I don’t know too many people that actually have fond memories of Windows 3.1, so I can’t think of too many reasons you’d want to run the ancient operating system on your smartphone. But whether you’re in it for the geek cred or you just want to run Microsoft Word 2.0, you’ll be happy to know that there is a way to shoehorn Windows 3.1 onto an Android smartphone.

Android Blog has the rundown, but in a nutshell you need to install aDOSBox, an app that lets you run old school DOS applications on Android. There are versions of DOSBox for a ton of platforms including Windows, Windows Mobile, and Linux. For what it’s worth, you can use aDOSBox to run a bunch of classic DOS games without installing Windows 3.1, so if that’s your goal, you can probably stop at this step.

If you want to go all the way, you’ll need to find the Windows 3.1 installation files, either in that old shoebox in your closet, or you know… somewhere else. You can either extract the setup files to your SD card and run a few commands or set up Windows 3.1 on your PC and copy the entire folder over to your phone’s SD card — whichever works best for you. You can find the step by step directions and Android Blog, along with a few photos of the results.

via Android Central

Brad Linder

Brad Linder is editor of Liliputing and Mobiputing. He's been tinkering with mobile tech for decades and writing about it since 2006. Brad has also worked with NPR, WHYY, PRI, and AOL.

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