open SYS, "command |" or die "$!";
while (<SYS>) {
  print
}
close SYS;
[download]

Thanks but that did not work. I built a standalone exe from the following code. Oh and I am doing this on windowz to make it even more fun.

until($cnt == "100"){
print "COUNT IS $cnt\n";
sleep 5;
$cnt++;
}
[download]

I then call the exe within perl. With the code you supplied it still waits until completion before printing. I even tried setting autoflush with the code below.

open SYS, "c:\\temp\\junk.exe |" or die "$!";
$oldfh=select(SYS);
$| = 1;
select($oldfh);
$| = 1;
while (<SYS>) {
print
}
close SYS;
[download]

Your standalone program is buffering its output. Try setting $|=1; (update: in the printing program!) before printing anything. $| has no effect on reading, only on output.
"What should it profit a man, if he should win a flame war, yet lose his cool?"

Thanks for the suggestion, but no go. system did the same thing. It just waited for the exe to finish before printing any output. Unfortunatly I don't have access to the code of the actual exe I will be running so no way to modify that code.