5 ms·

Windows 8.1 vs Windows 7 is not so interesting to me. But Microsoft 2014 vs Microsoft 1994 is very interesting to me. There was a time when they had enough wei

Windows 8.1 vs Windows 7 is not so interesting to me. But Microsoft 2014 vs Microsoft 1994 is very interesting to me. There was a time when they had enough weight that they could force their vendors to toe the party line on OS versions. Enterprises might drag their feet on upgrading, but consumers were force-fed the new release even if they hated it. They had failures, but even so their vendors were reluctant to push back like this. Or at least, that's how I remember it. Not any more.

bad_user 13y ago
Let's remember the versions history for Windows targeted at consumers ... Windows 3.0 (1990) => 3.1 (1992) => 3.11 (1993) => 95 (1995) => 98 (1998) => 98 SE (1999) => Me (2000) => XP (2001) Besides Windows Millennium, which was a total clusterfuck (and I happen to have used it), all other versions were better than the ones prior to it. Also worth considering - 3.11 was released one year after 3.1, however it was the same Windows, but with improved networking. And Win 98 SE was like a service pack for Win 98. The only time Microsoft hurried to release a major version of Windows within only one year of the previous one was after Win Me happened. And I was in high-school then, but I don't remember many Windows Me PCs being on display in computer shops.
- artmageddon 13y ago
  > And I was in high-school then, but I don't remember many Windows Me PCs being on display in computer shops. I was as well. I can confidently say that there were enough WinME PCs being sold, but it didn't last as long as Windows 98 had. What I can't remember was whether Windows 2000 was sold in stores in between WinME and XP.
- nollidge 13y ago
  (you've omitted Vista from your timeline)
- Joeri 13y ago
  I remember a different version history, nt4 to 2000 to xp, each version adding a ton of bloat without expanding the functionality (2000 added usb, but xp added nothing to 2000 except bloat and a dumber ui).
- dspillett 13y ago
  Many consider WfWG 3.11 a massive beta test for some of the improvements (in the networking mainly, but in I/O handling chunks too) planned for Win95. IIRC Windows ME, or Windows Yuppy Flu as is got unofficially renamed[!] was never supposed to happen: the cunsumer transition from lagacy Windows to the NT line was originally supposed to happen with Win2K but for various reasons (MS were not ready for it, and neither were the app/game vendors) this didn't happen, so they botched together an upgrade to Win98SE so they had something new to sell to that market until XP happened (by which time everyone (MS, the users, and the 3rd parties) was more ready to transition). [!] after the nick name for the debilitating-when-real illness misunderstood by many and that had a reputation for being faked by certain classes of people who thought they worked too hard (most of the yuppie types who were genuinely ill probably had hypertension/stresss related disorders due to lifestyle, but those did't sound as "cool" to have) which has bouts of chronic fatigue as its main identifying symptom

bad_user 13y ago

Let's remember the versions history for Windows targeted at consumers ... Windows 3.0 (1990) => 3.1 (1992) => 3.11 (1993) => 95 (1995) => 98 (1998) => 98 SE (1999) => Me (2000) => XP (2001) Besides Windows Millennium, which was a total clusterfuck (and I happen to have used it), all other versions were better than the ones prior to it. Also worth considering - 3.11 was released one year after 3.1, however it was the same Windows, but with improved networking. And Win 98 SE was like a service pack for Win 98. The only time Microsoft hurried to release a major version of Windows within only one year of the previous one was after Win Me happened. And I was in high-school then, but I don't remember many Windows Me PCs being on display in computer shops.

artmageddon 13y ago
> And I was in high-school then, but I don't remember many Windows Me PCs being on display in computer shops. I was as well. I can confidently say that there were enough WinME PCs being sold, but it didn't last as long as Windows 98 had. What I can't remember was whether Windows 2000 was sold in stores in between WinME and XP.
nollidge 13y ago
(you've omitted Vista from your timeline)
Joeri 13y ago
I remember a different version history, nt4 to 2000 to xp, each version adding a ton of bloat without expanding the functionality (2000 added usb, but xp added nothing to 2000 except bloat and a dumber ui).
dspillett 13y ago
Many consider WfWG 3.11 a massive beta test for some of the improvements (in the networking mainly, but in I/O handling chunks too) planned for Win95. IIRC Windows ME, or Windows Yuppy Flu as is got unofficially renamed[!] was never supposed to happen: the cunsumer transition from lagacy Windows to the NT line was originally supposed to happen with Win2K but for various reasons (MS were not ready for it, and neither were the app/game vendors) this didn't happen, so they botched together an upgrade to Win98SE so they had something new to sell to that market until XP happened (by which time everyone (MS, the users, and the 3rd parties) was more ready to transition). [!] after the nick name for the debilitating-when-real illness misunderstood by many and that had a reputation for being faked by certain classes of people who thought they worked too hard (most of the yuppie types who were genuinely ill probably had hypertension/stresss related disorders due to lifestyle, but those did't sound as "cool" to have) which has bouts of chronic fatigue as its main identifying symptom