windows iterations (was: Re: disk to VHD)

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

On Tue, 21 Sep 2021 at 16:57:21, Ken Blake <***@invalidemail.com> wrote
(my responses usually follow points raised):
[]

I almost always think each new version of Windows is better than its
predecessor. The one flagrant counterexample, as far as I'm concerned,
is version 7 to 8.

I vaguely favour the alternating principle (every _second_ one was good)
- though each had _something_ worthwhile to add (and you sometimes have
to consider minor variants to make it work):
(I never used 1 and 2. Hardware probably wasn't up to it anyway.)
3. - usable
3.1 (and 3.11) - good for their time
95 - first with the modern GUI; fair (poor at USB)
98 - fixed some of 95, but unfinished in some ways
98SE - good (towards the end, let down by USB, though there was the -
third-party - universal USB driver)
Me ("Millennium edition") - not _much_ liked, though it has its
adherents; arguably first not something running on top of DOS (though
that's partly true of the '9xs)
XP - good, in general; certainly affectionately liked looking back
Vista - good in theory (sort of an early 7), but that's really come to
light with hindsight: at release it wasn't much liked, not least because
user access control was rather vicious
7 - mostly liked, after initial resistance to any new variant
8 - mostly hated, mainly for the "tiles" interface (which was only the
default)
8.1 - fixed some of the worst aspects of 8, but still not very popular
10 - now entering the same phase as 7, i. e. nostalgia beginning. Some -
probably many on the 10 'group - like it a lot; some dislike the
(without jumping through hoops) unblockable updates aspect.
Arguably, 10 is actually several iterations; 10 21H1 is quite a lot
different from the original 10, though the overall is much the same.
11 - ?

That's initially the "consumer" ones: the business area also had NT3.51
(Windows 3.1 UI, roughly, but more robust - but rather stark), then NT4
('9x/XP interface; generally considered better, but needed more powerful
hardware - many companies used 3.51 and 4 in parallel as the 3.51
machines still had a lot of life left in them). The two streams more or
less merged at XP - though there were variants of all versions aimed
more at home (often called Home) and business (often called Pro) from
then on (as well as other versions - sometimes a very minimal version
aimed at the least hardware capable of running the version at all,
sometimes a version aimed at schools, sometimes a top level version
{sometimes called Ultimate}). [I haven't heard any mention of variants
of 11, but I'd be surprised if there aren't.]

There, that should provoke lots of arguments (-: [Though that
wasn't/isn't my intention.]

[RabidHussar]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

I almost always think each new version of Windows is better than its
predecessor. The one flagrant counterexample, as far as I'm
concerned, is version 7 to 8.

I vaguely favour the alternating principle (every _second_ one was
good) - though each had _something_ worthwhile to add (and you
(I never used 1 and 2. Hardware probably wasn't up to it anyway.)
3. - usable

I liked it but didn't see the point of the software at the time. Much of
the good stuff was in DOS.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
3.1 (and 3.11) - good for their time

It allowed you to get onto the Internet so it was definitely good. It
doesn't multitask well for some but I'm a "one application at a time"
type of guy anyway so I didn't see the issues, even on my very outdated
hardware at the time.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
95 - first with the modern GUI; fair (poor at USB)

It was pretty good, especially with the Plus pack. However, the winnuke
crap people used all the time showcased how vulnerable it was security-wise.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
98 - fixed some of 95, but unfinished in some ways

I found it awful.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
98SE - good (towards the end, let down by USB, though there was the -
third-party - universal USB driver)

My go-to OS until Windows 2000 came out.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
Me ("Millennium edition") - not _much_ liked, though it has its
adherents; arguably first not something running on top of DOS (though
that's partly true of the '9xs)

Garbage in every way. Stability was clearly not the developers' concern
at this point in time.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
XP - good, in general; certainly affectionately liked looking back

You forgot 2000 which was stellar in every possible way. XP was an
improvement on something that was already very excellent.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
Vista - good in theory (sort of an early 7), but that's really come to
light with hindsight: at release it wasn't much liked, not least
because user access control was rather vicious

