, so DANCAD3D (tm) can move
drawing data out of RAM & onto the harddisk as needed.
If you use a memory manager be sure that you do not
reassign the video memory addresses for other uses since
DANCAD3D (tm) requires memory addresses to be as they
were defined for the IBM XT & AT. Versions subsequent
to v2.7 may eventually require more than 640KB of
memory. If you run Windows 95 (tm) or make a RAM disk
above your DOS 640MB you should probably have 16MB to
64MB or more total RAM memory installed.
VIDEO.........CGA video graphics 640 by 200 pixels up to 4 colors.
MGC or Hercules graphics 720 by 348 pixels mono only.
EGA video graphics 640 by 350 pixels up to 16 colors.
VGA video graphics 640 by 480 pixels up to 16 colors,
and 320 by 200 pixels 256 palette mode up to 16 colors.
SVGA VESA video graphics up to 1600 by 1200 pixels and
256 palette mode of tones in up to 16 colors. Some VESA
compatible SVGA cards that fit into the ISA or PCI bus
slot may work, but some newer SVGA cards may not work,
or may need a VESA BIOS emulator, test the video board
with my programs before purchasing it since some video
boards may not work properly with my programs, or may
not have the required VESA BIOS options. The supported
VESA SVGA video modes generally do not require more than
4MB of video memory, except perhaps for some scan rates
on some monitors, so you probably do not need a video
board with more than 4MB to 8MB of video memory for use
with my programs. SVGA VESA modes for 1600 by 1200 may
not work on some video boards, or only some of the modes
will work, or your monitor may not sync to all the modes
that the video board will work with.
DISKS.........A 10MB to 8.4GB HARDDISK is required to use the CAD
programs. A floppy disk, modem, or CD-ROM may be
required to install the programs and associated files.
The CAM programs may be able to be run on a one or two
floppy system with no harddisk, depending on the size of
the tool path file or use of the CAM network.
PRINTER.......EPSON compatible with MX-80, LX-80, FX-286, or LQ-1500
Wide carriage dot matrix printers with EPSON type codes
IBM compatible with 5125, GRAPHICS PRINTER, PRO-PRINTER
STAR compatible with SG15X or SG10X
PostScript compatible laser printer
Linotronic 300 photo imagesetter
HPGL/2 code compatible laser printer
HP-PCL code ink jet and laser printer
LaserJet II compatible laser printers
LaserJet III compatible laser printer
Several types of Pen Plotter may also be able to be used.
Other printers may be able to be used to print drawings
in color, gray tones, or line art by saving a BMP file,
and then using a Windows (tm) program that has a driver
for your printer model installed.
In addition to the minimum hardware you will probably want some additional hardware to help get things done.
SUPPLEMENTAL EQUIPMENT FOR DANCAD3D (tm) v2.7:
MOUSE.........The CAD and CAM programs now use the mouse for many of
the menus and command prompts. For DOS 6.22 use you
might employ a good 3 button mouse if you currently have
a 3 button mouse now. Some cheep 3 button mice have a
center button, or button driver, that may not work
properly with my programs. For use under Windows 95
(tm) a 2 button mouse might be used, since you may find
that the three button mice may not work properly with
respect to the center button's functions within my
programs. When the center mouse button will not work,
you can use the equivalent keyboard key command.
CPU...........DANCAD3D (tm) v2.7 and DANCAD87 (tm) v2.7 may best be
used on computers with a clock speed of 733MHz. You
could also use an 80486 to PIII micro processor. Some
computers faster than 66MHz may not work properly with
older versions of DANCAD3D (tm) or my other programs, so
you may need to use an older computer depending on the
version of my programs you are trying to use. DANCAD3D
(tm) v2.7 may run on some 8088 XT type computers, but
the commands will take a very long time to act, so any
computer slower than a 80286 or 80386 may not be
practical. The maximum computer speed for v2.7 has not
been determined as of writing this, so anything faster
than 733MHz may present issues not yet observed.
PRINTER.......If you are going to buy a new printer you might consider
purchasing a laser printer. v2.7 supports the LaserJet
II type as well as PostScript type laser printers for
monochrome printing. PostScript or HPGL/2 compatible
printers might be faster than HP-PCL code printers for
some kinds of printing. If you want to print color or
shaded gray scale drawings, and you are using Windows 95
(tm) you might be able to save drawings from my programs
as BMP drawing files from the main menu Preview command
using one of the VGA or SVGA 16 or 256 palette video
modes for the color or monochrome display modes, then
load the BMP file into a windows graphics program such
as MSPaint (tm) and print the color drawing that way.
The quality of color printing would depend on the
windows driver installed for your printer and other
factors external to my programs, since my CAD programs
only directly support color plotting on pen plotters.
Do not convert BMP color or gray scale drawings to
compressed formats such as JPG or GIF before printing
them since the image may be degraded somewhat, the BMP
file as saved by my programs saves each unique pixel
individually without compression losses.
HARDDISK......A 7200RPM or faster harddisk with an access time of less
than 9ms may be desirable for use with my programs.
Slow stepper motor harddisks might make the program work
very sluggishly since the overlay files or animation
frames may need to be accessed frequently. You should
also use a harddisk optimizing program like DOS DEFRAG
to de-fragment the files on your harddisk at least once
a week in order to have DANCAD3D (tm) run well. A
program like the DOS SMARTDRV utility might help
DANCAD3D (tm) load its overlay files faster. Newer IDE
7200RPM harddisks can be used, but some may have an
automatic "sleep" mode that may cause some issues when
the CAM programs are used, or when you are making
computer animation in a film recorder. The newer drives
may go into head park and stop the disk after a few
minutes of inactivity, then momentarily lock up the
system when you make a request to the disk so that the
disk can spin-up to operational speed again.
