5 ms·

Amen. The entire OS was so polished and stable. I don't think it has been surpassed yet. Maybe by OS X 10.6

agumonkey 8y ago
my favorite MS anecdote: PC Magazine gave a beta 2k install on a CD. I tried it, and it was such an improvement over 98 that I never installed anything else until XP was a ~requirement (mostly a convenience because it embedded more and more recent drivers)
- ashleyn 8y ago
  To be frank, that's because the Win 9x line was intentionally designed around the older, less-stable MS-DOS architecture. NT, which is what 2000 was based on, was around for seven years by that point and was remarkably stable. The big problem is that it was compatible with virtually nothing, and it wasn't until Win XP that the business world aligned itself with NT.
  - menacingly 8y ago
    It wasn't until XP that the _consumer_ world aligned itself with NT. NT 4 & 2000 were unavoidable in business networks with windows domains
  - agumonkey 8y ago
    NT was more compatible with my hardware than 98 :)
    - kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
      Unless you wanted USB support.
- masklinn 8y ago
  > I never installed anything else until XP was a ~requirement Likewise. I only migrated to WXP because AoE3 required it… and it turned out to be terrible but there was no real way to downgrade.
  - agumonkey 8y ago
    same, not AoE3 but I remember that I didn't want XP but something required it...
teekert 8y ago
Oh, 10.6 was so nice, my MBP came with it, it flew, it was fast on 4 GB of ram! Now, the latest MacOS is slow on 16GB of ram, it's the same machine and I still do the same things with it. I don't understand "progress".
- lukifer 8y ago
  The more computing resources we make available, the more wasteful we become: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
  For comparison, Windows 2000 has a recommended minimum requirement of 64MB of ram. Windows 95 recommended 8MB. That's the scale of bloat we're talking about. That a modern UI which does essentially the same things can feel unresponsive in any way on several orders of magnitude more resources says a lot about the priorities of modern software developers.
  - jen20 8y ago
    Windows 95 to Windows 2000 is not a fair comparison, but Windows NT 4.0 is - which required 16MB and recommended 32MB.
    - phendrenad2 8y ago
      I don’t think they were comparing 2000 to 95, but both if them to modern OSs (in some sense 8MB vs 64MB is such a small difference compared to modern OSs which basically need 8GB minimum)

my favorite MS anecdote: PC Magazine gave a beta 2k install on a CD. I tried it, and it was such an improvement over 98 that I never installed anything else until XP was a ~requirement (mostly a convenience because it embedded more and more recent drivers)

ashleyn 8y ago
To be frank, that's because the Win 9x line was intentionally designed around the older, less-stable MS-DOS architecture. NT, which is what 2000 was based on, was around for seven years by that point and was remarkably stable. The big problem is that it was compatible with virtually nothing, and it wasn't until Win XP that the business world aligned itself with NT.
- menacingly 8y ago
  It wasn't until XP that the _consumer_ world aligned itself with NT. NT 4 & 2000 were unavoidable in business networks with windows domains
- agumonkey 8y ago
  NT was more compatible with my hardware than 98 :)
  - kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
    Unless you wanted USB support.
masklinn 8y ago
> I never installed anything else until XP was a ~requirement Likewise. I only migrated to WXP because AoE3 required it… and it turned out to be terrible but there was no real way to downgrade.
- agumonkey 8y ago
  same, not AoE3 but I remember that I didn't want XP but something required it...

teekert 8y ago

Oh, 10.6 was so nice, my MBP came with it, it flew, it was fast on 4 GB of ram! Now, the latest MacOS is slow on 16GB of ram, it's the same machine and I still do the same things with it. I don't understand "progress".

lukifer 8y ago
The more computing resources we make available, the more wasteful we become: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox
AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
For comparison, Windows 2000 has a recommended minimum requirement of 64MB of ram. Windows 95 recommended 8MB. That's the scale of bloat we're talking about. That a modern UI which does essentially the same things can feel unresponsive in any way on several orders of magnitude more resources says a lot about the priorities of modern software developers.
- jen20 8y ago
  Windows 95 to Windows 2000 is not a fair comparison, but Windows NT 4.0 is - which required 16MB and recommended 32MB.
  - phendrenad2 8y ago
    I don’t think they were comparing 2000 to 95, but both if them to modern OSs (in some sense 8MB vs 64MB is such a small difference compared to modern OSs which basically need 8GB minimum)