Article about how desktop UIs changed over the years

[Gonzo]

From memory Windows 95c (OEM) was pretty darn stable...

Yeah that's how I remember it too. I never had a single problem with my version of 95.

[kode54]

I had a system with the original 95. It had a 1GB drive formatted to FAT16 since FAT32 was not introduced until 95b. I later found a handy pirate copy of 95b and upgraded to that, then converted to FAT32, for a savings of about 300MB.

[Agozer]

I had a system with the original 95. It had a 1GB drive formatted to FAT16 since FAT32 was not introduced until 95b. I later found a handy pirate copy of 95b and upgraded to that, then converted to FAT32, for a savings of about 300MB.

I had a 1GB drive in my old Windows 95 box as well. Man, that was luxury back then.

[snkcube]

I had a system with the original 95. It had a 1GB drive formatted to FAT16 since FAT32 was not introduced until 95b. I later found a handy pirate copy of 95b and upgraded to that, then converted to FAT32, for a savings of about 300MB.

I had a 1GB drive in my old Windows 95 box as well. Man, that was luxury back then.

I had the same amount of storage as well in my old Windows 95 machine. Pentium II - 200Mhz, 32MB of RAM and a video card with 4MB of VRAM...good times.

[Gil_Hamilton]

I had a gigabyte on my 486 running MS-DOS 6.22.
EAT THAT, BITCHES!

[grinvader]

hahaha oh wow

i had 20MB while i was on dos 6.22



wangsters and their jiggabytes

[Gil_Hamilton]

Why... why would you run 6.22 on a 286?

[Agozer]

I had a system with the original 95. It had a 1GB drive formatted to FAT16 since FAT32 was not introduced until 95b. I later found a handy pirate copy of 95b and upgraded to that, then converted to FAT32, for a savings of about 300MB.

I had a 1GB drive in my old Windows 95 box as well. Man, that was luxury back then.

I had the same amount of storage as well in my old Windows 95 machine. Pentium II - 200Mhz, 32MB of RAM and a video card with 4MB of VRAM...good times.

Pretty much the exact same specs as mine; the only difference was the amount of VRAM. I had (I think) around 1-2MB VRAM stapled to a supposed 2D/3D video card (ATI Rage something). Needless to say, 3D performance was non-existent -- a lot of pure white textures, and less 3D accelerated goodness.

...

Until I got a 4MB 3Dfx Vodoo card. Now that had BLING written all over it.

[grinvader]

Why... why would you run 6.22 on a 286?

Coz that's all I had back then. It worked just fine, too. Years of use.

[Deathlike2]

I had a gigabyte on my 486 running MS-DOS 6.22.
EAT THAT, BITCHES!

So what, I had a 512MB HD on a 486 (with one of those overdrive 5x86 processors) running Win98SE. Partitioned in FAT32 (although I had to use the FAT32 conversion tool in Windows, but that worked well enough). This with a shitacular 1MB video card that ran on the ISA-VLB. Motherboard had two of them. The other one was used for the IDE controller IIRC and serial/parallel controller (all in one, before it was all integrated on the mobo).

[Gil_Hamilton]

I had a gigabyte on my 486 running MS-DOS 6.22.
EAT THAT, BITCHES!

So what, I had a 512MB HD on a 486 (with one of those overdrive 5x86 processors) running Win98SE. Partitioned in FAT32 (although I had to use the FAT32 conversion tool in Windows, but that worked well enough). This with a shitacular 1MB video card that ran on the ISA-VLB. Motherboard had two of them. The other one was used for the IDE controller IIRC and serial/parallel controller (all in one, before it was all integrated on the mobo).

Mmmm, VESA Local Bus.
We had a few cards over the years ran on VLB.

Oldest video card I'm sure about usage and specs was a PCI 2MB Virge.
We were using that from late DOS on through 1999, when I got a RivaTNT.
...
Yes, it was tough being a gamer in this house.

[odditude]

i had a Trio 64V+ (which is why VirtualPC's graphics support makes me cringe) until i scraped together enough cash to get a Riva 128ZX at a computer show (a Diamond Viper V330 8MB, to be exact).

the only redeeming factor about that Trio was that SDD fully supported it.

[Silensho]

Interesting read. I have more limited access to gui's, but I agree with your last comments.

I would have liked more information about what extra features the "addons" brought to the File Manager in Windows 3.x

[Gil_Hamilton]

I would have liked more information about what extra features the "addons" brought to the File Manager in Windows 3.x

The only ones I remember weren't so much add-ons as wholesale replacements.

I had one with integrated ZIP support(could make 'em, unzip 'em, and even handle 'em like a directory), image viewer, text viewer, and probably some other gibberish.
Don't even recall the name now.