DIGITIZER.....DANCAD3D (tm) v2.6 and v2.7 may work with a CALCOMP
"Drawing board II" (tm) type digitizer tablet for
drawing to draw and trace drawings. The digitizer
driver and accessory program versions may effect if the
tablet works or does not work with my programs.
SCANNER.......If you can use the software that came with your scanner
to make a BMP file in, 1 bpp line art, 8 bpp 256 palette
mode gray tone, or or 8 bpp 256 palette mode color type,
you may be able to load scanned images into my CAD
programs in various ways. The BMP file can be converted
into a Pixel file that can be used with the drawing
editor's manual trace command, automatic tracing can be
done with the JET TRACE command, or the image can be
converted into a tool path file or triangle surface
element. DANPLOT.EXE (tm) can be used to build a
scanner that can scan "life size" objects, or scan using
properties other than light values, and through my CAD
programs make a BMP file that can be used like a BMP
file made on any other scanner. Some commands in my CAD
programs require that the BMP file be cropped to the
correct pixel size before being saved for loading into
my programs, you might be able to use the graphics
software that came with your scanner to crop or re-size
your images to the right size.
DANCAD3D (tm) v2.7 and DANCAD87 (tm) v2.7 work on some of the video modes used in XT, AT compatible computers. Some VESA type SVGA video boards support one or more of these video modes. The modes available to pick from are listed in the video board menu that comes up when you run the CAD program for the first time, or when you select the [V]ideo menu from the title screen pop-up menu.
VIDEO TYPE TEXT DRAWING SCREEN PREVIEW DISPLAY SCREEN
C = CGA COLOR COLOR 640x200x2 640x200x2 or 320x200x4
B = CGA B&W MONOCHROME 640x200x2 640x200x2 or 320x200x4
H = HERCULES MONOCHROME 720x348x2 720x348x2
E = EGA COLOR COLOR 640x350x2 640x350x2 or 640x350x16
M = EGA MONO MONOCHROME 640x350x2 640x350x2
D = EGA COLOR COLOR 640x350x16 640x350x2 or 640x350x16
V = VGA COLOR COLOR 640x480x16 320x200x256 or
640x350x2 or 640x350x16
L = VGA MONO MONOCHROME 640x480x2 640x350x2
S = SVGA COLOR COLOR 640x480x16 320x200x256 or
640x350x2 or 640x350x16 or
800x600x16 or 800x600x256 or
1024x768x16 or 1024x768x256 or
1280x1024x16 or 1280x1024x256 or
1600x1200x16 or 1600x1200x256
All of the SVGA video modes may not work on some video boards, modes up to 1280 by 1024 may work all right if you have enough memory in your video board (4MB-8MB) and your monitor can sync at that speed, but the 1600 by 1200 mode may not be supported by your video BIOS, or the video BIOS version you have may not work properly with my programs. Also the 16 palette mode color modes may not work, but the 256 palette mode color modes will, or the other way around, due to issues with the video BIOS revision used in your video board or other version revision and hardware issues. You should not select modes that cause your monitor to go out of sync.
When a monochrome monitor is used, any colors to be displayed are sometimes displayed as gray tones, depending of the video mode selected. The 16 palette mode gray scale display modes are expanded by dithering to try to give the appearance of a smoother gray scale, so the solid shaded hidden line display modes may look better on the 16 palette mode gray scale modes than on the 16 palette mode color modes. The 256 palette mode gray tone modes may also look smoother than the 256 palette mode color tone modes, although both use dithering to try to smooth the tone gradation.
If you have an video board that supports several video or monitor modes, you should set the video board's operational mode to the mode you wish to use before you run DANCAD3D (tm). Normally my programs start from DOS in color or mono 80 by 25 text mode. To change the video mode for DANCAD3D (tm) that you wish it to be working with select [V]ideo, by pressing [V], from the small menu that comes up over the title screen when you run the program (press [Return] once when the title screen comes up to get this menu, if you press [Return] twice you will bypass this menu, and go to the program's main menu). Keep in mind that Pixel type files cannot be exchanged between video modes, so you should decide on one video mode, or board type, and stick with that mode for a particular animation Pixel file set.
It may be possible to select running using the CGA or EGA video modes on some VGA or SVGA video cards, but the Hercules (tm) 720 by 348 monochrome graphics mode should only be used on monochrome graphics cards that support that mode. Most, or nearly all, CGA, EGA, VGA, and SVGA cards do not support the 720 by 348 monochrome graphics mode, so never try to use the Hercules (tm) mode on your CGA, EGA, VGA, or SVGA card!
One model of ATI Wonder (tm) brand video board might let you output a composite video in some of the video modes DANCAD3D (tm) supports. Some older CGA compatible video boards might put out a composite video signal through a RCA jack on the back of the card next to the DB-9 monitor connector. There may also be SVGA to composite video converters that plug into your video board where the monitor cable normally plugs in. Such a composite video signal can sometimes be recorded on a NTSC VCR. Such a video board or signal converter may let you video tape animations made with DANCAD3D (tm) by using the [A]nimate command to display the animation on your NTSC TV screen. If you play such a video tape into a video encoding device on your computer you might be able to make an *.AVI or *.MPG MPEG1 or MPEG2 video file of a computer animation. Such a video file might then be used to make a Video-CD or DVD disk of an animation.