I didn't see the issue, to be honest. I was part of the beta-testing
process and found bugs to report on a daily basis. When they froze the
code and released it to the public, I couldn't believe it: clearly, what
I was running was nowhere near ready for the public. However, what the
public DID get wasn't that bad as long as your hardware wasn't already
outdated. Some features have since disappeared such as the animated
wallpaper but it wasn't as bad as people say. Most people don't realize
that 7 is basically just a re-released version of Vista.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
7 - mostly liked, after initial resistance to any new variant

It was little more than an optimized version of Vista whose performance
was close enough to XP that people didn't mind upgrading. I think that
people are probably still holding onto it to this day since none of the
newer stuff responds as quickly.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
8 - mostly hated, mainly for the "tiles" interface (which was only the
default)

It was the same as 7 except for the absence of the Start button (you had
to go to the lower-left corner instead). I understand what they tried to
do with the tiles but a Start menu would have been better.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
8.1 - fixed some of the worst aspects of 8, but still not very popular

Same as 8 except that the Start button re-appeared. I couldn't see any
other improvements, personally.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
10 - now entering the same phase as 7, i. e. nostalgia beginning. Some
- probably many on the 10 'group - like it a lot; some dislike the
(without jumping through hoops) unblockable updates aspect.
Arguably, 10 is actually several iterations; 10 21H1 is quite a lot
different from the original 10, though the overall is much the same.

Not bad but some of its issues are hard to ignore, notably how Bluetooth
ceases to function for no good reason every so often, same as the
wireless. The continued confusion between the new Settings panel and the
old Control Panel drag it down as well.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
11 - ?
That's initially the "consumer" ones: the business area also had
NT3.51 (Windows 3.1 UI, roughly, but more robust - but rather stark),
then NT4 ('9x/XP interface; generally considered better, but needed
more powerful hardware - many companies used 3.51 and 4 in parallel as
the 3.51 machines still had a lot of life left in them). The two
streams more or less merged at XP - though there were variants of all
versions aimed more at home (often called Home) and business (often
called Pro) from then on (as well as other versions - sometimes a very
minimal version aimed at the least hardware capable of running the
version at all, sometimes a version aimed at schools, sometimes a top
level version {sometimes called Ultimate}). [I haven't heard any
mention of variants of 11, but I'd be surprised if there aren't.]
There, that should provoke lots of arguments (-: [Though that
wasn't/isn't my intention.]

I find 11 to be quite good so far, especially since the Bluetooth and
wireless issues are mostly resolved. There is a lag in getting to the
context menu but it doesn't ruin the overall experience. It's clearly
better than 10, in my opinion, even in the beta stages.

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

I almost always think each new version of Windows is better than
its predecessor. The one flagrant counterexample, as far as I'm
concerned, is version 7 to 8.

I vaguely favour the alternating principle (every _second_ one was
good) - though each had _something_ worthwhile to add (and you
(I never used 1 and 2. Hardware probably wasn't up to it anyway.)
3. - usable
I liked it but didn't see the point of the software at the time. Much
of the good stuff was in DOS.

Indeed.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
3.1 (and 3.11) - good for their time
It allowed you to get onto the Internet so it was definitely good. It

Actually, I used the internet more under DOS (with a variant of the -
ITIW - KA9Q suite) in those days, only firing up W3.1 if I wanted to use
a web page. (I. e., email, FTP, etc. was fine - I think I even used Lynx
sometimes. Was still on dialup.)

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
doesn't multitask well for some but I'm a "one application at a time"

I was too, then. (Well, DOS encouraged that!)

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
type of guy anyway so I didn't see the issues, even on my very outdated
hardware at the time.
95 - first with the modern GUI; fair (poor at USB)
It was pretty good, especially with the Plus pack. However, the winnuke

I never felt tempted to get the Plus! pack!

