Happy Birthday Windows95

Washington Post ^ | Thursday, August 24, 1995 | David Segal

[N3WBI3]

With Windows 95's Debut, Microsoft Scales Heights of Hype

By David Segal Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, August 24, 1995; Page A14

You can hide under a bridge, row a boat to the middle of the ocean or wedge yourself under the sofa, cover your ears and then hum loudly. But get near a newspaper, radio, television or computer retailer today and you will experience the multimillion-dollar hype surrounding the launch of Windows 95.

Microsoft Corp. is spending about $300 million to trumpet the arrival of Windows 95, an upgraded operating system, the software that tells the machinery inside your personal computer what to do. Marketing mavens believe the all-out media blitz is the largest product advertising campaign ever. Print ads – from both Microsoft and increasingly giddy computer retailers – have been inescapable over the past few weeks.

[antiRepublicrat]

I was a beta tester for Win 95.

I remember how in the Win95 beta you could set an option to enable smooth window dragging. Then they took that feature out of Win95, making you buy the Plus Pack to get it back.

[TheForceOfOne]

Windows 95 had a screen lock on my heart.

[antiRepublicrat]

[Arthalion]

Yep, the recommended configuration for '95 was a 486 DX/66 with 8MB of RAM. As I recall, it didn't run too well on that either...you really needed a Pentium 66 with 12 or 16 MB of RAM or better to make it run with any kind of decent performance.

[Billthedrill]

ROTFLMAO! There actually IS one? Now how the heck will I get it on a medium that the old wheezer will read?

[HitmanLV]

I was so excited about Windows 95 I bought three copies that day!

Problem was, I didn't even have a computer. ;-)

[ShadowAce]

There actually IS one?

LOL!! I was truly amazed when I found it. I thought it would fit in with some of the other posts here.

[steveo]

I didn't have to, sometimes it did it by itself. Mostly graphic problems and sound card issues if I remember correctly.

[HitmanLV]

I was so excited about Windows 95 I bought three copies that day!

Problem was, I didn't even have a computer. ;-)

[antiRepublicrat]

Yep, the recommended configuration for '95 was a 486 DX/66 with 8MB of RAM.

You described exactly the system I first ran it on, and it worked fine.

[Born Conservative]

You're right! Clarification: Millenium Edition sucks. They couldn't even name it right!

[kylaka]

LOL. Don't get the wrong idea. Thats not ALL that I run. That particular LAN has no need to be upgraded. All my other stuff runs Win2000 or XP, and I actually find 2000 more stable than XP. I did not know what a BSOD was until I bought an HP machine for my kids with WinME on it. I blew that off after a couple months. Me was positively awful. The Pinto, Vega and Edsel of operating systems all rolled into one.

[Arthalion]

Maybe I should clarify that a little. The OS itself ran fine on a 486 DX2/66, but if you actually wanted to do any real work on it, you needed more. One of the most touted features of Windows 95 was it's ability to handle "True multitasking", but if you ran two programs (like MS word and Excel) at the same time on that setup the computer would slow to a crawl. The 486 processor simply didn't have the horsepower needed to do anything other than run one program at a time without seriously compromising performance.

The Pentium 66, with the same clockspeed and the same amount of memory, was the slowest CPU you could run that was capable of satisfactorily executing all of the new features in Windows 95. Since you could buy a Pentium 133 in July of 1995, I never understood why they didn't just use the Pentium as the recommended processor. Most PC buyers at that point were picking up P75's or P90's anyway (or the 486/100's, which matched the performance of the Pentium 66).

[markman46]

and OS/2 is still around, as ECS. even tho IBM has been trying to kill it for 10yrs..

check out http://www.ecomstation.com

[Reaganghost]

Ahh, those were the days. I remember my first 14-ounce granite headthumper. It had a 27-inch oak hand-hewn handle with the stone married in place by sinew from the shin of a sabre tooth, enough leverage to hammer any liberal.

[garyhope]

Since we're talking Windows,...what is Windows Center Media Edition? How is it different from regular XP Home or XP Pro.

Is XP Pro worth the extra money over XP Home?

Thanks.

[N3WBI3]

Neither XP or XPpro is worth the money if you have 2k keep it and wait until vista (longhorn). If you dont have anything use Linux (at least until Longhorn comes out) cause you 'officially' cant buy 2000 anymore, though I am sure you can find it if you look..

[ShadowAce]

I've heard that vista, now that they've taken out a lot of the beta features, is really nothing more than XP with a prettier smile.

[N3WBI3]

I've heard that vista, now that they've taken out a lot of the beta features, is really nothing more than XP with a prettier smile.

Dont know, Ive heard that they built it from the ground up. Ill reserve judgment until I see it..

[ShadowAce]

Ill reserve judgment until I see it..

Agreed. Pre-release rumors aren't usually all that reliable. :)