One of the more important revisions to the CAD and CAM programs has been the addition of color graphic display modes. Some of the new modes work on regular VGA video cards, but the higher resolutions displayed in the CAD programs require a SVGA VESA v1.2 or v2.0 compatible video card. Some older EGA and VGA boards may present issues with some program features used by those modes but the EGA and VGA modes seem to work on many boards.
Many SVGA video cards made for 80486 computers supported SVGA VESA modes that are compatible with my programs in their present state of development, but some newer video cards may lack the VESA BIOS, or may have their bus arranged to only work under Windows (tm) and not DOS.
I have tried several video cards and all that I have work in some modes with my programs, but they are the type of card that seem to be compatible with DOS software.
Video cards that are not compatible because they lack the on board video BIOS may be able to be used if a TSR program is run before my programs to load a software BIOS substitute for the hardware BIOS, but although I have seen some notes on Web sites of video board manufactures making references to various downloads, I do not have those video boards, and cannot tell if such software would be compatible with my programs.
I have tested some PCI bus video cards that state that they work with DOS software, and found that video modes up to 1280x1024 seem to work, but some did not seem to support 1600x1200 in the VESA modes. Which VESA modes are supported by video boards seems to vary from one chip set to another.
The boards that seem to work are generally the cheep ones, including some that are from the China area. You may be able to get a used ISA, VLB, or PCI video board cheep and find that it works better with my programs than newer video boards.
You generally do not need more than 4MB or 8MB of memory on the video board for the VESA modes. If you are not going to use the highest resolution modes then a video board with 1MB or 2MB might work.
Color display modes for EGA boards, as well as regular VGA boards may also work on an SVGA board. The CGA and Hercules (tm) monochrome graphics are still supported, so if your fancy new video board does not support my programs, you might be able to stick in some old board you have laying around and still make use of my programs graphic displays.
The main video boards that I have been testing v2.7 with seem to use the "SiS 6326" graphic accelerator chip, although I do not make special calls to that chip. I have tried the programs with another board that seems to use the "Trident Blade3D 9880" chip set, which seemed to work in at least some modes. All three of these boards use the PCI bus. I also have tried an older SVGA Genoa board that seems to use a "Cirrus Logic CL-GD5428-" chip. You might try one of these if you have some extra video boards laying around.
Even if your video board supports the needed modes, your monitor will probably not. Mostly only new monitors in the larger sizes support 1600x1200 resolution, so if you try to use those modes on an older monitor it will go out of sync and you will not be able to see what is on the screen to enter commands. Also it may not be healthy for your monitor to be out of sync, it might over heat or burn out. So only select display modes that both your video board and your monitor support properly.
You can check the amount of free system memory your computer system has with the DOS CHKDSK command. Do not confuse the amount of bytes free on your harddisk with the amount of DOS system RAM memory free! The DOS command CHKDSK is external and comes on your OS system disks.
EXAMPLE: C>C:\DOS\CHKDSK
If you have 1MB or more RAM in your computer and the free RAM reads less then 655360 bytes total you should check the computer's instruction book about how to install the computer for 640K of system memory. You will probably have to take the cover off and set the memory jumper to the 640KB position, then run setup and tell setup you have 640KB of system memory and 0K of expanded memory. Some older AT computers had the memory jumper set to the 512KB/512KB memory split, change that to the 640KB/0KB or 640KB/384KB memory option.
Terminate and stay resident, also known as TSR, computer programs use up some of your computers free memory. DOS also uses up some of the system RAM memory. Although DANCAD3D (tm) v2.7 can work with variable amounts of free RAM since v2.7 swaps data onto your harddisk, best performance will come with the maximum RAM free. The programs will not work properly if there is not enough memory free, so free as much as is possible. NEVER use that little (TSR) program that puts a clock in the corner of the computer screen while running any of my programs and especially the CAM programs DANCAM.EXE (tm) and DANPLOT.EXE (tm).
You may need to edit your AUTOEXEC.BAT or CONFIG.SYS files to remove some drivers or other programs to free up memory. You may need to reduce the FILES=20 and BUFFERS=20 values to free up more memory. Be sure that you save the files back to your disk before you re-boot your computer.
DANCAD3D (tm) and DANCAD87 (tm) can work with drawings larger than 640KB of DOS memory since they automatically create a "virtual memory" workspace file on your harddisk. When you work on different parts of a large drawing DANCAD3D (tm) automatically tries to load the proper part of the drawing into the available RAM memory. In general the larger the amount of free RAM the less often the program will need to swap data to and from the harddisk "virtual memory" file. Drawing files of about 512MB (12 million line segments or 6 million triangles) or more should be able to be edited if you have more than 2GB free in each of two partitions on your harddisk, and you set up the "workspace" file to use a drive partition other than the one the CAD program is in, e.g. have system files in partition C:, have the CAD program files in partition D:, and use partition E: for the workspace swap file.