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
crap people used all the time showcased how vulnerable it was
security-wise.
98 - fixed some of 95, but unfinished in some ways
I found it awful.

I don't remember enough about it.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
98SE - good (towards the end, let down by USB, though there was the
- third-party - universal USB driver)
My go-to OS until Windows 2000 came out.

I stayed with it a long time.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
Me ("Millennium edition") - not _much_ liked, though it has its
adherents; arguably first not something running on top of DOS
(though that's partly true of the '9xs)
Garbage in every way. Stability was clearly not the developers' concern
at this point in time.

Seemed rushed, and not to offer anything much beyond 98SE. And some
things removed IIRR.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
XP - good, in general; certainly affectionately liked looking back
You forgot 2000 which was stellar in every possible way. XP was an
improvement on something that was already very excellent.

I did indeed forget 2000. Though I think it was still part of the NT
sequence, rather than the "home" sequence. Though some overlap, I think
of the NT sequence as mainly NTFS-based, with the home sequence based on
FAT (and variants). Came together in XP (which could run on FAT, but by
default didn't).

[I preferred FAT, but Everything - the Voidtools utility - doesn't work
anything like as well on FAT; I think that was the clincher, as I find
Everything very useful.]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
Vista - good in theory (sort of an early 7), but that's really come
to light with hindsight: at release it wasn't much liked, not least
because user access control was rather vicious
I didn't see the issue, to be honest. I was part of the  beta-testing
process and found bugs to report on a daily basis. When they froze the
code and released it to the public, I couldn't believe it: clearly,
what I was running was nowhere near ready for the public. However, what
the public DID get wasn't that bad as long as your hardware wasn't
already outdated. Some features have since disappeared such as the
animated wallpaper but it wasn't as bad as people say. Most people

I think you're in the minority - perhaps being an "insider". My main
experience with Vista was helping an old chap who'd been given a Vista
laptop, which was as slow as molasses; I don't think it actually didn't
work, but wait times were bad, to the extent that I more than once
thought of paving it and installing XP. Reading what _others_ were
saying, I think the pain of the UIC _was_ great.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
don't realize that 7 is basically just a re-released version of Vista.
7 - mostly liked, after initial resistance to any new variant
It was little more than an optimized version of Vista whose performance
was close enough to XP that people didn't mind upgrading. I think that
people are probably still holding onto it to this day since none of the
newer stuff responds as quickly.

Hmm.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
8 - mostly hated, mainly for the "tiles" interface (which was only
the default)
It was the same as 7 except for the absence of the Start button (you
had to go to the lower-left corner instead). I understand what they
tried to do with the tiles but a Start menu would have been better.

It sort of coincided with the explosion in 'phones; tiles are a lot less
useful if you don't have a touch screen, which most even laptops didn't
(certainly not machines with separate monitors). Actually, I'm not aware
large touch screens are that common, even now.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
8.1 - fixed some of the worst aspects of 8, but still not very popular
Same as 8 except that the Start button re-appeared. I couldn't see any
other improvements, personally.

I'll admit I have minimal experience of the 8s, so based on what I've
read others saying. (Brief plays with it in shops - remember shops!? -
it seemed more alien than anything before, and to some extent since.)

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
10 - now entering the same phase as 7, i. e. nostalgia beginning.
Some - probably many on the 10 'group - like it a lot; some dislike
the (without jumping through hoops) unblockable updates aspect.
Arguably, 10 is actually several iterations; 10 21H1 is quite a lot
different from the original 10, though the overall is much the same.
Not bad but some of its issues are hard to ignore, notably how
Bluetooth ceases to function for no good reason every so often, same as

How much of that is just your (or a few like you) experience, though? (I
haven't much experience of using it.)

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
the wireless. The continued confusion between the new Settings panel
and the old Control Panel drag it down as well.

Agreed, the confusion is bad - with two and a half ways of getting to
things: Settings, and the two ways the Control Panel can be sorted.
(Plus Device Manager as a third way for some things.)

