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Q71989: IBMCACHE.SYS Will Not Load If HIMEM.SYS Is Loaded

Article: Q71989
Product(s): Microsoft Disk Operating System
Version(s): MS-DOS:4.0,4.01,4.01a,5.0
Operating System(s): 
Keyword(s): 
Last Modified: 22-NOV-1999

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The information in this article applies to:

- Microsoft MS-DOS operating system versions 4.0, 4.01, 4.01a, 5.0 
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SUMMARY
=======

The disk caching program IBMCACHE.SYS version 1.00 will not load if HIMEM.SYS is
loaded. When the cache device driver is loaded with DOS high, the following
error message appears:

  Allocating Cache Buffers...Not enough space to allocate Cache buffers

This problem occurs because IBMCACHE.SYS tries to allocate extended memory via
the interrupt 15 (or INT 15) interface. As specified by XMS 2.0, HIMEM.SYS
allocates all extended memory to itself via INT 15 to provide XMS memory.

There are three workarounds to this problem:

1. Load IBMCACHE.SYS before HIMEM.SYS.

2. Do not load HIMEM.SYS.

3. In MS-DOS version 5.0, load HIMEM.SYS with the following switch:

     DEVICE=HIMEM.SYS /INT15=xxxx

  This switch allocates the specified amount of extended memory, in kilobytes,
  for the interrupt 15h interface. To ensure that enough memory is available,
  add 64 to the value you want to specify for xxxx. Valid values range from 64
  through 65535. For more information on the /INT15 switch, refer to the
  version 5.0 "Microsoft MS-DOS User's Guide and Reference."


Additional query words: 4.00 4.01 4.01a 5.00 noupd

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Keywords          :  
Technology        : kbMSDOSSearch kbMSDOS400 kbMSDOS500 kbMSDOS401
Version           : MS-DOS:4.0,4.01,4.01a,5.0

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