You should always exit, i.e. [Q]uit, DANCAD3D (tm) back to the DOS prompt before turning your computer off, or closing the DOS window. If DANCAD3D (tm) crashes (see also Section 8 regarding bug reports), or you have a power failure while DANCAD3D (tm) is running you should use the DOS CHKDSK command or the system SCANDISK command to recover any lost clusters on your harddisk before running any programs. Usually no real harm to your system comes from lost clusters, except for the lost data that was in the files that where not closed properly, but the lost clusters use up disk space and might sometimes result in lost data if files get cross linked or are overwritten. Getting lost clusters is not unique to DANCAD3D (tm) since turning off your computer while some file is open for writing may result in lost clusters. When you run CHKDSK or SCANDISK the lost clusters on your harddisk may be converted into files named FILE????.CHK. You need to delete the FILE????.CHK files before you can recover the lost disk space. You might prefer using the DOS 6.22 or Windows 95 (tm) command SCANDISK over CHKDSK to try to repair your disk after a crash, or bad power down, since SCANDISK can test for some disk faults. Do not use disk utilities from different OS versions on your disk, since you may damage the FAT or other data on your harddisk, use the utilities of the same or recommended version the harddisk is formatted in and boots with.
EXAMPLE: C>C:\DOS\CHKDSK
C>DEL FILE????.CHK
In Version 2.7 after a bad power down or a crash you will need to manually delete a file named DANCADXX.RUN before the program will boot again. This file is used to tell some of my programs that a program is running in that directory, so if the program was not shut down properly the file DANCADXX.RUN will still be in the directory after the computer has been re-booted, or the window was closed and a new one opened.
EXAMPLE: C:\>CD DC27
C:\DC27>DEL DANCADXX.RUN
C:\DC27>DANCAD3D
DANCAD3D (tm) prints drawings on some standard printer types. DANCAD3D (tm) prints on some models of Dot matrix printers, LaserJet II and III type HP-PCL code compatible ink jet and laser printers, and also PostScript (tm) or HP-GL/2, compatible laser printers and imagesetters such as the Linotronic 300. DANCAD3D (tm) can plot in different sizes and colors on some models of pen plotter. In order to use a printer you need to install the appropriate driver file with the main menu [C]hange command. Additionally you may need to change the port name that is in the installed driver file to the port your device is connected to i.e. LPT1, LPT2, LPT3, COM1, or COM2 (the [I]nstall command for each type of driver is found in the DOT, JET, or PLOT sub-menu of the hard-copy sub- menu.)
If you are going to use a Windows (tm) program such as MSPAINT (tm) to print a BMP file you saved from my CAD programs on your printer you would need to install the driver that came with your printer into Windows (tm) Once you install the printer driver for your printer into Windows (tm) you may need to select the new printer as the printer to use with the print command in your various Windows (tm) programs. The Windows (tm) graphic programs might let you print onto a color printer mode that is not supported directly by my programs currently. The quality of the printout that you get from windows programs would depend on them, and not my programs. If you are printing black and white line drawings you might do better to print from my programs, since you might be able to control the image size on the print out better.
DANCAD3D (tm) may print at high quality on some models of dot matrix printer. DANCAD3D (tm)'s print out on dot matrix printers can be more sharp than a screen dump, and compares with the printout obtained from laser printers if you photocopy the printout at half the size of the original print out. DANCAD3D (tm) will work with 8 or 9 pin and some 24 pin printers that have a 240 dot per inch mode. DANCAD3D (tm) can work with line feeds of 1/216 or 1/180 inch and also with 1/144 or 1/72. Provision has been made to print on 120 dot per inch printers as well. A maximum of 1920 dot columns is supported (3840 dots are for wide carriage mode printers.) Look for the drivers for dot matrix printers in the DRIVERS\*.PRN sub-directory after you install the CAD program. You might also install a non-standard type of printer with a built in utility ([H] [D] [I] from the main menu) depending on if the printer is compatible with how the program works. Some printers are very slow when printing at this high resolution. Also the speed of your computer can effect the speed of print out. A page that takes 2 hours or more to print on a 4.77 MHz 8088 computer and dot matrix printer might print in a few minutes on a 733 MHz PIII computer and laser printer. It might be possible to use DANCAD3D (tm) to automatically print several drawings overnight by running a macro command file, if you have the ability to monitor hazards.
There are several dot matrix drivers that may have been supplied with the program for use with the current version of DANCAD3D.COM (tm). Your dot matrix printer may use these codes, and so may work with one of these drivers:
DRIVER FILENAME DOT MATRIX PRINTER TYPE PROPRINT.PRN 9 pin printers with 1/216" line feed (FX, LX, IBM.) LQ_1500.PRN 24 pin printers with 1/180" line feed (LQ, NEC-P6.) STARG15X.PRN Older star SG15X and SG10X with 1/144" line feed. MX_80.PRN Older Epson type, with only 120 dpi print mode (MX.) FX286E13.PRN Wide carriage with 1/216 inch line feed (FX, LX, IBM.) LQ_1500W.PRN Wide carriage with 1/180 inch line feed (LQ, NEC.)
DANCAD3D (tm)'s JET sub-menu of the HARDCOPY menu from the main menu will let you print drawings on printers compatible with the LASERJET or LASERJET II at 150 dots per inch (d.p.i.), or 300 d.p.i. Multiple copies of a drawing can be produced faster than the first copy once the first copy has been down loaded to the printer, by setting the copies value. The HP-PCL drivers are named *.JET. Note that the HP-PCL code printers require 1.5MB of printer memory to print full pages at 300 dpi. When you pick a LaserJet driver you should stick with that driver since the Jet page files only work with the driver used to make them. To change the default *.JET driver you need to use the main menu [C]hange command. There are several HP-PCL drivers supplied for different resolutions and page sizes, the file names of the drivers follow this form:
DRIVER FILENAME HP-PCL OR LASERJET TYPE OF PRINTER HPLJPLUS.JET 8 by 11 inch, at 150 dpi driver for LaserJet Plus. 150D8X11.JET 8 by 11", 150 dpi for LaserJet II compatibles. 300D8X11.JET 8 by 11", 300 dpi for LaserJet II compatibles. 300D8X14.JET 8 by 14", 300 dpi for LaserJet II compatibles.