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
11 - ?
That's initially the "consumer" ones: the business area also had
NT3.51 (Windows 3.1 UI, roughly, but more robust - but rather
stark), then NT4 ('9x/XP interface; generally considered better, but
needed more powerful hardware - many companies used 3.51 and 4 in
parallel as the 3.51 machines still had a lot of life left in them).

Then 2000.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
The two streams more or less merged at XP - though there were
variants of all versions aimed more at home (often called Home) and
business (often called Pro) from then on (as well as other versions
- sometimes a very minimal version aimed at the least hardware
capable of running the version at all, sometimes a version aimed at
schools, sometimes a top level version {sometimes called Ultimate}).
[I haven't heard any mention of variants of 11, but I'd be surprised
if there aren't.]
There, that should provoke lots of arguments (-: [Though that
wasn't/isn't my intention.]
I find 11 to be quite good so far, especially since the Bluetooth and
wireless issues are mostly resolved. There is a lag in getting to the
context menu but it doesn't ruin the overall experience. It's clearly
better than 10, in my opinion, even in the beta stages.

Your "clearly" is perhaps different from some. I've not used it at all,
but from what I've seen on here, most of those who've tried it seem to
give the impression that "there's nothing* wrong with it, but I don't
see that much that's a game-changer improvement either". (*other than
teething troubles.) The fact that the installer - or tester - demands
certain things (hardware) that the OS itself doesn't actually need to
run (so far) is a bit of a con, though; whether - since that fact has
leaked out - M$ relax those requirements, or actually implement
something that really needs them (which would be seen by some as being
done in a fit of pique [others will see it as a good security measure -
the TPS module thing - or just a good clear-out of old hardware - the
generations thing]), we'll just have to see.

[RabidHussar]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

 []

   I almost always think each new version of Windows is better than
   its predecessor. The one flagrant counterexample, as far as I'm
   concerned, is version 7 to 8.

 I vaguely favour the alternating principle (every _second_ one was
 good) - though each had _something_ worthwhile to add (and you
 (I never used 1 and 2. Hardware probably wasn't up to it anyway.)
 3. - usable
I liked it but didn't see the point of the software at the time. Much
of the good stuff was in DOS.

Indeed.

 3.1 (and 3.11) - good for their time
It allowed you to get onto the Internet so it was definitely good. It

Actually, I used the internet more under DOS (with a variant of the -
ITIW - KA9Q suite) in those days, only firing up W3.1 if I wanted to
use a web page. (I. e., email, FTP, etc. was fine - I think I even
used Lynx sometimes. Was still on dialup.)

My first Internet experience was through a shell account (Delphi
Internet) and you didn't have a choice but to browse the web through
lynx. I thought it was neat but once I realized that I could get
graphics, I switched over to Windows 3.1 and the Mosaic browser.

< snip >

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

 Me ("Millennium edition") - not _much_ liked, though it has its
 adherents; arguably first not something running on top of DOS
 (though that's partly true of the '9xs)
Garbage in every way. Stability was clearly not the developers' concern
at this point in time.

Seemed rushed, and not to offer anything much beyond 98SE. And some
things removed IIRR.

It truly was a waste of time. It added the basic video editor and system
restore but otherwise, it was a pointless upgrade. The system restore
was also completely useless since it ran as poorly in the past as it did
in the present.

< snip >

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

I didn't see the issue, to be honest. I was part of the  beta-testing
process and found bugs to report on a daily basis. When they froze the
code and released it to the public, I couldn't believe it: clearly,
what I was running was nowhere near ready for the public. However, what
the public DID get wasn't that bad as long as your hardware wasn't
already outdated. Some features have since disappeared such as the
animated wallpaper but it wasn't as bad as people say. Most people

I think you're in the minority - perhaps being an "insider". My main
experience with Vista was helping an old chap who'd been given a Vista
laptop, which was as slow as molasses; I don't think it actually
didn't work, but wait times were bad, to the extent that I more than
once thought of paving it and installing XP. Reading what _others_
were saying, I think the pain of the UIC _was_ great.

