14 ms·

I Still Use Windows 95 (2008)

184 points by zdw 3y ago

danjoredd 3y ago
Honestly, respect to him for using it that long. I wonder if he is still able to use it, or if security certificates will keep him from accessing anything on the internet?
- idontknowifican 3y ago
  he seemed a pragmatist around upgrades for new programs so i’d assume he’s rocking longhorn (vista pre release) at this point
  - kayodelycaon 3y ago
    I don’t think pragmatist is the word I’d use for him. I can empathize with the annoyance of things changing, but a pragmatist wouldn’t be this inflexible. Given his other writings and the fact he hits things when they anger him, I’d go with curmudgeon. A word harsher than I’d like, but it captures the essence. He seems angry at the world around him and does not like adapting to it. This is pretty common but most people don’t take it this far. :)
- grose 3y ago
  I found a more recent (2016) blog post by him about it: http://www.andrewturnbull.net/log/index7e39.html?p=716 http://www.andrewturnbull.net/log/index7e39.html?p=716
  - Aachen 3y ago
    That post also addresses what a lot of people in this thread have been saying about why not run Linux > the complex rituals needed to achieve the functionality that goes for granted in Windows ah, the ballad of a true "I grew up with Windows and don't realise I've had three decades of learning the various ins and outs in my pocket" user
  - troad 3y ago
    It's an interesting article. He rejects Linux because he has a "day job" and no "time and enthusiasm to tinker with computers for their own sake instead of using them productively as a means to an end". I mean... isn't this a little rich for someone who wants to devote time to tracking down retro computer parts being sold by "two-bit resellers", just so he can keep using Windows XP? At some point, maybe you should admit you're a retro-computing enthusiast (high-five to that!), and none of this has anything at all to do with productivity.
    - nylonstrung 3y ago
      It's not productive because it gets progressively harder as time goes on and support/hardware availability gets worse. It's the opposite of futureproof
    - bombcar 3y ago
      It's the difference between keeping your 1948 Dodge Custom 6 running (work on it or pay someone to work on it, everything else remains the same) and buying an entire new car. I can certainly believe it's productivity; Linux itself is annoyingly "changing" over time, Windows 95 will never change.
      - sidewndr46 3y ago
        but you could just install whatever random linux distribution you wanted, disable all updates, & be done.
        bombcar 3y ago
        Sure, and if you were already used to Linux, that would be great. But if you've never used anything but Windows 95, you'd have to learn all the idiosyncrasies and differences.
        BirAdam 3y ago
        Eh. That would be worse. Software made a few months later would require newer libraries. The only “stable” (in the sense of unchanging) API out there is effectively win32. I can easily make software written for Win2K or Win95 work on Linux through WINE, but I cannot do the same for Loki games, or even for some abandoned application written a year ago.
  - cat_plus_plus 3y ago
    I love how he wants stability for himself but front page of the blog is filled with dunking on conservatives. There is some nuance in that one can want Windows 95 for him/herself and still allow others to have Windows 11. But having "Windows 95 states" and "Windows 11 states" should be at least considered as a solution and also, what if people forcibly install Windows 11 on your kids laptops and don't even bother telling you? Anyway, since he wants to force everyone to take COVID vaccines, surely he can't object to being forced to install the latest OS that still gets up to date security patches?
- fsiefken 3y ago
  I think Windows9x is not usable anymore with internet unless one uses proxies for the ssl and accept not using modern javascript pages. There was a similar thread about this a month ago or so. XP is more or less usable as there are hacks to use a Chrome version from 2022, I was tempted to create a VM with it to try it as a daily driver, but I lack the time.
  - tracker1 3y ago
    Might be better served with one of the lite10/lite11 type windows remixes with most of the fluff removed. Though not sure I'd remove UAC or Defender myself.. but would be roughly similar to XP in terms of overhead with an arguably nicer skin.
gfv 3y ago
Windows 95 was released 13 years prior to the article, roughly the same time span as between Windows 7 release and today. Windows 7 is still installed on a single-digit percentage of computers. It is interesting to see that the reasons outlined in the article could be used almost word-for-word by someone justifying their use of Windows 7.
- hosteur 3y ago
  I still use windows 7 in a vm for a legacy program. Works really well. Is hugely faster than any modern windows. Even in the vm. I have to run an old version of tortoisesvn. Needless to say the vm is only connected to a local network.
  - gfv 3y ago
    Precisely. Compare your comment with these excerpts from the article: >Windows 95 is reasonably fast in performance, and is not compromised by the arguably frivolous animation and eye candy features in Windows 98 and newer versions. >I prefer to have as much native compatibility as possible with DOS applications such as older games I own.
- mysterydip 3y ago
  One difference is the switch from 95/98 to 2000/XP meant all future games and apps would be incompatible with the older OS. Aside from security patches, I see nothing that prevents 7 from being used today. Subsequent OSes added nothing useful that I noticed, and a lot of negatives. Ironically, you may actually be more secure today running 95 than 7, since any modern exploit would be incompatible with it.
  - qsort 3y ago
    (obligatory security patches aside) Major OSs are arguably almost exactly the same as they were 20 years ago, with some random nonsense baked in. Functionally speaking, there's no reason I couldn't be on OSX Tiger or Windows 2000. Linux did get better in terms of hardware support. Freaking NDISWrapper still gives me nightmares.
diego_moita 3y ago
Besides from DOS games (perhaps), all the reasons he gives to stick with Windows 95 are even better reasons to pick up a light Linux distribution. Well, maybe what he really, really wants is just to brag on the internet about it. No one would care if he was using Linux.
- marcodiego 3y ago
  Except for performance, a light linux distro with DOSBox is much better than windows 95. If it is possible to run DOSEmu then the performance penalty may be smaller but also would be compatibility.
jansan 3y ago
I am still using Paint Shop Pro 7.04 anniversary edition from 2001, and I am using it almost every day. Edit: Here is a wonderful writeup why I am using that specific version: https://www.theregister.com/2007/12/20/verity_stob_software_murder/ https://www.theregister.com/2007/12/20/verity_stob_software_...
- ProAm 3y ago
  This is great, I havent heard PSP in a very long time!
NotYourLawyer 3y ago
I’d still use Windows 7 (or honestly, even Windows 2000) if I could. Everything since has been a step in the wrong direction.
- alkonaut 3y ago
