I don't know about you sometimes bluto-you can boot dos on almost any computer from a msdos boot floppy. But youll need a newer version like dos 6.22 which supports extended memory. You can even create an msdos boot cd. Some bios instruction sets in newer computers might give you some trouble. Turn off all the networking settings. Dos this way will not recognize modern harddrives though. Youll have to save your c++ programs on a floppy and then boot to windows and copy them to your harddrive. The xp command.com does not have a full dos instruction set. It is less than functional for someone who wants to learn c from the ground up-get dos 6.22 and learn it-then take a shot at programing in C++.