4 ms·

> You need to account for the era of release though. Sure, I account for that. > And hence the subjective part: I disagree with you’re selection of criteria

> You need to account for the era of release though. Sure, I account for that. > And hence the subjective part: I disagree with you’re selection of criteria I explicitly haven't listed an entire set of criteria, although I'd be curious to se which version of Windows you would think could be put forward as better objectively. Pretty sure Windows 7 has all types of aware and highest scores for user satisfaction and what not, so a cursory review of the available data would seem to align with my ranking. But, still, which version do you think beats Windows 7 since you disagree based on the few qualifiers I listed? You seem like an XP man, is it XP?

hnlmorg 2y ago
No. I don’t like XP. For me it would be Windows 2000. When it was released its competition was - Mac OS 9 (which was about as reliable as Windows 98) - OSX wasn’t yet released. But when it did, it wasn’t particularly great for existing Mac users. It took a few years for OSX to really gain momentum. - Linux (who’s desktop support was still immature) - BeOS 5 (which was bloody awesome, but also very niche) - Windows Me (easily the worst desktop OS Microsoft have ever produced. Say what you will about Vista, but its flaws were a combination of its ambition and Microsoft “certifying” it for hardware that wasn’t powerful enough. Whereas Me just sucked in every conceivable and irredeemable way). Windows 2000 was the first time Microsoft but focus on the little details. For example Notepad was finally given hot keys like ctrl+s to save. In fact I’d argue it was the last time Microsoft put refinement above new features too. It was the first time we saw a workstation OS suitable for home use (aside perhaps BeOS but much as I love BeOS, NT was a more sophisticated engineering feat). Windows 2000 was the first time a windows release didn’t double the system requirements. A trend that then continued again right up until around 7/8. Windows 2000 was rock solid. I only managed to crash it twice and one of those times was because I was playing around with an undocumented Windows API — so that really was my own fault. Windows 2000 was the last time was unified UI across all of the OS management tools. Except for the font management which was still a 16-bit app. Microsoft have only gotten worse at this since too. It was also the prettiest too (but that’s entirely subjective). Windows 2000 was the OS that shipped the most sane defaults. Though there was still some WTF moments like the terminal port being open. Since then though, I’m constantly fighting with Windows trying to dumb everything down. Windows 2000 is what proved to the world that Microsoft could release a half decent OS that supports SMP and doesn’t require a DOS bootloader. It was a real game changer of an OS and released at the time when everything else on the market was garage too. Which just goes to demonstrate just how much of a game changer it was. It was, in my opinion, not only the first Microsoft OS that didn’t completely suck in every conceivable way. But arguably the only good OS they’ve ever released because everything since has been fraught with compromises. Including 7. XP pre-SP2 was basically an uglier 2000 with twice the CPU and memory footprint. After SP2 XP grew into its own entirely. But by that point desktop Linux was good enough to run as my primary OS. Edit: the opinions here are both my own, and my professional experience managing desktop and server IT infrastructures for small businesses at that time. And at that time, Windows 2000 changed everything. If 7 hadn’t been released then Microsoft could have kept supporting XP and most people would have been perfectly happy. But if 2000 wasn’t released then Microsoft would have been in the same deep shit that Apple were with their repeated failed attempts at creating a successor to Mac OS prior to re-hiring Steve Jobs.
- kennysoona 2y ago
  I think a lot of these reasons are explicitly subjective preferences without even making an attempt to list objective criteria. Windows 2000 was indeed much better than XP and I ran it myself, but it was designed to be a replacement for NT and not geared towards consumers. Win7 was the culmination and peak of what MS started with XP - moving consumers to a stable NT based OS. W7 was also rock solid, didn't double the system requirements from Vista, and I would also argue had a 99% practically unified UI experience with Aero Glass. The defaults were mostly fine, not worse than W2000 IMO, as a bunch of services still had to be disabled, but it was nothing like what you have to do to restrict W10. What arguments could you make, attempting to use objective criteria and technical merit only (i.e. excluding being first at something and just considering how well something worked) that 2000 was better than W7, when AFAIK W7 was a better culmination of Microsoft's goals with a better user experience, and much longer longevity. W7 had a longer lifetime than XP, and XP and 7 both had far longer lifetimes than 2000.
  - hnlmorg 2y ago
    I don’t know if you remember, but I was the one who originally said these types of conversations are seldom entirely objective. The arguments you’re making about my comments are precisely the ones I made to you yesterday.
    - kennysoona 2y ago
      No, not at all. I said OSes can be objectively measured, when you were pointing out that much of the measurement is subjective. I pointed out that is largely irrelevant, since all that matters is they can be measured objectively, even if it's a discussion on how best to do that. You begrudgingly agreed. I simply stated W7 was the best without defining criteria, but did say I believe it would hold up against whatever objective criteria are established, and that there is already objective evidence in support of that point. Here, you've listed unambiguously subjective preferences and opinions, with not even a slight attempt to define objective criteria to support your point. For what it's worth, if you search 'best version of windows', pretty much every singles article ranking them is giving Windows 7 first. At the very least, it seems to be the majority opinion. I think the text from the Digital Trends article giving it first place is fair: "There’s an argument to be made that Windows 7 is a just a refined version of Windows Vista, released at a time when people actually had the kind of hardware that could run it properly. But this king of Windows releases did so much more than that. It was fast and responsive, with many important visual upgrades over previous versions of Windows. It had excellent compatibility, working with older hardware and software alike, and introduced important features which are still Windows mainstays today. It added pinning applications to the taskbar, introduced stacking Windows for better organization, let you preview windows with taskbar thumbnails, and it made it possible to snap Windows to different portions of the screen. Windows 7 is important for what it didn’t have, too. It feels like the last Windows operating system that was fast and modern, but hadn’t yet started chasing features designed for other platforms, like touch-targeted UI elements, or smart assistant integration. It didn’t have the Microsoft Store or overblown data collection, and there was no attempt to force you to use an online account to login. It was a clean, responsive operating system that many would likely continue to use today if it was still supported by Microsoft and modern hardware alike."