  There is a huge number of minor annoyances (People tend to complain about start menus ads performance regressions, poor context menu in Win11 etc - and I agree with all of them). But there is also a massive number of small things added and improve. Just between base Win10 and more recent Win10 there is a huge number of features added regarding for example how apps DPI scale, especially when moving across multiple screens with different DPI for example. Or WSL. So I wouldn't agree "everything" is going in the wrong direction. Something as simple as Win+Shift+S is an amazing improvement which required a third party tool under Win7 but no more since 2010CU. The new terminal... the list goes on and on.
  - calvinmorrison 3y ago
    No need for cycling, a real terminal, powerfully. Windows improved dramatically
  - actionfromafar 3y ago
    WSL is not fundamentally different to me than a PC emulator. I'd still take Windows 2000 over Win 11 if I could run modern apps like browsers and IDEs on it. It's been on my mind lately that Windows really hasn't done much lately except improving upon the way it's an Azure and Ads vehicle. That's the real "innovation". The OS is no longer the product, it's just an appendage to the cloud. The mushroom, if you will. The mycelium it's connected to is much larger.
    - alkonaut 3y ago
      WSL was just one exemple. There are literally thousands of other improvements. Not all are revolutionary but at least some matter in a big way to most people. Any gamer would say DirectX 12 is enough to upgrade from Win7 to Win10. Anyone with two screens of different DPI should say the same. Anyone with a Wifi6 router would want to upgrade. The list goes on. I also liked the fast and simple Win2000, or Win7. But I do remember how terrible the screenshot functionality was, how bad the terminal was and how crappy the dpi scaling was. Nostalgic glasses are some times too rosy. > The OS is no longer the product It used to be that the product was office, sql server, exchange and windows was the vehicle to deliver it. It’s really not so different that the products are OneDrive or AppInsights or GitHub.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
gtk40 3y ago
I was playing around with Windows 95 in a VM a few years ago (I think 2020 when we all felt we had too much time on our hands). I was curious how modern of a web browser I could get and I found RetroZilla: https://rn10950.github.io/RetroZillaWeb/ https://rn10950.github.io/RetroZillaWeb/ It essentially backported some newer Gecko features and SSL certs to older version of Windows. I was able to use many common websites perfectly fine on this browser. RetroZilla hasn't received an update since 2019 so it may not work as well now three years later. It looks like there may be a current build of K-Meleon for Windows 95 though so I may give that a whirl sometime.
- mananaysiempre 3y ago
  As far as TLS goes, Crypto Ancienne[1] can be useful in this context. (Don’t use it to bank or download blasphemous books, needless to say.) [1] http://oldvcr.blogspot.com/2023/04/crypto-ancienne-22-now-supported-on.html http://oldvcr.blogspot.com/2023/04/crypto-ancienne-22-now-su...
  - chungy 3y ago
    "Download blasphemous books"? That sounds like a highly specific use case, one I've never sought out. Why would it be inherently dangerous on Windows 95? I think there's some context or euphemism I'm missing.
    - mananaysiempre 3y ago
      No, I’m being literal, it’s just the environment I’m suddenly finding myself in in recent months :) I simply meant that the security of the TLS library (port) is founded more on good wishes and optimism than on testing or expertise (which the authors freely admit), so don’t use it as a daily driver.
      - chungy 3y ago
        So more of a political situation. I live in the United States and there is no such similar concern. There is Tor if you do live in a country that practices censorship.
netbioserror 3y ago
To his point, even in the Linux world, DEs have accumulated the bloat of features, animations, complex compositing, front-to-back theming, and other frivolities that have made them large and slow. Not to mention that "flat" theming has somehow consumed everything. Try using an older stacking WM. It is shocking how fast they are and how few resources they use. Their problem is that they're not maintained. Is there a WM out there that can do the basic quality-of-life functions of today's DEs? I'd love a simple, opinionated WM that takes the features we know are useful today (workspaces, expo mode, sensible file manager layouts, system trays) and gives them a color-adjustable window theme inspired by 90's aesthetics, with minimal compositing that can run fast on hardware as minimal as a prototype RISC-V board. Or really, what we need is a truly minimal DE. Something that doesn't care about GTK or Qt or Kvantum, and stays lean. Edit: I've already tried tiling WMs and I don't like them. I want a primarily mouse-driven UI. I'm sort of in agreement with the NeXT philosophy there. I primarily use Mint and Cinnamon these days. I also understand that applications are bloated, but they can be bloated in their own little sandbox instead of creeping out to the rest of the system.
- gibspaulding 3y ago
  Its been a while since I distro/desktop hopped around the Linux world, but these are definitely still out there. Bodhi Linux especially comes to mind with their enlightenment fork moksha. LXQT or XFCE might also for the bill if you want something a bit less foreign. Or Openbox if you want to go all the way minimalist. Or i3/sway if you're into tiling WM's.
  - Sander_Marechal 3y ago
    I love my AwesomeWM
    - tmtvl 3y ago
      Same, it really nice to be able to say "this tag has floating windows, that tag has maximized windows, and that other tag tiles in a spiral."
- 3y ago
cuddlyogre 3y ago
Are there truly insurmountable reasons why an ancient os can't be used, even a closed source os like Windows, that couldn't be worked around by building some kind of compatibility layer, given infinite effort and resources?
- mynameishere 3y ago
  You could probably emulate Windows 11 on a Multics machine if you wanted.
- jzb 3y ago
  If you really wanted, you should be able to use any old version of Windows or whatever in VirtualBox or VMware or under Qemu/KVM. Probably have limits around screen resolution - I don’t think you could coax Windows 3.11 or 95 to do fulscreen at 3480x2160 - but if you just want to get it going, you could. A few years ago I nearly got the first Red Hat Linux release going under KVM. I imagine someone who knows it better than I could succeed.
  - bombcar 3y ago
    It seems Win98 supported 1920x1440 at least, and maybe you could do something dirty with "multiple monitors" somehow.
- Night_Thastus 3y ago
  Can't? I'd be surprised. But the older the OS, the harder it's going to be to get anything modern working on it. And people do have finite effort and resources. And frankly, it's just not a great idea anyways. For all the complaints, modern Windows is heaps better than its older counterparts for usage today. It's much better at utilizing modern CPUs, SSDs, GPUs, etc. It has (if imperfect) up to date security measures. More or less everything is out-of-the-box compatible with it. I can't even remember the last time I had something break and it was actually on the Windows end and not an application running on top of it that was the problem.
- BirAdam 3y ago
  Things like kernelEx did exactly that. There’s also HX for MS-DOS. Thing is, as fewer and fewer people use the OS for which compatibility is intended, the translation systems fall into disrepair.
guestbest 3y ago
Windows 98 SE was probably the most stable ‘light’ version of Microsoft Windows ever made. I Microsoft got rid of the DOS underpinnings in Win 2k the systems started requiring much more ram just to run. When combined with VS6 and at least a gig of hd space, it was a very capable machine for development.
