51–60 of 140 posts
> I have only tested this with Windows 98se. Win98SE the last windows i actually enjoyed using and believed it was an improvement over the its predecessor. Nowadays im afraid to run modern windows without a VM and a firewall.
In the days when Windows was easier to crack, it was not uncommon to find very small, specialised ISOs of "miniature windows" designed specifically for running a certain task -- typically some form of data-recovery app, system repair/maintenance or similar -- and they would fit on a single CD-R, have almost no system requirements, and, if I recall successfully, be bloody useful to my school's computer administrators…
(Write.exe is still present in Windows 10, and redirects to WordPad, which replaced Write.exe in Windows 95.)
> I have only tested this with Windows 98se. Win98SE the last windows i actually enjoyed using and believed it was an improvement over the its predecessor. Nowadays im afraid to run modern windows without a VM and a firewall.
In Windows 98 SE, there was a button next to “minimise” that would give every widget a tooltip explaining what it did and how to use it; most programs came with a built-in, GUI instruction manual. Nobody else does this! (The best help UI ever made, and Microsoft just dropped it…)
Windows 98 SE included its own kernel-based virtual machine system, which it used for multi-tasking DOS and “sandboxing” DOS drivers. (They had a global lock and full privileges, though, so it's not really much of a sandbox.)
Windows 98 came with Active Desktop: you could display bits of website on your desktop as widgets (e.g. a weather service). It also came with mshta.exe, for HTML Applications; HTAs were basically like Electron, but built into the OS, so you didn't have loads of insecure Chrome versions clogging up your RAM and hard drive. (It was Internet Explorer, but iirc Internet Explorer was actually good around about that time.)
Yes, it was DOS-based. Yes, you could log in as the system user by clicking “cancel” on the “enter your username and password” box. It should be simple to beat that… so why hasn't anyone?
> I have only tested this with Windows 98se. Win98SE the last windows i actually enjoyed using and believed it was an improvement over the its predecessor. Nowadays im afraid to run modern windows without a VM and a firewall.
Windows 98 Second Edition is terrible in many ways. I could probably hit the comment limit listing them. Yet it remains my favourite operating system of all time, because everything else (yes, even precious Debian!) is just worse . Worse UI, worse memory use, worse hackability… In Windows 98 SE, there was a button next to “minimise” that would give every widget a tooltip explaining what it did and how to use it; most…
> I have only tested this with Windows 98se. Win98SE the last windows i actually enjoyed using and believed it was an improvement over the its predecessor. Nowadays im afraid to run modern windows without a VM and a firewall.
Windows 98 Second Edition is terrible in many ways. I could probably hit the comment limit listing them. Yet it remains my favourite operating system of all time, because everything else (yes, even precious Debian!) is just worse . Worse UI, worse memory use, worse hackability… In Windows 98 SE, there was a button next to “minimise” that would give every widget a tooltip explaining what it did and how to use it; most…
I never found Active Desktop all that useful. It was annoying because if you wanted a jpg desktop wallpaper, it would enable Active Desktop just for that. The problem was that it noticeably slowed the entire system. I would always convert to bmp and use that, taking a hit on disk space (and possibly RAM) instead of speed.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
When I was in high school, I had a specialized CD like this. The computers in our labs were configured to prevent us from running arbitrary programs, but they weren't configured to prevent booting from a CD. I created a stripped down Windows 95 live CD that had the default shell replaced by StarCraft. I could sit down at a machine, insert my CD, reboot, and the machine would boot directly into SC.
Hehe, neat! I remember doing something similar, albeit once accidentally. Instead of changing the shell (e.g. to LiteStep), I forced an old DOS game to be executed before windows. Exiting the game would result in shutting down the PC. I was terrified that I removed my OS and replaced it with a shareware point and click adventure game. It was a great learning experience though (esp. for my German: https://moorhuhn.fan…
win+R before login was pretty useful - albeit insecure!
> I have only tested this with Windows 98se. Win98SE the last windows i actually enjoyed using and believed it was an improvement over the its predecessor. Nowadays im afraid to run modern windows without a VM and a firewall.
Windows 98 Second Edition is terrible in many ways. I could probably hit the comment limit listing them. Yet it remains my favourite operating system of all time, because everything else (yes, even precious Debian!) is just worse . Worse UI, worse memory use, worse hackability… In Windows 98 SE, there was a button next to “minimise” that would give every widget a tooltip explaining what it did and how to use it; most…
> I have only tested this with Windows 98se. Win98SE the last windows i actually enjoyed using and believed it was an improvement over the its predecessor. Nowadays im afraid to run modern windows without a VM and a firewall.
No love for Windows 2000? NT kernel with the classic Windows interface. It ran pretty well on Windows 98 machines and was extremely stable.
> I have only tested this with Windows 98se. Win98SE the last windows i actually enjoyed using and believed it was an improvement over the its predecessor. Nowadays im afraid to run modern windows without a VM and a firewall.
No love for Windows 2000? NT kernel with the classic Windows interface. It ran pretty well on Windows 98 machines and was extremely stable.
I don't think so, for example requirements for RAM:
Windows 98: 16 megabytes (MB) of memory (24 MB recommended)
Windows 2000: 64 megabytes (MB) of RAM recommended minimum;