hnlmorg 2y ago

No. I don’t like XP. For me it would be Windows 2000. When it was released its competition was - Mac OS 9 (which was about as reliable as Windows 98) - OSX wasn’t yet released. But when it did, it wasn’t particularly great for existing Mac users. It took a few years for OSX to really gain momentum. - Linux (who’s desktop support was still immature) - BeOS 5 (which was bloody awesome, but also very niche) - Windows Me (easily the worst desktop OS Microsoft have ever produced. Say what you will about Vista, but its flaws were a combination of its ambition and Microsoft “certifying” it for hardware that wasn’t powerful enough. Whereas Me just sucked in every conceivable and irredeemable way). Windows 2000 was the first time Microsoft but focus on the little details. For example Notepad was finally given hot keys like ctrl+s to save. In fact I’d argue it was the last time Microsoft put refinement above new features too. It was the first time we saw a workstation OS suitable for home use (aside perhaps BeOS but much as I love BeOS, NT was a more sophisticated engineering feat). Windows 2000 was the first time a windows release didn’t double the system requirements. A trend that then continued again right up until around 7/8. Windows 2000 was rock solid. I only managed to crash it twice and one of those times was because I was playing around with an undocumented Windows API — so that really was my own fault. Windows 2000 was the last time was unified UI across all of the OS management tools. Except for the font management which was still a 16-bit app. Microsoft have only gotten worse at this since too. It was also the prettiest too (but that’s entirely subjective). Windows 2000 was the OS that shipped the most sane defaults. Though there was still some WTF moments like the terminal port being open. Since then though, I’m constantly fighting with Windows trying to dumb everything down. Windows 2000 is what proved to the world that Microsoft could release a half decent OS that supports SMP and doesn’t require a DOS bootloader. It was a real game changer of an OS and released at the time when everything else on the market was garage too. Which just goes to demonstrate just how much of a game changer it was. It was, in my opinion, not only the first Microsoft OS that didn’t completely suck in every conceivable way. But arguably the only good OS they’ve ever released because everything since has been fraught with compromises. Including 7. XP pre-SP2 was basically an uglier 2000 with twice the CPU and memory footprint. After SP2 XP grew into its own entirely. But by that point desktop Linux was good enough to run as my primary OS. Edit: the opinions here are both my own, and my professional experience managing desktop and server IT infrastructures for small businesses at that time. And at that time, Windows 2000 changed everything. If 7 hadn’t been released then Microsoft could have kept supporting XP and most people would have been perfectly happy. But if 2000 wasn’t released then Microsoft would have been in the same deep shit that Apple were with their repeated failed attempts at creating a successor to Mac OS prior to re-hiring Steve Jobs.

kennysoona 2y ago
I think a lot of these reasons are explicitly subjective preferences without even making an attempt to list objective criteria. Windows 2000 was indeed much better than XP and I ran it myself, but it was designed to be a replacement for NT and not geared towards consumers. Win7 was the culmination and peak of what MS started with XP - moving consumers to a stable NT based OS. W7 was also rock solid, didn't double the system requirements from Vista, and I would also argue had a 99% practically unified UI experience with Aero Glass. The defaults were mostly fine, not worse than W2000 IMO, as a bunch of services still had to be disabled, but it was nothing like what you have to do to restrict W10. What arguments could you make, attempting to use objective criteria and technical merit only (i.e. excluding being first at something and just considering how well something worked) that 2000 was better than W7, when AFAIK W7 was a better culmination of Microsoft's goals with a better user experience, and much longer longevity. W7 had a longer lifetime than XP, and XP and 7 both had far longer lifetimes than 2000.
- hnlmorg 2y ago
  I don’t know if you remember, but I was the one who originally said these types of conversations are seldom entirely objective. The arguments you’re making about my comments are precisely the ones I made to you yesterday.
  - kennysoona 2y ago
    No, not at all. I said OSes can be objectively measured, when you were pointing out that much of the measurement is subjective. I pointed out that is largely irrelevant, since all that matters is they can be measured objectively, even if it's a discussion on how best to do that. You begrudgingly agreed. I simply stated W7 was the best without defining criteria, but did say I believe it would hold up against whatever objective criteria are established, and that there is already objective evidence in support of that point. Here, you've listed unambiguously subjective preferences and opinions, with not even a slight attempt to define objective criteria to support your point. For what it's worth, if you search 'best version of windows', pretty much every singles article ranking them is giving Windows 7 first. At the very least, it seems to be the majority opinion. I think the text from the Digital Trends article giving it first place is fair: "There’s an argument to be made that Windows 7 is a just a refined version of Windows Vista, released at a time when people actually had the kind of hardware that could run it properly. But this king of Windows releases did so much more than that. It was fast and responsive, with many important visual upgrades over previous versions of Windows. It had excellent compatibility, working with older hardware and software alike, and introduced important features which are still Windows mainstays today. It added pinning applications to the taskbar, introduced stacking Windows for better organization, let you preview windows with taskbar thumbnails, and it made it possible to snap Windows to different portions of the screen. Windows 7 is important for what it didn’t have, too. It feels like the last Windows operating system that was fast and modern, but hadn’t yet started chasing features designed for other platforms, like touch-targeted UI elements, or smart assistant integration. It didn’t have the Microsoft Store or overblown data collection, and there was no attempt to force you to use an online account to login. It was a clean, responsive operating system that many would likely continue to use today if it was still supported by Microsoft and modern hardware alike."