- npteljes 3y ago
  Not on my machine. After Win 3.1, Win XP Sp1 was the first system that was stable, otherwise I needed to reinstall them constantly.
- sjm 3y ago
  98SE for gaming was perfect. 2000 was "ok" when you had to eventually switch. Everything after that was pretty terrible.
  - sn_master 3y ago
    What was wrong with XP? (besides the default "bubbly" UI)
    - guestbest 3y ago
      This was around 2003-4. I had a Libretto 50ct (pentium 75mhz, 32 meg ram) running 95 and 98 perfectly, but on upgrading it to win 2k, not only was it extremely slow, but it also was limited to 16 colors (no drivers for video). There was no retro community in those days, so the recommendation to get a usb or Wi-Fi connection to the internet was to upgrade to win98 as I don’t remember win95 having any support for Wi-Fi or usb. Since win98 was already old at that point, a user such as myself might as well use win98se. I remember it being rock solid Linux with the 2.4 kernel ram just as slow as windows 2k in the basic bash terminal mode and x windows was very slow. The terminal was also sadly very slow given the limited bus capacity for the hard drive which ran at 5200rpm. The Linux 2.2 kernel ran much faster, but everything was too old in the debian software archive to support usb over pcmcia. Also listening to MP3’s and doing anything else caused a slow down in the gui and skipping in the mp3 except in windows and older Linux kernels
JEDI-HACKER 3y ago
[dead]
meerita 3y ago
"Second of all, for a variety of reasons I have a major aversion to Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 and higher" I remember how painfull and ultra-integrated with all the operative system IE 4.0 wanted to be back then. The computers were suffering all the time, and some widgets cloned on the screen when they've been dragged.
- bombcar 3y ago
  I remember bypassing so many "school lockdown" tools by opening a file browser and then using that to become a web browser and versa vice.
cat_plus_plus 3y ago
That's rookie numbers, I still use a Citizen watch which is solar powered but is otherwise identical to an 18th century mechanical watch, with a single crown to set date and time. Beats charging a smartwatch daily or fumbling with button combos to change timezone while traveling. Now it's true that I got a hardware update, but the author would presumably like a new desktop/laptop if it didn't force unwanted UI changes from what works for him. It's a sign that computer tech has not matured yet. You can easily get a car, or watch or a TV with the same controls that worked for you your whole life. There is no reason laptops or smartphones should be different, especially since software can easily support multiple themes for different tastes.
- seanhunter 3y ago
  Cars, old school watches and (unconnected) TVs are things don't change because they aren't updated. If you disable updates many laptops and smartphones won't have any UI changes.
  - onetokeoverthe 3y ago
    [dead]
- jollyllama 3y ago
  >You can easily get a car, or watch or a TV with the same controls that worked for you your whole life. Is this still true, say, if you are 40 years old and "get" is interpreted as "buy new from a store/dealer"? I don't think it is, and that's a shame.
Aloha 3y ago
He's still blogging too - http://www.andrewturnbull.net http://www.andrewturnbull.net
- pt_PT_guy 3y ago
  spent some time there. fun!
deviantbit 3y ago
If we continue his logic, I would hate to know what other tools he still uses from 1995. I would assume his toothbrush hasn't changed either.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
forgotmypw17 3y ago
Windows 95 was developed over several years with a lot of research and user studies. The primary objective of all this work was so that a person without prior exposure to computers could figure out how to use it. The software was designed to help the user accomplish the tasks they have set out to do before sitting down at the computer. Today, both the audience and the objectives have changed. The overwhelming majority of the audience is now computer-literate and can be counted on to figure out how to use the basic features regardless of how poorly designed or inefficient they may be. And the priorities for many interfaces have changed, with the user's tasks relegated to a side quest. Another factor is that Windows 95 was developed for "install it and leave it" operation, with the next upgrade coming in a year or two. Giving more attention to detail was unavoidable because you could not patch a bug a week after release. And Microsoft was offering phone support for its products, so every UI flaw would increase support costs. Also, one of the design requirements was to fully support only-keyboard operation as a first-class access method, and a lot of QA effort went into ensuring this was true. This parallel access method resulted in a UI which was much more thoroughly evaluated for its efficiency. Finally, I think a higher portion of people in the UI field were there for personal and passion reasons, and would have been embarrassed to have anything to do with the type of blundering buffoon of an interface that is common in today's computing. https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/05/24/strategy-letter-ii-chicken-and-egg-problems/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/05/24/strategy-letter-ii... https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2001/07/31/hard-assed-bug-fixin/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2001/07/31/hard-assed-bug-fix... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35932340 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35932340
- MichaelZuo 3y ago
  To be fair to Microsoft, that's still mostly true for the Windows server editions. The pared down version without the GUI even runs fine on 512MB of memory. Though still a far cry from the 64 MB that XP needed, which included the GUI.
  - Clamchop 3y ago
    95 needed at least 4MB, ideally 8MB or more of memory. Which means it will fit in the cache of modern CPUs many times over, though I may be ignoring some swap stuff. 512MB isn't a lot today so might as well use it, at least for things that are useful, but it's nevertheless impressive how puny these old operating systems were, despite having user-facing functionality that would still feel familiar and natural to today's users.
random5245 3y ago
and in future there will be guy say "I still use windows xp/7/10"
- sangriafria 3y ago
  Windows 7 was considered by many to be the last version before Microsoft really started screwing things up. I am pretty certain there will be people on it for decades
random5245 3y ago
there will be guy saying " I still use windows xp" in 5 years from now.
- estebank 3y ago
  https://woodfromeden.substack.com/p/my-long-goodbye-to-windows-xp https://woodfromeden.substack.com/p/my-long-goodbye-to-windo...
- bombcar 3y ago
  WORDSTAR!!!!!! https://awritersden.wordpress.com/2018/02/20/george-r-r-martin-a-computer-dinosaur/ https://awritersden.wordpress.com/2018/02/20/george-r-r-mart...
lbrito 3y ago
>for a variety of reasons I have a major aversion to Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 and higher: I do not want to use it and I do not want it present in any form on any computer I own. I'm always at awe when I see these kinds of Stallman-y statements. This unrelenting, uncompromising, passionate defense of something that I personally just don't give a shit about is fascinating.
- bombcar 3y ago