Vista _was_ bad, don't get me wrong. However, I'm the type to routinely
clean the system's cache and defragment so I didn't get an experience as
poor as those who never bother with such things. Vista was like a car
whose oil needed to be changed ever 100 kilometres.

< snip >

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

 10 - now entering the same phase as 7, i. e. nostalgia beginning.
 Some - probably many on the 10 'group - like it a lot; some dislike
 the (without jumping through hoops) unblockable updates aspect.
 Arguably, 10 is actually several iterations; 10 21H1 is quite a lot
 different from the original 10, though the overall is much the same.
Not bad but some of its issues are hard to ignore, notably how
Bluetooth ceases to function for no good reason every so often, same as

How much of that is just your (or a few like you) experience, though?
(I haven't much experience of using it.)

Well, it's an issue I've seen on my old laptop, the new one and even my
father-in-law's computer in addition to the work computer they provided
for me two years ago as well as last year. So, it seems like a general
problem.

< snip >

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

I find 11 to be quite good so far, especially since the Bluetooth and
wireless issues are mostly resolved. There is a lag in getting to the
context menu but it doesn't ruin the overall experience. It's clearly
better than 10, in my opinion, even in the beta stages.

Your "clearly" is perhaps different from some. I've not used it at
all, but from what I've seen on here, most of those who've tried it
seem to give the impression that "there's nothing* wrong with it, but
I don't see that much that's a game-changer improvement either".
(*other than teething troubles.) The fact that the installer - or
tester - demands certain things (hardware) that the OS itself doesn't
actually need to run (so far) is a bit of a con, though; whether -
since that fact has leaked out - M$ relax those requirements, or
actually implement something that really needs them (which would be
seen by some as being done in a fit of pique [others will see it as a
good security measure - the TPS module thing - or just a good
clear-out of old hardware - the generations thing]), we'll just have
to see.

There is a slight chance that Windows 11 will be worse at release than
it currently is but I consider it to be very solid and I can't imagine
anyone complaining about it. On the other hand, Windows users are
innovators in whining so it remains to be seen what they will notice
which, to this point, hasn't bothered me.

[Mark Lloyd]

On 9/22/21 11:10 AM, RabidHussar wrote:

[snip]

Post by RabidHussar

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

 Me ("Millennium edition") - not _much_ liked, though it has its
 adherents; arguably first not something running on top of DOS
 (though that's partly true of the '9xs)
Garbage in every way. Stability was clearly not the developers' concern
at this point in time.

Seemed rushed, and not to offer anything much beyond 98SE. And some
things removed IIRR.

It truly was a waste of time. It added the basic video editor and system
restore but otherwise, it was a pointless upgrade. The system restore
was also completely useless since it ran as poorly in the past as it did
in the present.

When I was setting up an old system (for testing old browsers) I had a
choice of using 98SE or ME. ME was the obvious choice since it comes
with the USB storage driver, which I was going to need.

[snip]

[Frank Slootweg]

RabidHussar <***@huss.ar> wrote:
[...]

Can you please stop posting in multipart/alternative format, i.e.
a text/plain part (good) *and* a text/html part (not good and
redundant)?

Thanks.

I assume it's just an error in the configuration of your News account
in Thunderbird.

[Paul]

Post by Frank Slootweg
[...]
Can you please stop posting in multipart/alternative format, i.e.
a text/plain part (good) *and* a text/html part (not good and
redundant)?
Thanks.
I assume it's just an error in the configuration of your News account
in Thunderbird.

Those messages are getting filtered off here, as multipart
don't make it through in at least some of these groups.

