Windows 95 turns 20 (Tomorrow Aug 24)

Tech Central ^ | Aug 23, 2015 | Jonathan Roberts

[Dalberg-Acton]

I also started monkeying around with computers in the pre-DOS days. When Windows 3.1 came out, I finally got a bootleg version and tried it. I thought my wrists would swell up from having to use that damned mouse. When I had a problem, I was able to call a 1-800 number and speak with a knowledgeable AMERICAN and they didn’t care HOW I got the operating system, just that I was using it (to build market share, I’m sure).

When Windows 95 rolled out, it was like a rock show. People were all over it and the North Richland Hills Comp-USA store opened at midnight to a huge crowd. MS had been warning people before the event not to use the publicly available beta version for vital stuff. Once they got the market share, they started acting like a “for profit” company again.

[Dalberg-Acton]

They used NT server 3.51 on a computer at work when it came out and our department jumped onto NT 4.0. It was created by some DEC brainiacs that MS had hired to build them an adult OS. That distribution disk would install NT on Intel, DEC or Power PC architecture. Remind me again HOW we have moved forward.

[dennisw]

Damn rodents!!!! I had no computer or anything but I remember the constant news coverage over Windows 95 release. The huddled masses (of geeks) lined up outside stores to buy their copy. The way they go batty over new Apple gadgets these days.

Windows 95 was a quantum leap into making the internet more accessible. Matter of fact my take is the selling out and decline of the United States, via open borders + free trade etc got kicked into high gear with Windows 95 and widespread internet access. Don’t ask me to connect the dots. The year 1995 is a good dividing point.

[BRK]

I still remember upgrading to Win95 on my machine from 3.1. It all seemed like a dream and when that “clouds” background came up for the first time...Wow..

[BRK]

I still remember upgrading to Win95 on my machine from 3.1. It all seemed like a dream and when that “clouds” background came up for the first time...Wow..

[minnesota_bound]

Put Windows 95 or 98 in a Virtualbox or VMware window and see how fast it really could be when you have the ram memory.

I got my first pc with Windows 95 in Dec of 95 and have been fascinated ever since and have made a living with computers since 1998.

Virtualbox
https://www.virtualbox.org/

VMware Player
https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/free#desktop_end_user_computing/vmware_player/7_0

[KoRn]

I feel like such a noob when I tell them that my first home machine was WinME.(grr)

I recall my uncle buying our family’s ‘first’ computer. It was a Windows 95 that he paid $2,500 for from Radio Shack(lol). A little while later, he got it “upgraded” to 16MB. lol

[Windflier]

My wife and I had only been married one month in August of ‘95. We recently celebrated our twentieth anniversary.

Our marriage has yet to crash, or run into the blue screen of death :-)

[nascarnation]

Well done & God bless.

[Windflier]

Thanks. We didn’t get our first computer until ‘98. It cost us about $3,000 and came with Win98 installed. It took me months to work up the courage to even sit in front of it.

I never thought I’d see the day when there’d be seven or eight computers in my house, a couple of tablets, a half dozen smart phones, and a Kindle. Even our TVs are ‘smart’.

[ADemocratNoMore]

Windows 1.01 Nov. 1985
Windows 2.0 May 1988
Windows 3.0 May 1990
Windows 3.1 Aug. 1996

OS/2 Dec. 1987

AMIGA 1000, Workbench 1.0 July 1985
AMIGA 2000 Workbench 2.0 March 1987

I've owned several Amigas, they were at least 10 years ahead of any other consumer machine on the market at the time and a great deal of the design philosophy of AmigaDOS/Workbench went into Win95.

[Secret Agent Man]

Yes not all pcs were as equal then. Gateways were very prone to sucking hard. Compaqs to a lesser extent with their weird proprietary bios crap.

[kitchen]

Windows 3.1 was in wide use from 1990 until the introduction of Windows 95.

My F500 employer was a MS beta. It wasn't until some time in 1997 that they considered Win95 to be secure enough for use. We were issued Windows 3.11. I was running a global project with 3.11 and the IS group was testing Windows 98.

[PeteB570]

Not being a tech person I don’t remember the machine I had in 1994 but it was some beast.

Lot’s of stuff was loaded on those big 5 inch floppy disks. Load one in and the machine would Wheerrrrr, Wheerrr, Thump, Thump and then come up on screen.

Must have been some time in 1996 when I got a PC with Win 95. Still have it out in the garage and fire it up now and again.

[Ronniesque]

Even though there are massive changes to Windows’ appearance, features, and performance, there is still a “connection” between Windows 95 and Windows 10...it was a dramatic change from 3.1 to 95.

[Ronniesque]

Ah, those were the wild days...Internet Explorer vs Netscape Navigator...using AOL, CompuServe and Prodigy...waning days of dialing in to a BBS...56K modems being the big speed jump...computers that became obsolete within a year...