  I love them; they almost always stem from something real, and it can be quite the adventure discovering just what it is (like in this case, losing the actual file explorer as a separate program).
superkuh 3y ago
I'm still using Ubuntu 10.04 (2010) to type this here in 2023. The newer linux distros just don't have the text to speech ecosystem good enough to compare to the Festival 1.96 + Nitech HTS voices only available on older distros.
exeldapp 3y ago
I had similar thoughts when I was messing with Mac OS 7 and 8 a few months ago. I was astounded at how featureful most software was. Microsoft Word version 5 had every feature I possibly needed and was extremely fast, way faster than modern Word. It makes me wonder what has modern software added to justify making it so slow? Because it’s obviously, at least to me, not new features. If I could I would be just like Andrew here but my work, and love for playing video games (modern and classic alike) prevents me.
- klodolph 3y ago
  I feel like Google Docs is slowly catching up with the functionality of Word 5 on the Mac. Maybe one day it will reach feature parity!
danielvaughn 3y ago
My first computer was a 95 Packard Bell. I loved it. Maybe I have nostalgia goggles, but I distinctly remember the UI being extremely responsive. Even the mouse was extremely fast.
paulpauper 3y ago
Windows 7 is still good. The last of the 'original' Windows before major changes were made with Windows 8.
nkotov 3y ago
I setup a Windows 98 SE VM back in 2020 that I spin up every couple of weeks to play games from my childhood. It's almost like a nostalgia shrine for me. It makes me feel cozy inside when I hear the startup sound or listening to AoE:RoR soundtrack.
gwbas1c 3y ago
I find the attitude in the article troubling, as if the author is resistant to change. I can get staying on something because it works, and "if it aint broke, don't fix it." I also will admit that I don't rush out to get the new version of Windows / MacOS anymore. I've skipped over a few. (But I really, really like Windows 11) But, in 1990s and early 2000s computing, a big thing you had to accept was that the technology you were using was going to be outdated soon; and that the new version will be different. Change was part of the bargain.
afavour 3y ago
Interestingly the author still blogs: http://www.andrewturnbull.net http://www.andrewturnbull.net I wonder what they're using these days?
g42gregory 3y ago
I feel that, in the Desktop OS development progression, at some point the providers (MSFT, Apple, Lunix distros) simply exhausted the list of features that users actually need. I think for Microsoft it happened at around Windows XP (and some people think it was Win 95). At least for me, past Win XP, the OS simply gotten worse though the infinite bloat and making UI "cool and looking like Facebook page (the so called Facebook envy at the time)". Desktop Mac OS, which I currently use, has 99% features that I don't need and don't like. I don't need to spend every second of my life checking latest social media posts, "cool" videos or "wonderful" songs. Luckily the UI is still good and kernel is still POSIX compliant, although I would strongly prefer straight Linux and none of the Apple's command line, storage and memory compression "innovations". Desktop Ubuntu Unity -> everything is a search. Why do I need this? What wrong with the straight windowing system coming from XEROX PARC? It was designed to be just like the pieces of paper on your actual desk. Why would you not want this? It feels like innovation for the sake of innovation.
- insomagent 3y ago
  The way they try to "intelligently" organize everything and make "searching" the default way to access things really breaks the mental model. This disconnect also makes it hard to utilize muscle memory and procedural memory to find things. I remember when I was younger and using Windows 2000, I could flick my mouse like I was in CS:GO grand finals, and use keyboard shortcuts like I was hackerman. That speed came from a procedural familiarity, not from my young age at the time. I know that because kids of the current generation don't have the same abilities, because modern OSes, in their strive to simplify everything, have in fact created more friction for the user.
retrocryptid 3y ago
Meh. 95 was crap for reliability, but I preferred it's UI to the Mac or X or NeXTStep. Unfortunately not all of the #a11y hooks worked as well as 98 or W2K... But those OSes incorporated "weird" UI abstractions that weren't present in 95. Just my $0.02.
- mnd999 3y ago
  NT4 had the same UX as 95 didn’t it? It was certainly way more reliable.
  - hulitu 3y ago
    Yeah, but no DirectX.
    - retrocryptid 3y ago
      And I got scared away from everyone saying "oh, NT has such beefy hardware requirements and doesn't support joysticks." And before I realized I didn't play games on my beefy work computer, win2k was out and it seemed to have better support for multiple displays.
murdoze 3y ago
Windows NT 3.51 still the best
systems_glitch 3y ago
Let's face it, Office 97, or 2000 at the latest, is peak office productivity software. Everything since then has been backslide and churn for the sake of selling new licenses.
- freeAgent 3y ago
  Excel has dramatically improved since then. It’s not even close. It’s much more powerful. I’d also argue that the whole OneDrive/SharePoint live syncing/version history/sharing is also a huge productivity enhancer, though that’s not directly related to what the programs themselves can do.
  - hulitu 3y ago
    The only improvement was working with big files. The new UI in excel (the ribbon) is shitshow.
beefman 3y ago
If you use Windows 7 today, you're longer out of date than this chap was in 2008.
- sn_master 3y ago
  The difference between Windows XP SP2 in 2008 and Windows 95 is much bigger than Windows 7 and Windows 11. By 2008 nothing mainstream was supporting Windows 95 at all.
  - beefman 3y ago
    That's why I wrote "longer" instead of "more". Maybe I should have also added a #Timeghost hashtag.[1] One machine on my desk here is still running Vista 64. But my main machine since 2012 has been a Mac. [1] https://xkcd.com/1393/ https://xkcd.com/1393/
- hulitu 3y ago
  Really ? I use it daily for printing, scanning etc. It is much more usable than Win 10 which i use daily ,at work.
crunkykd 3y ago
I still use Palm Desktop (c1996)
dang 3y ago
Related: Why I Still Use Windows 95 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=236977 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=236977 - July 2008 (35 comments)
sgjohnson 3y ago
Completely unrelated, but I refuse to run a retail SKU of Windows. It's LTSC or bust. I don't care about all the bloat that comes with retail SKUs. In fact, I absolutely hate it. Virtually the only thing I use my windows box for is gaming, and still, it's LTSC or bust. Currently running on Windows Enterprise LTSC 2021 (Build 21H2), and I'll upgrade only when the next LTSC version comes out.
heftig 3y ago
Someone I know is still working with an old HELOS particle size analyzer, which came with a Windows 95 PC and an ISA interface card. Considering the daunting cost of a new machine, they're doing everything they can to keep the PC alive.
earthboundkid 3y ago
OS X Lion is now 13 years old. :-)
jesterpm 3y ago
> and the OS installed takes up well under 500MB Fast-forward to 2023 and many individual Android apps are 100-500 MB each.
fuzzfactor 3y ago
>There are no "activation" schemes, and the OS installed takes up well under 500MB. Actually only 35MB if carefully trimmed for top performance, before adding Office 97.

