MINTEQA Help Site
Suggestions for downloading and running MINTEQA2
The lastest version of MINTEQA (4.0) has a few minor gliches that can easily be worked out. These are suggestions for helping you along with downloading the program from the ESM 552 site and for running the program in order to do the laboratory problems. Remember that this program only runs on PC computers in DOS mode or in an MSDOS window.
1) When opening Minteqa for the first time to expand it, you may receive a message that states: Not ready reading drive E: Abort, Retry, Fail? The EPA suggests putting a media in each drive that is not in use (eg. CD, ZIP, floppy) so as not to confuse the program.
2) When the program is properly installed, open the MSDOS window (from the Programs menu) or restart your computer in DOS mode. A prompt will likely appear that that says: C:\WINDOWS>_
Change drives by typing: cd\
From the C:\> prompt, enter cd followed by the drive where you saved Minteqa (eg. cd D:) or if you saved MINTEQA2 on your C drive, proceed directly to the next step.
Type cd MINTEQA2 at the C:\> (or D) prompt.
At the C:\MINTEQA2> prompt, type xprodefx to begin PRODEFA2. The program will ask for a seed file to be created. For lab problem 1, press Enter. Then create an input file as in the instructions for Version 3.11.
From here, follow the instructions in the MINTEQA2 Practice Lab/Homework to set up the appropriate settings in PRODEFA. Remember to run PRODEFA first to create a file for MINTEQA (both programs are included in your download).
To execute MINTEQA2, type xminteqx at the C:\MINTEQA2> prompt.
Although you may be able to open the program by double clicking on the appropriate icon in WINDOWS format, you probably won't be given the option to edit your output file later (a necessity!). For this reason, be sure to open the program through the DOS sequence.
3) An important difference to note between versions is found in Edit Level II of PRODEFA (at least for Lab Problem 1). In Option #6, choose #1 to select NTA (NTA +3 is not an option in this version).