🚀 go-pugleaf

Greetings. I hope this post isn't too far out of line with this newsgroup.
Before I put an axe through my new 386, I thought I'd ask y'all a few
questions. 

What I want to do: write software (in C) to reduce and display astronomical
images on my 386. These images will be floating point up to 512x512 (1
Mbyte each). The code (and executable) does not have to be at all portable
since it will never go beyond my machine and I would like to maximize the
number crunching speed, thus I would like to compile in 386 protected mode,
if possible. Also, being able to display with a 256 level grayscale or
false color palette is mandatory.

What I've got to do it with: 33 MHz 386 running DOS 4.01, FP coprocessor,
1024x768x256 color monitor and graphics card (Diamond SpeedSTAR VGA v.
3.10 with 1 Mbyte RAM), 4 Mbyte RAM (with room for plenty more), 135 Mbyte
hard disk, etc.

Specific questions: Do any compilers out there compile real, honest-to-God,
386 instructions as opposed to only 286 and lower? What things do I need so
I can do a malloc for 1 Mbyte? Any compilers know how to talk to the
SpeedSTAR card so I can get 1024x768x256 as opposed to 640x480x16? 

Any advice on how to put the software together for not too many dollar$
would be greatly appreciated - I'm a starving grad student, etc. I've
played with Microsoft C 6.0 and Turbo C++ and neither were close to
satisfactory (the user interfaces are fine; they just won't talk to my
video board or produce 386 optimized instructions). QEMM seemed to make
PCWrite barf (what does "packed file is corrupt" mean?) while Microsoft
didn't tell me much of anything about the extended memory stuff they
included with DOS 4.01. So I'm very confused, frustrated, and seriously
wondering if I spent a lot of money on a machine that won't do what I want
it to do anyway. Again, any useful advice will be very greatly appreciated.
Please e-mail (preferred for bandwidth considerations) or post. Thanks.

P.S. Could someone please explain to me the following Microsoft device
drivers included with DOS 4.01? Why should or shouldn't I use them? Yes, I
RTFM, but half of them weren't even mentioned in the manual. (I do
understand smartdrive and ramdrive, but any extra hints will be greatly
appreciated.)
   emm386.sys, himem.sys, xma2ems.sys, smartdrive.sys, ramdrive.sys
--
  Mike Ressler - Infrared Photon Jockey     ressler@galileo.ifa.hawaii.edu

  If at first you don't succeed, get a bigger sledgehammer.