184 points by zdw 3y ago

Honestly, respect to him for using it that long. I wonder if he is still able to use it, or if security certificates will keep him from accessing anything on the internet?

idontknowifican 3y ago
he seemed a pragmatist around upgrades for new programs so i’d assume he’s rocking longhorn (vista pre release) at this point
- kayodelycaon 3y ago
  I don’t think pragmatist is the word I’d use for him. I can empathize with the annoyance of things changing, but a pragmatist wouldn’t be this inflexible. Given his other writings and the fact he hits things when they anger him, I’d go with curmudgeon. A word harsher than I’d like, but it captures the essence. He seems angry at the world around him and does not like adapting to it. This is pretty common but most people don’t take it this far. :)
grose 3y ago
I found a more recent (2016) blog post by him about it: http://www.andrewturnbull.net/log/index7e39.html?p=716 http://www.andrewturnbull.net/log/index7e39.html?p=716
- Aachen 3y ago
  That post also addresses what a lot of people in this thread have been saying about why not run Linux > the complex rituals needed to achieve the functionality that goes for granted in Windows ah, the ballad of a true "I grew up with Windows and don't realise I've had three decades of learning the various ins and outs in my pocket" user
- troad 3y ago
  It's an interesting article. He rejects Linux because he has a "day job" and no "time and enthusiasm to tinker with computers for their own sake instead of using them productively as a means to an end". I mean... isn't this a little rich for someone who wants to devote time to tracking down retro computer parts being sold by "two-bit resellers", just so he can keep using Windows XP? At some point, maybe you should admit you're a retro-computing enthusiast (high-five to that!), and none of this has anything at all to do with productivity.
  - nylonstrung 3y ago
    It's not productive because it gets progressively harder as time goes on and support/hardware availability gets worse. It's the opposite of futureproof
  - bombcar 3y ago
    It's the difference between keeping your 1948 Dodge Custom 6 running (work on it or pay someone to work on it, everything else remains the same) and buying an entire new car. I can certainly believe it's productivity; Linux itself is annoyingly "changing" over time, Windows 95 will never change.
    - sidewndr46 3y ago
      but you could just install whatever random linux distribution you wanted, disable all updates, & be done.
      - bombcar 3y ago
        Sure, and if you were already used to Linux, that would be great. But if you've never used anything but Windows 95, you'd have to learn all the idiosyncrasies and differences.
      - BirAdam 3y ago
        Eh. That would be worse. Software made a few months later would require newer libraries. The only “stable” (in the sense of unchanging) API out there is effectively win32. I can easily make software written for Win2K or Win95 work on Linux through WINE, but I cannot do the same for Loki games, or even for some abandoned application written a year ago.
- cat_plus_plus 3y ago
  I love how he wants stability for himself but front page of the blog is filled with dunking on conservatives. There is some nuance in that one can want Windows 95 for him/herself and still allow others to have Windows 11. But having "Windows 95 states" and "Windows 11 states" should be at least considered as a solution and also, what if people forcibly install Windows 11 on your kids laptops and don't even bother telling you? Anyway, since he wants to force everyone to take COVID vaccines, surely he can't object to being forced to install the latest OS that still gets up to date security patches?
fsiefken 3y ago
I think Windows9x is not usable anymore with internet unless one uses proxies for the ssl and accept not using modern javascript pages. There was a similar thread about this a month ago or so. XP is more or less usable as there are hacks to use a Chrome version from 2022, I was tempted to create a VM with it to try it as a daily driver, but I lack the time.
- tracker1 3y ago
  Might be better served with one of the lite10/lite11 type windows remixes with most of the fluff removed. Though not sure I'd remove UAC or Defender myself.. but would be roughly similar to XP in terms of overhead with an arguably nicer skin.

gfv 3y ago

Windows 95 was released 13 years prior to the article, roughly the same time span as between Windows 7 release and today. Windows 7 is still installed on a single-digit percentage of computers. It is interesting to see that the reasons outlined in the article could be used almost word-for-word by someone justifying their use of Windows 7.

hosteur 3y ago
I still use windows 7 in a vm for a legacy program. Works really well. Is hugely faster than any modern windows. Even in the vm. I have to run an old version of tortoisesvn. Needless to say the vm is only connected to a local network.
- gfv 3y ago
  Precisely. Compare your comment with these excerpts from the article: >Windows 95 is reasonably fast in performance, and is not compromised by the arguably frivolous animation and eye candy features in Windows 98 and newer versions. >I prefer to have as much native compatibility as possible with DOS applications such as older games I own.
mysterydip 3y ago
One difference is the switch from 95/98 to 2000/XP meant all future games and apps would be incompatible with the older OS. Aside from security patches, I see nothing that prevents 7 from being used today. Subsequent OSes added nothing useful that I noticed, and a lot of negatives. Ironically, you may actually be more secure today running 95 than 7, since any modern exploit would be incompatible with it.
- qsort 3y ago
  (obligatory security patches aside) Major OSs are arguably almost exactly the same as they were 20 years ago, with some random nonsense baked in. Functionally speaking, there's no reason I couldn't be on OSX Tiger or Windows 2000. Linux did get better in terms of hardware support. Freaking NDISWrapper still gives me nightmares.

diego_moita 3y ago

Besides from DOS games (perhaps), all the reasons he gives to stick with Windows 95 are even better reasons to pick up a light Linux distribution. Well, maybe what he really, really wants is just to brag on the internet about it. No one would care if he was using Linux.

marcodiego 3y ago
Except for performance, a light linux distro with DOSBox is much better than windows 95. If it is possible to run DOSEmu then the performance penalty may be smaller but also would be compatibility.

jansan 3y ago

I am still using Paint Shop Pro 7.04 anniversary edition from 2001, and I am using it almost every day. Edit: Here is a wonderful writeup why I am using that specific version: https://www.theregister.com/2007/12/20/verity_stob_software_murder/ https://www.theregister.com/2007/12/20/verity_stob_software_...

ProAm 3y ago
This is great, I havent heard PSP in a very long time!