*******

http://al.howardknight.net/?STYPE=msgid&MSGI=%3CvIG2J.15879%24Im6.7503%40fx09.iad%3E

User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:91.0) Gecko/20100101
Thunderbird/91.1.1

From: RabidHussar <***@huss.ar>

Message-ID: <vIG2J.15879$***@fx09.iad>

NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2021 14:03:07 UTC

Content-Type: multipart... <=== HTML email setting

*******

Paul

[RabidHussar]

Post by Paul

[...]
  Can you please stop posting in multipart/alternative format, i.e.
a text/plain part (good) *and* a text/html part (not good and
redundant)?
  Thanks.
  I assume it's just an error in the configuration of your News account
in Thunderbird.

Those messages are getting filtered off here, as multipart
don't make it through in at least some of these groups.
*******
http://al.howardknight.net/?STYPE=msgid&MSGI=%3CvIG2J.15879%24Im6.7503%40fx09.iad%3E
  User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:91.0)
Gecko/20100101
   Thunderbird/91.1.1
  NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2021 14:03:07 UTC
  Content-Type: multipart...   <=== HTML email setting
*******
   Paul

I'll send in plain text by default. It wasn't an error on my part; I
intentionally sent both versions but I didn't know that it would cause
issues.

[Ken Blake]

Post by RabidHussar

Post by Paul

[...]
  Can you please stop posting in multipart/alternative format, i.e.
a text/plain part (good) *and* a text/html part (not good and
redundant)?
  Thanks.
  I assume it's just an error in the configuration of your News account
in Thunderbird.

Those messages are getting filtered off here, as multipart
don't make it through in at least some of these groups.
*******
http://al.howardknight.net/?STYPE=msgid&MSGI=%3CvIG2J.15879%24Im6.7503%40fx09.iad%3E
  User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:91.0)
Gecko/20100101
   Thunderbird/91.1.1
  NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2021 14:03:07 UTC
  Content-Type: multipart...   <=== HTML email setting
*******
   Paul

I'll send in plain text by default. It wasn't an error on my part; I
intentionally sent both versions but I didn't know that it would cause
issues.

It's much better now, thanks.

[Frank Slootweg]

Post by RabidHussar

Post by Paul

[...]
  Can you please stop posting in multipart/alternative format, i.e.
a text/plain part (good) *and* a text/html part (not good and
redundant)?
  Thanks.
  I assume it's just an error in the configuration of your News account
in Thunderbird.

Those messages are getting filtered off here, as multipart
don't make it through in at least some of these groups.

[...]

Post by RabidHussar
I'll send in plain text by default. It wasn't an error on my part; I
intentionally sent both versions but I didn't know that it would cause
issues.

Thanks. For me they didn't cause problems, but as Paul mentioned,
articles which have a text/html part might get dropped by some News
servers and hence will not propagate to other News servers. But in any
case, posting in text/plain *plus* text/html format is wasteful, because
the text/html part does not add any value/functionality.

[Ken Blake]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

I almost always think each new version of Windows is better than its
predecessor. The one flagrant counterexample, as far as I'm concerned,
is version 7 to 8.

I vaguely favour the alternating principle (every _second_ one was good)

Not me.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
- though each had _something_ worthwhile to add (and you sometimes have
(I never used 1 and 2. Hardware probably wasn't up to it anyway.)

I started with 2, as I think I said earlier.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
3. - usable
3.1 (and 3.11) - good for their time

No big deal, but I'll mention it because it was one of my pet peeves
back in those days:

Windows 3.11 was almost identical to 3.1. It just added a few fixes that
had been available separately and a few new drivers.

You probably meant Windows for Workgroups 3.11. That *was* different,
but please don't mix it up with Windows 3.11.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
95 - first with the modern GUI; fair (poor at USB)
98 - fixed some of 95, but unfinished in some ways
98SE - good (towards the end, let down by USB, though there was the -
third-party - universal USB driver)
Me ("Millennium edition") - not _much_ liked, though it has its
adherents; arguably first not something running on top of DOS (though
that's partly true of the '9xs)

I wasn't exactly an adherent. It wasn't much different from 98, but I
thought it was fine.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
XP - good, in general; certainly affectionately liked looking back
Vista - good in theory (sort of an early 7), but that's really come to
light with hindsight: at release it wasn't much liked, not least because
user access control was rather vicious