Since the JET page files are also used for some of the conversions to and from BMP line art files, the JET driver selected can be used to alter the size of the BMP file processed. The HARDCOPY OUTLINE and HARDCOPY READY commands also use the JET driver files.
DANCAD3D (tm) supports HPGL/2 printer mode in the LaserJet III (tm) printer, which prints quicker than the HP-PCL commands generally. To use the HPGL/2 commands the printer needs an additional memory board installed, and the printer needs "page protection mode" switched on (see your printer's book.) The LJIII???.PLT drivers can be installed in place of the PostScript (tm) drivers, i.e. substitute LJIII811.PLT for driver ADOBE_PS.LZR, see the main menu change command. The LJIII*.PLT and *.LZR drivers work with the [H]ardcopy [L]aser commands from DANCAD3D (tm)'s main menu.
DRIVER FILENAME HPGL/2 DEVICE PAPER SIZE. LJIII811.PLT 8.5" by 11" paper on LaserJet III. LJIII814.PLT 8.5" by 14" paper on LaserJet III. LJIIIA4.PLT A4 paper on LaserJet III.
In those cases where you want to print hidden line drawings from triangle elements, you should probably use the HARDCOPY JET WORKSPACE command on a PCL code laser printer rather than the HARDCOPY LASER command on a HPGL/2 only printer, because the HPGL/2 print commands are not set up to print using the hidden line display modes currently. If your printer only supports the HPGL/2 printing modes, then you will need to use the HARDCOPY READY command to make a new element that depicts the hidden line display, but only is made of "free" lines that can be printed using the HPGL/2 commands. Select the element made by HARDCOPY READY as the element to print, and use display mode 1 rather than the hidden line display modes for printing.
DANCAD3D (tm) supports pen plotters. Up to 127 plotter pens correspond to the 1 to 127 line color code numbers. You can drive the serial or parallel port or send the plotter data to a disk file for spooling, storage, or transport. Most plotters use an ASCII text type of data format so the DOS spooler PRINT should work if your plotter will accept a form feed, i.e. ASCII 12. The plotter drivers are named *.PLT. Check the DRIVERS\ sub-directory for any plotter drivers supplied, a few of the commonly used are:
DRIVER FILENAME PLOTTER TYPE OR FILETYPE
HPGL.PLT Makes HP-GL type plotter codes.
HI_80.PLT Makes Epson type plotter codes.
DXF.PLT Makes DXF type drawing files. See also the command
[F]iles [S]ave [I]ndustry [D]XF from DANCAD3D
(tm)'s main menu.
If the plotter connects to your computer's serial port you may need to use the OS MODE command from the DOS prompt to set-up the serial port to match the settings in the plotter. You may need to adjust the setting of the DIP switches in your plotter for the right BAUD rate, start bits, data bits, and so on. You may need to use a special NUL MODEM cable between the serial port on your computer and your plotter. Check your plotter's manual for hook-up and set-up information.
Some older plotters may use the 25 pin serial connector, and your computer may only have 9 pin serial connectors, so you may need to get a 9 pin to 25 pin serial adapter.
In those cases where you want to print hidden line drawings from triangle elements, you should probably use the HARDCOPY JET WORKSPACE command and a PCL code laser printer rather than the HARDCOPY PLOT PLOT command, because the plotter commands are not set up to print using the hidden line display modes currently. If you really need to use your plotter, because you need an somewhat oversize drawing, different pen colors, or something like that, then you will need to use the HARDCOPY READY command to make a new element that depicts the hidden line display, but only is made of "free" lines that can be plotted using the HARDCOPY PLOT PLOT command. In the HARDCOPY READY command it might be best to select the hidden line display modes that just show the outlines of the edges, rather than the modes that fill in the surface triangles with shading, since on a mechanical pen plotter the pen will go up and down so much it might poke holes in the paper. Select the element made by HARDCOPY READY as the element to print, and use display mode 1 rather than the hidden line display modes for plotting.
If you have a laser printer that supports Adobe's PostScript (tm) Adobe Systems Inc. you can plot out on the PostScript (tm) printer with good quality. Your local desk top publishing center may have a Linotronic 300 typesetter by Linotype, if so, you can use the driver for the Linotronic that is included. You can install DANCAD3D (tm)'s laser printer PostScript (tm) plotter driver to output data to a disk file rather than a port and take that disk file on a floppy disk down to your local desk top publishing center to print the file out. If the desk top publishing center's Linotronic 300 (tm) or LaserWriter Plus (tm) are on the COM1 port of their PC, all you may have to do is put the disk with your PostScript plotted file on it into their A: drive and enter COPY A:*.OUT COM1 (you would have entered PAGE1.OUT, or PAGE2.OUT, ... when you changed the plotter port in the plotter driver you used in DANCAD3D (tm) to make the file) at the DOS prompt. Press [H] [P] [I] from DANCAD3D (tm)'s main menu and change the output port installed in the PostScript (tm) driver ADOBE_PS.LZR to a filename like A:\PS.OUT, so that all you have to do is put a BLANK formatted disk into drive A: and hit the spacebar to make your PostScript (tm) files when you have pressed [H]ardcopy [L]aser from the main menu. The PostScript (tm) drivers are named *.LZR. Before you use a PostScript (tm) printer on the COMx port you will need to use the OS MODE command to set-up the serial port, then you can use COPY or run my CAD program and print.