NotYourLawyer 3y ago

I’d still use Windows 7 (or honestly, even Windows 2000) if I could. Everything since has been a step in the wrong direction.

alkonaut 3y ago
There is a huge number of minor annoyances (People tend to complain about start menus ads performance regressions, poor context menu in Win11 etc - and I agree with all of them). But there is also a massive number of small things added and improve. Just between base Win10 and more recent Win10 there is a huge number of features added regarding for example how apps DPI scale, especially when moving across multiple screens with different DPI for example. Or WSL. So I wouldn't agree "everything" is going in the wrong direction. Something as simple as Win+Shift+S is an amazing improvement which required a third party tool under Win7 but no more since 2010CU. The new terminal... the list goes on and on.
- calvinmorrison 3y ago
  No need for cycling, a real terminal, powerfully. Windows improved dramatically
- actionfromafar 3y ago
  WSL is not fundamentally different to me than a PC emulator. I'd still take Windows 2000 over Win 11 if I could run modern apps like browsers and IDEs on it. It's been on my mind lately that Windows really hasn't done much lately except improving upon the way it's an Azure and Ads vehicle. That's the real "innovation". The OS is no longer the product, it's just an appendage to the cloud. The mushroom, if you will. The mycelium it's connected to is much larger.
  - alkonaut 3y ago
    WSL was just one exemple. There are literally thousands of other improvements. Not all are revolutionary but at least some matter in a big way to most people. Any gamer would say DirectX 12 is enough to upgrade from Win7 to Win10. Anyone with two screens of different DPI should say the same. Anyone with a Wifi6 router would want to upgrade. The list goes on. I also liked the fast and simple Win2000, or Win7. But I do remember how terrible the screenshot functionality was, how bad the terminal was and how crappy the dpi scaling was. Nostalgic glasses are some times too rosy. > The OS is no longer the product It used to be that the product was office, sql server, exchange and windows was the vehicle to deliver it. It’s really not so different that the products are OneDrive or AppInsights or GitHub.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

gtk40 3y ago

I was playing around with Windows 95 in a VM a few years ago (I think 2020 when we all felt we had too much time on our hands). I was curious how modern of a web browser I could get and I found RetroZilla: https://rn10950.github.io/RetroZillaWeb/ https://rn10950.github.io/RetroZillaWeb/ It essentially backported some newer Gecko features and SSL certs to older version of Windows. I was able to use many common websites perfectly fine on this browser. RetroZilla hasn't received an update since 2019 so it may not work as well now three years later. It looks like there may be a current build of K-Meleon for Windows 95 though so I may give that a whirl sometime.

mananaysiempre 3y ago
As far as TLS goes, Crypto Ancienne[1] can be useful in this context. (Don’t use it to bank or download blasphemous books, needless to say.) [1] http://oldvcr.blogspot.com/2023/04/crypto-ancienne-22-now-supported-on.html http://oldvcr.blogspot.com/2023/04/crypto-ancienne-22-now-su...
- chungy 3y ago
  "Download blasphemous books"? That sounds like a highly specific use case, one I've never sought out. Why would it be inherently dangerous on Windows 95? I think there's some context or euphemism I'm missing.
  - mananaysiempre 3y ago
    No, I’m being literal, it’s just the environment I’m suddenly finding myself in in recent months :) I simply meant that the security of the TLS library (port) is founded more on good wishes and optimism than on testing or expertise (which the authors freely admit), so don’t use it as a daily driver.
    - chungy 3y ago
      So more of a political situation. I live in the United States and there is no such similar concern. There is Tor if you do live in a country that practices censorship.

netbioserror 3y ago

To his point, even in the Linux world, DEs have accumulated the bloat of features, animations, complex compositing, front-to-back theming, and other frivolities that have made them large and slow. Not to mention that "flat" theming has somehow consumed everything. Try using an older stacking WM. It is shocking how fast they are and how few resources they use. Their problem is that they're not maintained. Is there a WM out there that can do the basic quality-of-life functions of today's DEs? I'd love a simple, opinionated WM that takes the features we know are useful today (workspaces, expo mode, sensible file manager layouts, system trays) and gives them a color-adjustable window theme inspired by 90's aesthetics, with minimal compositing that can run fast on hardware as minimal as a prototype RISC-V board. Or really, what we need is a truly minimal DE. Something that doesn't care about GTK or Qt or Kvantum, and stays lean. Edit: I've already tried tiling WMs and I don't like them. I want a primarily mouse-driven UI. I'm sort of in agreement with the NeXT philosophy there. I primarily use Mint and Cinnamon these days. I also understand that applications are bloated, but they can be bloated in their own little sandbox instead of creeping out to the rest of the system.

gibspaulding 3y ago
Its been a while since I distro/desktop hopped around the Linux world, but these are definitely still out there. Bodhi Linux especially comes to mind with their enlightenment fork moksha. LXQT or XFCE might also for the bill if you want something a bit less foreign. Or Openbox if you want to go all the way minimalist. Or i3/sway if you're into tiling WM's.
- Sander_Marechal 3y ago
  I love my AwesomeWM
  - tmtvl 3y ago
    Same, it really nice to be able to say "this tag has floating windows, that tag has maximized windows, and that other tag tiles in a spiral."
3y ago

cuddlyogre 3y ago

Are there truly insurmountable reasons why an ancient os can't be used, even a closed source os like Windows, that couldn't be worked around by building some kind of compatibility layer, given infinite effort and resources?

mynameishere 3y ago
You could probably emulate Windows 11 on a Multics machine if you wanted.
jzb 3y ago
If you really wanted, you should be able to use any old version of Windows or whatever in VirtualBox or VMware or under Qemu/KVM. Probably have limits around screen resolution - I don’t think you could coax Windows 3.11 or 95 to do fulscreen at 3480x2160 - but if you just want to get it going, you could. A few years ago I nearly got the first Red Hat Linux release going under KVM. I imagine someone who knows it better than I could succeed.
- bombcar 3y ago
  It seems Win98 supported 1920x1440 at least, and maybe you could do something dirty with "multiple monitors" somehow.
Night_Thastus 3y ago
Can't? I'd be surprised. But the older the OS, the harder it's going to be to get anything modern working on it. And people do have finite effort and resources. And frankly, it's just not a great idea anyways. For all the complaints, modern Windows is heaps better than its older counterparts for usage today. It's much better at utilizing modern CPUs, SSDs, GPUs, etc. It has (if imperfect) up to date security measures. More or less everything is out-of-the-box compatible with it. I can't even remember the last time I had something break and it was actually on the Windows end and not an application running on top of it that was the problem.
BirAdam 3y ago
Things like kernelEx did exactly that. There’s also HX for MS-DOS. Thing is, as fewer and fewer people use the OS for which compatibility is intended, the translation systems fall into disrepair.

guestbest 3y ago

Windows 98 SE was probably the most stable ‘light’ version of Microsoft Windows ever made. I Microsoft got rid of the DOS underpinnings in Win 2k the systems started requiring much more ram just to run. When combined with VS6 and at least a gig of hd space, it was a very capable machine for development.

