Delrina Daily Planner - 1992 vintage software

cbessant · 03 Apr 2013

My wife loves Delrina Daily Planner. This version dates back to 1992, and was on 3.5" floppies. I was able to install this on Windows XP using a USB memory stick rather than the diskettes given the PC didn't have a diskette drive.

Now, the Windows XP machine is going away and I need to install Delrina Daily Planner on a Windows 7 64 bit laptop. I get the following error:

The version of this file is not compatible with the version of Windows you're running. check you computer system information to see whether you need an x86 (32 bit) or (64 bit) version of the program then contact the software publisher.

Obiously this is a 16-bit package that was meant to run on Windows 3.1. Any advice on how to get this going would be much appreciated.

Thank you.

Chuck

Dsprague · 04 Apr 2013

What version of windows 7 do you have? If you have professional or ultimate you can install it using XP mode: Download Windows Virtual PC from Official Microsoft Download Center

Bongo · 04 Apr 2013

Welcome to the Seven Forums

Sorry to inform you that a 16-bit program will not run on a Windows 7 64-bit computer How can I run 16 bit programs in Windows 7 64-bit? - Microsoft Community you might be able to get it to work with DOSBox - free opensource DOS & X86 Emulator for Windows & Linux | Windows Reference

If you have Windows 7 Professional or Ultimate you could try Windows XP Mode - Install and Setup

Jerry

cbessant · 04 Apr 2013

Thank you for the advice, I'll try the recommendations. I'm running Windows 7 Ultimate w/SP 1.

Bongo · 04 Apr 2013

You're Welcome

PickyRicky · 17 Dec 2013

Yes, 64 bit PCs are the first wave of PCs that can't run the old Delrina Daily Planner. Most of the time, people ask how to load the old SW on a newer machine. It's easy. I recommend copying all the old files from the mini floppy installation disk onto a CD. You must then copy those files to a new directory on your C: drive titled DISK1. Then double click on INSTALL program and you're off and running.

Jay920215 · 16 Oct 2017

All,
I also love the Delrina Daily Planner, having received it in 1993, known then as the Amaze Daily Planner. My new wife (first and still) gave it to me as a first anniversary present. For the last year I have been searching for a way to run it on my new Dell XPS Windows 10 machine and have had no luck. I have tried the Windows Compatibility tool and it won't even touch the Daily Planner install.exe file or tell me what's wrong with it. Since 1993 I have run it on Windows 3.1, W95, W2000 and WXP. Once my last two XP machines die I will be without my Daily Planner which has been my favorite major resource for managing my life activities. The current crop of planners are just a calendar month page with little boxes to put stuff in; pathetically lame compared to the Daily Planner’s capabilities.

I now have 24 years of planner .dp files, containing history since 1993, and I hate the thought of losing access to that history. However, excavating through the web I have found three of the original Amaze staff and begged them to resurrect the Amaze Daily Planner to run on Windows 10 and beyond. Right now my latest contact today (October 16, 2017) says he will look into it but he’s busy with a new startup. There may be problems with finding the original source code and with the current owner of the product who has vehemently stated that they refuse to consider bringing the planner back.

Right now, I'd like to get a feel for how many people might be interested in resurrecting the Daily Planner to run on Windows 10 and beyond. Maybe popular demand would convince them to see it as a new, viable product. If they can bring Blade Runner back after 35 years why not the Daily Planner after only 24 years? At this point I have told them I'd pay $1,000 to get a planner that would move into the future as Microsoft advances their OS beyond W10 and would be able to open all my old .dp files. If we can demonstrate enough interest in bringing the Planner back they may feel some real encouragement to re-acquire the license to it and update the source code to work on the new Windows environments into the future. Best case we see a new Daily Planner 2017 hit the market.

Thanks. Jay