See also the [F]iles [S]ave [I]ndustry [P]ostscript command to use as a shortcut saving a PostScript (tm) file, without having to use the above methods involving the editing of the plotter driver to change the output port.
DRIVER FILENAME TYPE OF POSTSCRIPT DEVICE TO USE DRIVER WITH ADOBE_PS.LZR Any standard PostScript printer or use to make file. LINOTYPE.LZR Drive the Linotronic 300 photo imagesetter.
If the laser printer connects to your computer's serial port you may need to use the OS MODE command from the DOS prompt to set- up the serial port to match the settings in the laser printer. You may need to adjust the setting of the DIP switches in your laser printer for the right BAUD rate, start bits, data bits, and so on. You may need to use a special NUL MODEM cable between the serial port on your computer and your laser printer. Check your laser printer's manual for hook-up and set-up information.
Some laser printers may need a set-up command string to be sent to the printer after being turned on, and before being used by my programs for printing. You may be able to put that command string in a small file, and use the DOS COPY command to transmit it to the printer, something like:
EXAMPLE: C:\DC27>COPY LPSETUP.BIN COM1 /B
Some older laser printers may use the 25 pin serial connector, and your computer may only have 9 pin serial connectors, so you may need to get a 9 pin to 25 pin serial adapter.
In those cases where you want to print hidden line drawings from triangle elements, you should probably use the HARDCOPY JET WORKSPACE command and use a PCL code laser printer rather than use the HARDCOPY LASER command and a PostScript (tm) only printer, because the PostScript (tm) print commands are not set up to print using the hidden line display modes currently. If your printer only supports the PostScript (tm) printing modes, then you will need to use the HARDCOPY READY command to make a new element that depicts the hidden line display, but only is made of "free" lines that can be printed using the PostScript (tm) commands. Select the element made by HARDCOPY READY as the element to print, and use display mode 1 rather than the hidden line display modes for printing.
DANCAD3D (tm) v2.7 supports standard DOS type two or three button mice for the menus and drawing. On some cheep mice being sold as three button mice you may not get the center button work, due possibly to the mouse not being supplied with its own driver disk. Be sure to run the driver that came with your device before running DANCAD3D (tm). You may also need to run the DOS MODE command to setup the serial port for the mouse driver. Read the book that came with the mouse. You can move the drawing cursor, mark, draw lines, and redraw the screen by moving the "mouse" device and pressing its buttons. Note that some older versions of the mouse drivers supplied with the mice may have bugs that will crash your programs, therefore you might want to contact the company you bought the mouse device from to obtain their latest driver software. If my CAD program crashes when you enter the main menu, then try editing your AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS files to not install the mouse driver and see if you can draw that way. The mouse controls the menu selection bar found in most of the menus in DANCAD3D (tm). By pressing the left mouse button you can select the command the menu bar is over. Within the drawing editor you can move the drawing cursor, mark, draw lines, and select menu commands by moving the mouse device and pressing its buttons.
Under DOS you need to put the mouse driver files in your CONFIG.SYS or AUTOEXEC.BAT files in order for the mouse to be loaded before you run my programs. When using Windows 95 (tm), the mouse driver has probably already been loaded, so the mouse driver should be automatically available when you open a DOS window. The mouse center button may not work under Windows 95 (tm), so you may have to use the substitute or equivalent keyboard command for the mouse center button. The left and right mouse buttons should both work normally under Windows 95 (tm). Support for the 3D track-ball in v2.7 requires manually telling the program to check for it (see [S]et-up in the drawing editor), since the 3D track-ball checking may cause issues under Windows 95 (tm) use of the 3D track-ball may require running the programs under DOS. Two button mice should work well under both DOS and Windows 95 (tm) if their drivers are installed properly.
As a general rule when using the mouse with DANCAD3D (tm) the left mouse button activates a command like the [Return] key and the right button erases the filename or number prompt like the [Escape] key. At prompts that ask you to answer [Y]es or [N]o the left mouse button answers [Y]es and the right mouse button answers [N]o.
In the drawing editor, command [D]raw from the main menu, the mouse is normally used to move the cross shaped drawing cursor, but can also be used to select the commands from the menus by pressing and releasing the mouse's center button. If your mouse only has two buttons you can press the [Spacebar] on the keyboard to toggle the mouse between moving the drawing cursor and moving the menu selection bar. When drawing, the mouse's right button marks the starting point for a line segment, and the mouses left button draws the line segment from the marked point to the drawing cursors current position.
In the text editor, command [W]rite from the main menu, the mouse's center or left button makes a menu of commands pop-up on the screen. If you do not have a mouse press the [F1] key (or press the [Ctrl] and [^] keys at the same time) to pop- up the menu. Commands are selected from the pop-up menu with the left mouse button or [Return] key (or the command's first letter) as usual.
Digitizer tablet support has been added for absolute distance drawing and tracing. Support is currently just for the CalComp Drawing Board II series of tablets. The drawing editor cursor can be controlled for drawing to absolute distances, and the buttons on the tablet "cursor" or pen can be used to activate some commands. The tablet works well on my system, but since this is a new feature I do not know if there are any compatibly problems with other computers, if you are going to buy a tablet for use with DANCAD3D (tm) try to try it out first with DANCAD3D (tm) to see if it works on your computer, be sure to follow the set-up instructions carefully.