npteljes 3y ago
Not on my machine. After Win 3.1, Win XP Sp1 was the first system that was stable, otherwise I needed to reinstall them constantly.
sjm 3y ago
98SE for gaming was perfect. 2000 was "ok" when you had to eventually switch. Everything after that was pretty terrible.
- sn_master 3y ago
  What was wrong with XP? (besides the default "bubbly" UI)
  - guestbest 3y ago
    This was around 2003-4. I had a Libretto 50ct (pentium 75mhz, 32 meg ram) running 95 and 98 perfectly, but on upgrading it to win 2k, not only was it extremely slow, but it also was limited to 16 colors (no drivers for video). There was no retro community in those days, so the recommendation to get a usb or Wi-Fi connection to the internet was to upgrade to win98 as I don’t remember win95 having any support for Wi-Fi or usb. Since win98 was already old at that point, a user such as myself might as well use win98se. I remember it being rock solid Linux with the 2.4 kernel ram just as slow as windows 2k in the basic bash terminal mode and x windows was very slow. The terminal was also sadly very slow given the limited bus capacity for the hard drive which ran at 5200rpm. The Linux 2.2 kernel ran much faster, but everything was too old in the debian software archive to support usb over pcmcia. Also listening to MP3’s and doing anything else caused a slow down in the gui and skipping in the mp3 except in windows and older Linux kernels

JEDI-HACKER 3y ago

[dead]

meerita 3y ago

"Second of all, for a variety of reasons I have a major aversion to Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 and higher" I remember how painfull and ultra-integrated with all the operative system IE 4.0 wanted to be back then. The computers were suffering all the time, and some widgets cloned on the screen when they've been dragged.

bombcar 3y ago
I remember bypassing so many "school lockdown" tools by opening a file browser and then using that to become a web browser and versa vice.

cat_plus_plus 3y ago

That's rookie numbers, I still use a Citizen watch which is solar powered but is otherwise identical to an 18th century mechanical watch, with a single crown to set date and time. Beats charging a smartwatch daily or fumbling with button combos to change timezone while traveling. Now it's true that I got a hardware update, but the author would presumably like a new desktop/laptop if it didn't force unwanted UI changes from what works for him. It's a sign that computer tech has not matured yet. You can easily get a car, or watch or a TV with the same controls that worked for you your whole life. There is no reason laptops or smartphones should be different, especially since software can easily support multiple themes for different tastes.

seanhunter 3y ago
Cars, old school watches and (unconnected) TVs are things don't change because they aren't updated. If you disable updates many laptops and smartphones won't have any UI changes.
- onetokeoverthe 3y ago
  [dead]
jollyllama 3y ago
>You can easily get a car, or watch or a TV with the same controls that worked for you your whole life. Is this still true, say, if you are 40 years old and "get" is interpreted as "buy new from a store/dealer"? I don't think it is, and that's a shame.

Aloha 3y ago

He's still blogging too - http://www.andrewturnbull.net http://www.andrewturnbull.net

pt_PT_guy 3y ago
spent some time there. fun!

deviantbit 3y ago

If we continue his logic, I would hate to know what other tools he still uses from 1995. I would assume his toothbrush hasn't changed either.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

forgotmypw17 3y ago

Windows 95 was developed over several years with a lot of research and user studies. The primary objective of all this work was so that a person without prior exposure to computers could figure out how to use it. The software was designed to help the user accomplish the tasks they have set out to do before sitting down at the computer. Today, both the audience and the objectives have changed. The overwhelming majority of the audience is now computer-literate and can be counted on to figure out how to use the basic features regardless of how poorly designed or inefficient they may be. And the priorities for many interfaces have changed, with the user's tasks relegated to a side quest. Another factor is that Windows 95 was developed for "install it and leave it" operation, with the next upgrade coming in a year or two. Giving more attention to detail was unavoidable because you could not patch a bug a week after release. And Microsoft was offering phone support for its products, so every UI flaw would increase support costs. Also, one of the design requirements was to fully support only-keyboard operation as a first-class access method, and a lot of QA effort went into ensuring this was true. This parallel access method resulted in a UI which was much more thoroughly evaluated for its efficiency. Finally, I think a higher portion of people in the UI field were there for personal and passion reasons, and would have been embarrassed to have anything to do with the type of blundering buffoon of an interface that is common in today's computing. https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/05/24/strategy-letter-ii-chicken-and-egg-problems/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/05/24/strategy-letter-ii... https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2001/07/31/hard-assed-bug-fixin/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2001/07/31/hard-assed-bug-fix... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35932340 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35932340

MichaelZuo 3y ago
To be fair to Microsoft, that's still mostly true for the Windows server editions. The pared down version without the GUI even runs fine on 512MB of memory. Though still a far cry from the 64 MB that XP needed, which included the GUI.
- Clamchop 3y ago
  95 needed at least 4MB, ideally 8MB or more of memory. Which means it will fit in the cache of modern CPUs many times over, though I may be ignoring some swap stuff. 512MB isn't a lot today so might as well use it, at least for things that are useful, but it's nevertheless impressive how puny these old operating systems were, despite having user-facing functionality that would still feel familiar and natural to today's users.

random5245 3y ago

and in future there will be guy say "I still use windows xp/7/10"

sangriafria 3y ago
Windows 7 was considered by many to be the last version before Microsoft really started screwing things up. I am pretty certain there will be people on it for decades

random5245 3y ago

there will be guy saying " I still use windows xp" in 5 years from now.

estebank 3y ago
https://woodfromeden.substack.com/p/my-long-goodbye-to-windows-xp https://woodfromeden.substack.com/p/my-long-goodbye-to-windo...
bombcar 3y ago
WORDSTAR!!!!!! https://awritersden.wordpress.com/2018/02/20/george-r-r-martin-a-computer-dinosaur/ https://awritersden.wordpress.com/2018/02/20/george-r-r-mart...

lbrito 3y ago

>for a variety of reasons I have a major aversion to Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 and higher: I do not want to use it and I do not want it present in any form on any computer I own. I'm always at awe when I see these kinds of Stallman-y statements. This unrelenting, uncompromising, passionate defense of something that I personally just don't give a shit about is fascinating.

bombcar 3y ago
I love them; they almost always stem from something real, and it can be quite the adventure discovering just what it is (like in this case, losing the actual file explorer as a separate program).

superkuh 3y ago

I'm still using Ubuntu 10.04 (2010) to type this here in 2023. The newer linux distros just don't have the text to speech ecosystem good enough to compare to the Festival 1.96 + Nitech HTS voices only available on older distros.