I never had a problem with it.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
7 - mostly liked, after initial resistance to any new variant
8 - mostly hated, mainly for the "tiles" interface (which was only the
default)

Hated by me too.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
8.1 - fixed some of the worst aspects of 8, but still not very popular

Better than 8, but still not great.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
10 - now entering the same phase as 7, i. e. nostalgia beginning. Some -
probably many on the 10 'group - like it a lot; some dislike the
(without jumping through hoops) unblockable updates aspect.
Arguably, 10 is actually several iterations; 10 21H1 is quite a lot
different from the original 10, though the overall is much the same.

I like 10 fine. A big improvement over 8.x

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
11 - ?

We'll see.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
That's initially the "consumer" ones: the business area also had NT3.51
(Windows 3.1 UI, roughly, but more robust - but rather stark), then NT4
('9x/XP interface; generally considered better, but needed more powerful
hardware - many companies used 3.51 and 4 in parallel as the 3.51
machines still had a lot of life left in them).

I never ran an NT version except for 2000. which I liked.


The two streams more or

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
less merged at XP - though there were variants of all versions aimed
more at home (often called Home) and business (often called Pro) from
then on (as well as other versions - sometimes a very minimal version
aimed at the least hardware capable of running the version at all,
sometimes a version aimed at schools, sometimes a top level version
{sometimes called Ultimate}). [I haven't heard any mention of variants
of 11, but I'd be surprised if there aren't.]
There, that should provoke lots of arguments (-: [Though that
wasn't/isn't my intention.]

No arguments from me. I was mostly just voicing my opinions.

[Mark Lloyd]

On 9/22/21 7:59 AM, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

[snip]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
Me ("Millennium edition") - not _much_ liked, though it has its
adherents; arguably first not something running on top of DOS (though
that's partly true of the '9xs)

It IS running on top of DOS, they just tried to hide that fact.

ME did have the advantage of including the USB storage driver, but
otherwise wasn't better than 98SE. However not worse unless you count
the more fragile help system.

Also, you left out the best version: 2000

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
XP - good, in general; certainly affectionately liked looking back
Vista - good in theory (sort of an early 7), but that's really come to
light with hindsight: at release it wasn't much liked, not least because
user access control was rather vicious

The first with the "assume you're a thief" system misleadingly labeled
"activation".

[snip]

[RabidHussar]

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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 2021-09-22 12:54 p.m., Mark Lloyd
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite" cite="mid:RcJ2J.42482$***@fx35.iad">On
9/22/21 7:59 AM, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
<br>
<br>
[snip]
<br>
<br>
<blockquote type="cite">Me ("Millennium edition") - not _much_
liked, though it has its adherents; arguably first not something
running on top of DOS (though that's partly true of the '9xs)
<br>
</blockquote>
<br>
It IS running on top of DOS, they just tried to hide that fact.
<br>
<br>
ME did have the advantage of including the USB storage driver, but
otherwise wasn't better than 98SE. However not worse unless you
count the more fragile help system.
<br>
<br>
Also, you left out the best version: 2000
<br>
</blockquote>
<p>My understanding was that the 9x editions of Windows were indeed
based on DOS but I had this argument with Peter Köhlmann on
comp.os.linux.advocacy a few years ago and he assured me that it
was its own OS and that DOS was neither needed nor running
underneath it. Windows 9x had DOS support and would allow you to
run some applications within it and others through a reboot into
DOS proper but I guess he's right in saying that it doesn't run
_atop_ the legacy system.</p> <p>&lt; snip &gt;</p>
<p>-- </p>
<div class="moz-signature"><b>@RabidHussar</b><br>
Proud <a href="http://www.libreoffice.org">LibreOffice</a> &amp;
<a href="http://www.thunderbird.net">Thunderbird</a> donor<br>
Supporter of independent journalism<br>
John 15:18
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