A "fee hand" drawing mode has been added for tablet users to trace and draw curves while one of the "cursor" buttons is held down.
With DANCAD3D (tm) and DANCAD87 (tm) you can try to use a CalComp "Drawing Board II" (tm) type digitizing tablet to make drawings or trace drawings. The tablet measures distances in an absolute way, and so can be used for making measurements of angles and distances, on drawings or photographs, by using DANCAD3D (tm)'s measure command (in the drawing editor.)
The tablet must be turned on and set up before you run DANCAD3D (tm). To activate the tablet control of the drawing cursor press [F2] while in the drawing editor, or select [T]ablet from the drawing editor's [S]et-up menu. Do not try to turn the tablet use on if the tablet and serial port have not been configured properly, since activating the tablet without the tablet being ready will make the program lock up.
The tablet supersedes the mouse & cursor keys in the control of the drawing cursor. To return control of the drawing cursor to the mouse or cursor keys press [F2] again. Use the [F2] key to change between the tablet and the mouse & cursor keys while drawing.
Read the help screen in the [F2] menu for a listing of the tablet "cursor" button functions. "Cursors" with up to 16 buttons are supported. The one or two button pens, as well as the 4 button cursors can also be used.
To set up your tablet for use do these things:
Connect the tablet to the serial port and then turn the tablet on.
Run external DOS command C:\DOS\MODE COM1:9600,N,8,1,P
Run CalComp driver: C:\CALDB\CCMOUSE.COM
Run CalComp utility: C:\CALDB\RMDRV.EXE
Click the tablet cursor on the "Config/Exit" mark on the top of the tablet, the tablet should beep once and the power and configuration lights will go from dark to lighting up.
Put the tablet cursor on the "Bank/B" mark on the top of the tablet, the power light should be out, then click the cursor button, the tablet will beep and the power light will come on.
Click the tablet cursor on the "Configuration/Macros- #18" mark on the top of the tablet, the tablet will beep and the power light will go out. If the light comes on, click again, because the whole point of fiddling with the tablet configuration is to turn "B-18" off.
Click the tablet cursor on the "Save-#1-Default" mark on the top of the tablet, the tablet will beep twice and the power light will flash.
Click the tablet cursor on the "Config/Exit" mark on the top of the tablet, the tablet should beep and the power and configuration lights will become dark.
Run DANCAD3D (tm), select [D]raw, select [F]ront view, select [D]raw, press [F2], select the use of the tablet. The tablet cursor should then move the drawing cursor around, if not something is wrong. If the tablet "cursor" goes outside the tablet active area the tablet power light will blink, and DANCAD3D (tm) will "go dead" until you put the tablet "cursor" back in the tablet active area. Depending on how you have the zoom set in the drawing editor, the drawing cursor can go off the side of the screen when you move the tablet "cursor" around (if you cannot see the drawing cursor on the screen zoom out with the [-] & [*] keys until you see what area the tablet covers in your drawing.)
Steps 5 through 9 only need to be done once since the tablet will remember the setting of its configuration "buttons", i.e. #B18 being set off. Steps 2 through 4 can be put in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file so they will automatically be done when your computer is powered on. Step 1 will not be a problem, remembering to turn on the tablet, if you have your computer plugged into a power strip with a switch, so that the power supply for the tablet will be turned on when you turn the power strip for your computer on (leave the power switch on the tablet on all the time.)
So all you will have to do normally is press [F2] while drawing in DANCAD3D (tm), all the other steps are done automatically by the tablet and your computer after you set them up once.
The "button" Bank B: #18 is used to set the "CTS Line Enable" to the state 0/OFF. You will probably also want to set "button" Bank B: #10 to state 0/OFF to turn off the tablet pen click off, because DANCAD3D (tm) makes a click AFTER the button press is detected, where as the tablet clicks before DANCAD3D (tm) has read the tablet, and may cause you to let the button up on the tablet "cursor" before DANCAD3D (tm) knows the button was pressed. The click DANCAD3D (tm) makes when the tablet "cursor" button is pressed can be selected from the menu that comes up when you press [F2] in the drawing editor.
Recommended settings for the tablet configuration would be:
CONFIG # 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 BANK A 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 BANK B 0 0 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0
The DOS command MODE can be put in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file. So can the executable files CCMOUSE.COM & RMDRV.EXE come on a floppy disk with your tablet. See Appendix B in the CalComp Drawing Board II User's Guide, Configurations, for the meaning of the tablet settings.
BE SURE THAT YOUR TABLET IS TURNED ON BEFORE YOU BOOT YOUR COMPUTER, SO THE TABLET CAN BE SET UP BY THE PROGRAMS IN YOUR AUTOEXEC.BAT FILE EACH TIME THE COMPUTER IS TURNED ON.
DANCAD3D (tm) v2.6 and v2.7 use data format "CalComp 9100 Format #1", which is an ASCII data format with a resolution of 0.001 inch. The actual accuracy you can get moving the cursor by hand is about 0.01 inch, so although the tablets can give smaller values in other data formats the extra resolution only makes it harder to hold the tablet cursor still enough to get particular position values. In the tablet menu, you get by pressing [F2] in DANCAD3D (tm)'s drawing editor, you can change the minimum increment that the drawing cursor will move as you move the tablet "cursor" (use larger values to make drawing straight lines easier.)