exeldapp 3y ago

I had similar thoughts when I was messing with Mac OS 7 and 8 a few months ago. I was astounded at how featureful most software was. Microsoft Word version 5 had every feature I possibly needed and was extremely fast, way faster than modern Word. It makes me wonder what has modern software added to justify making it so slow? Because it’s obviously, at least to me, not new features. If I could I would be just like Andrew here but my work, and love for playing video games (modern and classic alike) prevents me.

klodolph 3y ago
I feel like Google Docs is slowly catching up with the functionality of Word 5 on the Mac. Maybe one day it will reach feature parity!

danielvaughn 3y ago

My first computer was a 95 Packard Bell. I loved it. Maybe I have nostalgia goggles, but I distinctly remember the UI being extremely responsive. Even the mouse was extremely fast.

paulpauper 3y ago

Windows 7 is still good. The last of the 'original' Windows before major changes were made with Windows 8.

nkotov 3y ago

I setup a Windows 98 SE VM back in 2020 that I spin up every couple of weeks to play games from my childhood. It's almost like a nostalgia shrine for me. It makes me feel cozy inside when I hear the startup sound or listening to AoE:RoR soundtrack.

gwbas1c 3y ago

I find the attitude in the article troubling, as if the author is resistant to change. I can get staying on something because it works, and "if it aint broke, don't fix it." I also will admit that I don't rush out to get the new version of Windows / MacOS anymore. I've skipped over a few. (But I really, really like Windows 11) But, in 1990s and early 2000s computing, a big thing you had to accept was that the technology you were using was going to be outdated soon; and that the new version will be different. Change was part of the bargain.

afavour 3y ago

Interestingly the author still blogs: http://www.andrewturnbull.net http://www.andrewturnbull.net I wonder what they're using these days?

g42gregory 3y ago

I feel that, in the Desktop OS development progression, at some point the providers (MSFT, Apple, Lunix distros) simply exhausted the list of features that users actually need. I think for Microsoft it happened at around Windows XP (and some people think it was Win 95). At least for me, past Win XP, the OS simply gotten worse though the infinite bloat and making UI "cool and looking like Facebook page (the so called Facebook envy at the time)". Desktop Mac OS, which I currently use, has 99% features that I don't need and don't like. I don't need to spend every second of my life checking latest social media posts, "cool" videos or "wonderful" songs. Luckily the UI is still good and kernel is still POSIX compliant, although I would strongly prefer straight Linux and none of the Apple's command line, storage and memory compression "innovations". Desktop Ubuntu Unity -> everything is a search. Why do I need this? What wrong with the straight windowing system coming from XEROX PARC? It was designed to be just like the pieces of paper on your actual desk. Why would you not want this? It feels like innovation for the sake of innovation.

insomagent 3y ago
The way they try to "intelligently" organize everything and make "searching" the default way to access things really breaks the mental model. This disconnect also makes it hard to utilize muscle memory and procedural memory to find things. I remember when I was younger and using Windows 2000, I could flick my mouse like I was in CS:GO grand finals, and use keyboard shortcuts like I was hackerman. That speed came from a procedural familiarity, not from my young age at the time. I know that because kids of the current generation don't have the same abilities, because modern OSes, in their strive to simplify everything, have in fact created more friction for the user.

retrocryptid 3y ago

Meh. 95 was crap for reliability, but I preferred it's UI to the Mac or X or NeXTStep. Unfortunately not all of the #a11y hooks worked as well as 98 or W2K... But those OSes incorporated "weird" UI abstractions that weren't present in 95. Just my $0.02.

mnd999 3y ago
NT4 had the same UX as 95 didn’t it? It was certainly way more reliable.
- hulitu 3y ago
  Yeah, but no DirectX.
  - retrocryptid 3y ago
    And I got scared away from everyone saying "oh, NT has such beefy hardware requirements and doesn't support joysticks." And before I realized I didn't play games on my beefy work computer, win2k was out and it seemed to have better support for multiple displays.

murdoze 3y ago

Windows NT 3.51 still the best

systems_glitch 3y ago

Let's face it, Office 97, or 2000 at the latest, is peak office productivity software. Everything since then has been backslide and churn for the sake of selling new licenses.

freeAgent 3y ago
Excel has dramatically improved since then. It’s not even close. It’s much more powerful. I’d also argue that the whole OneDrive/SharePoint live syncing/version history/sharing is also a huge productivity enhancer, though that’s not directly related to what the programs themselves can do.
- hulitu 3y ago
  The only improvement was working with big files. The new UI in excel (the ribbon) is shitshow.

beefman 3y ago

If you use Windows 7 today, you're longer out of date than this chap was in 2008.

sn_master 3y ago
The difference between Windows XP SP2 in 2008 and Windows 95 is much bigger than Windows 7 and Windows 11. By 2008 nothing mainstream was supporting Windows 95 at all.
- beefman 3y ago
  That's why I wrote "longer" instead of "more". Maybe I should have also added a #Timeghost hashtag.[1] One machine on my desk here is still running Vista 64. But my main machine since 2012 has been a Mac. [1] https://xkcd.com/1393/ https://xkcd.com/1393/
hulitu 3y ago
Really ? I use it daily for printing, scanning etc. It is much more usable than Win 10 which i use daily ,at work.

crunkykd 3y ago

I still use Palm Desktop (c1996)

dang 3y ago

Related: Why I Still Use Windows 95 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=236977 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=236977 - July 2008 (35 comments)

sgjohnson 3y ago

Completely unrelated, but I refuse to run a retail SKU of Windows. It's LTSC or bust. I don't care about all the bloat that comes with retail SKUs. In fact, I absolutely hate it. Virtually the only thing I use my windows box for is gaming, and still, it's LTSC or bust. Currently running on Windows Enterprise LTSC 2021 (Build 21H2), and I'll upgrade only when the next LTSC version comes out.

heftig 3y ago

Someone I know is still working with an old HELOS particle size analyzer, which came with a Windows 95 PC and an ISA interface card. Considering the daunting cost of a new machine, they're doing everything they can to keep the PC alive.

earthboundkid 3y ago

OS X Lion is now 13 years old. :-)

jesterpm 3y ago

> and the OS installed takes up well under 500MB Fast-forward to 2023 and many individual Android apps are 100-500 MB each.

fuzzfactor 3y ago

>There are no "activation" schemes, and the OS installed takes up well under 500MB. Actually only 35MB if carefully trimmed for top performance, before adding Office 97.