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Recalling Windows 1.0 At 25 Years

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the if-you-knew-then dept.

alphadogg writes "When Microsoft released the very first version of Windows nearly 25 years ago, on Nov. 20, 1985, it was late to the game and little used. Apple had already brought graphical user interfaces to computers with Macintosh more than a year earlier, while DOS systems dominated the market for IBM and IBM-compatible PCs. No one who used this first version was likely to have predicted that Windows would completely dominate the PC market 25 years later..."

3 of 384 comments (clear)

  1. I remember the time by Chrisq · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Our office used Gem Desktop. We were amazed at how primitive Windows was by comparrison, with no overlapping windows, etc.

  2. Re:Windows 1.0 was barely usable by Waffle+Iron · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Windows 1.0 was a complete joke - it didn't even support overlapping windows. Even Windows 2.0 in 1987 was pretty bad. About the only thing worth getting it for was the new Word-for-Windows, a WYSIWYG upgrade to Word 6.

    Windows only became truly useful once the Windows/386 variant of Windows 2.1 came out. I hardly ever used the GUI part of it, but its support for multiple virtual DOS sessions with built-in EMS was a great feature at the time. The early Windows GUI apps were generally a joke. I used mostly DOS apps in virtual consoles until Windows95 came out.

  3. Obligatory squeegee link by thatseattleguy · · Score: 4, Interesting
    And they announced it to the world...by sending out boxes with squeegees?

    (said items probably a hell of a lot more useful than the actual Windows 1.0 software ever was...)