DANCAD3D (tm) should automatically adjust to the size of your tablet (tablets come in different sizes from 12" by 12" to table top size for large drawings.) You can change the center point of the tablet relative to DANCAD3D (tm)'s workspace center to enable you to work on drawings larger than your tablet (see the tablet menu in the drawing editor.)
For general drawing using a track-ball or mouse will probably be more useful since DANCAD3D (tm) has special processing of the mouse input to make drawing straight lines easier. Processing the tablet input would defeat the purpose of using an absolute position input device. If you can afford both a mouse/track-ball and tablet they complement each other because the mouse/track-ball is good for general drawing, and the tablet is necessary for tracing accurately.
Because DANCAD3D (tm) makes very heavy use of the harddisk I recommend that you use a harddisk optimizing program, such as the DEFRAG command to reshuffle the fragmented files so they might be accessed faster. DANCAD3D (tm) may run a little faster in the root directory of your harddisk. Some harddisk optimizing programs let you locate a particular program close to the FAT. Doing this with DANCAD3D (tm) may also help speed it up. You can also backup all the files from your harddisk and then reformat the harddisk and restore the files, this will speed up the file access until the files become fragmented again.
You should also use the DOS BACKUP command at least once a day to keep your data safe. BACKUP has an add only files that have changed option since the last backup, so you do not have to backup all of the files each time.
Voice coil harddisks may help the programs load their overlay files faster than the older stepper motor type harddisks. You should try to use a harddisk that has an average access time of less than 9 ms.
If you can set up a 10MB or larger RAM disk above the DOS 640KB you can copy all the DANCAD3D (tm) files into the RAM disk to get the program to work faster. Alternately or additionally putting the pixel frame files to be loaded with the [A]nimate command, of the [F]iles sub-menu of the main menu, into a RAM disk may make the pixel files load much smoother and faster.
Newer harddisks have a built in RAM buffer that might help speed up animation of disk files, if the length of the animated file set is smaller than the buffer size. The file set may need to read all the way through once before all the frames are buffered, then the frames will display faster the second time through the frame set.
Windows 95 (tm) may buffer files read from the harddisk, so you may not need to use a RAM disk if you are reading animation frames under Windows 95 (tm). Check your Windows 95 (tm) settings to see if you can improve the settings that effect disk cashing.
By using the small menu that comes up over DANCAD3D (tm)'s title screen, you can relocate the workspace file into another directory or drive, so, DANCAD3D (tm) can be in a RAM disk and the workspace file on your harddisk, or the other way around. DANCAD3D (tm)'s workspace file takes from about 500KB to 2GB depending on how many line segments are in the drawing being held in the workspace.
In your DOS CONFIG.SYS start up file you can have two commands that tell DOS how much memory DOS can take for its own use. When running DANCAD3D (tm) these two commands might be set to: FILES=20, and BUFFERS=80. Setting the buffers to more than 20 might help to reduce harddisk head movement when the harddisk does not have a buffer built in.
If you need more free DOS memory you can configure fewer buffers, e.g. BUFFERS=2, but you would generally only use so few buffers if DANCAD3D (tm)'s overlay files are loaded into a RAM disk since accessing the overlay files from a harddisk might take too long without more file buffers.
If you use the DOS command SMARTDRV to cache your harddisk you may get faster performance if you use a medium number of buffers, but you may have to adjust the exact number and check how that number of buffers effects the commands in DANCAD3D (tm) that you will be using. If you use SMARTDRV be sure to flush the cache memory back to your harddisk before you turn your computer off.
Not loading the mouse driver might save some memory running under DOS, but you would normally want the DOS mouse driver in your CONFIG.SYS or AUTOEXEC.BAT file so that the mouse driver is loaded when the computer is turned on. Drivers for the sound board may be able to be omitted, unless you need them to activate the Joy-Stick port on your sound board for use with my CAM programs. If the sound driver takes too much memory you might be able to get an older separate Joy-Stick port board that does not need a driver, and disable the Joy-Stick port that is on the sound board.
When you open a DOS window in Windows 95 (tm) you may find that you have more "DOS" memory free than when you boot using DOS 6.22, so my CAD programs may have more memory free to use under Windows 95 (tm). Windows 95 (tm) generally already has the disk cashing and mouse drivers loaded, so you probably do not have to make changes to the CONFIG.SYS or AUTOEXEC.BAT files, just open a DOS window and install the programs. You may need to use the DOS MODE command, or other device specific programs, after you open the DOS window to set up the COMx ports before you run my programs. If you get "phantom" file or port sharing conflicts when running my programs under Windows 95 (tm), particularly after a program crash or other anomaly, you may need to close all windows and programs, then reboot your computer so that the OS will forget that the files where open. Do not try to use the same file or port from programs open in two or more windows.
If you do not have a DOS icon on your Windows 95 (tm) desktop, you can use the START button at the lower left of the Windows 95 (tm) desktop, then the RUN command that is in the menu that pops up from the START button. Enter COMMAND as the "program" name in the Windows (tm) RUN command. This should open a DOS window, if the window is not full screen you should select full screen mode. You might also be able to change the settings in the DOS window to a state that no programs will be running in background, see the window's PROPERTIES option. You might get the DOS window's PROPERTIES option by right clicking twice on the button for the DOS window at the bottom of the desktop on its task bar.