Man, speaking of replacements... shell replacements were awesome back then.




Also: Congratulations, Nach. You are now a Wikipedia citation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Program_Manager#cite_ref-0
In fact, you are the ONLY citation for that article. For a tangental statement about Windows 8, in fact.

You also got cited in the Windows 8 article.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_8#cite_ref-28

[Nach]

I would have liked more information about what extra features the "addons" brought to the File Manager in Windows 3.x

As Gil said, there was for integrated zip support. Other additions:
"quick start" program bar on top.
Enhanced association support, with drag and drop to common launchers.
Drive menu list (even if using 3.0!).
Open command prompt here.
File search, with many options, such as find files which match a particular file.

Too many others that I've forgotten.

I would have liked more information about what extra features the "addons" brought to the File Manager in Windows 3.x

I had one with integrated ZIP support(could make 'em, unzip 'em, and even handle 'em like a directory), image viewer, text viewer, and probably some other gibberish.
Don't even recall the name now.

Wiz File Manager Pro had all that and more. So maybe you had that? More Info.

Also: Congratulations, Nach. You are now a Wikipedia citation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Program_Manager#cite_ref-0
In fact, you are the ONLY citation for that article. For a tangental statement about Windows 8, in fact.

You also got cited in the Windows 8 article.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_8#cite_ref-28

...although it's not the first time. All my GUI articles are cited on WP. Several of my programming ones are cited in source code documentation too for popular applications as well.

[Gil_Hamilton]

I would have liked more information about what extra features the "addons" brought to the File Manager in Windows 3.x

I had one with integrated ZIP support(could make 'em, unzip 'em, and even handle 'em like a directory), image viewer, text viewer, and probably some other gibberish.
Don't even recall the name now.

Wiz File Manager Pro had all that and more. So maybe you had that? More Info.

It's possible. The name sounds familiar.
My copy was on a shovelware CD full of random shareware demos. Man, there was all sorts of crazy shit on those... I miss 'em sometimes.

[Nach]

It's possible. The name sounds familiar.
My copy was on a shovelware CD full of random shareware demos. Man, there was all sorts of crazy shit on those... I miss 'em sometimes.

I paid $30 for a full copy of mine, and it was worth the price tag.

There were also all kinds of shareware addons for Program Manager, but I didn't find them as useful and don't remember them well.

[Rashidi]

Animated Icons add-on for Win3.x program manager, thats what i remembered as my early-adopter friend asks me where his animated icons goes when he upgraded to newly released win95.

[nuhuysm]

A history of Windows
Highlights from the first 25 years
1975–1981: Microsoft boots up,

1982–1985: Introducing Windows 1.0,

1987–1992: Windows 2.0–2.11—More windows, more speed,

1990–1994: Windows 3.0–Windows NT—Getting the graphics,

1995–2001: Windows 95—the PC comes of age (and don't forget the Internet),

1998–2000: Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows Me,

2001–2005: Windows XP—Stable, usable, and fast

2006–2008: Windows Vista—Smart on security

2009–Today: Windows 7

watching out for >>>> Windows 8

To me I think windows XP was and is the best don't know about you, what do you think?

[grinvader]

2001–2005: Windows XP—Stable, usable, and fast

you probably meant "after SP2"

[nuhuysm]

2001–2005: Windows XP—Stable, usable, and fast

you probably meant "after SP2"

Yeah its the service pack 2(SP2) but I think I have seen that blue screen even on windows 7

[paulguy]

Yeah that's more a shittty third party driver error. I had it in 7 from a bad driver. But yeah, most of microsoft's launch-day OSes were pretty bad, but got better with updates, even vista isn't that bad.

[SquareHead]

I agree with everyone, the article was well written, and rings true.

I still get the BSOD in 7. My netgear drivers for my wireless n device seem to be the culprit.

The first MS dominant computer I cut my teeth on was an old 486 DX4 100Mhz with 8Mb Ram and a 640Mb hd. It ran Windows 95, and crashed every time I blinked. But then again I had a pen and digitizer, a connectix quick cam, printer and scanner all loaded on there, not to mention I was an AOL customer... America Online's software was absolute shit, and caused more problems than anything.

[grinvader]

dood, don't write MB 'Mb'. either you skip the caps for everything or you don't. putting it on the m and not the b makes it look like you're insisting on megabits, which makes your ram 1MB (which is what i had on the shitty 286) and a 80MB hdd, which definitely sounds wrong for a 486.

[Rashidi]

Someone at MSFN (post #1317) cited how Nemulator appears earlier than when Win8 design team starting to re-imangined windows in 2010.

Interrestingly, I haven't found any other site that talk how Nemulator were so close "look and feel" to win8's Metro/Modern UI/MDL ...