Microsoft Windows 6.0 . . . ?

Chris
Posts: 845
Joined: Fri 15 Aug, 2003 19.03
Location: Surrey

DJGM wrote:Not quite. Windows 98 and 98SE were still v4.x under the x.x numbering system, although I'm not sure
of their exact v4.x increments. Windows 2000 wasn't designed as a home user version of Windows. It
was primarily designed for business users, since it's actually the next step up from Windows NT4.0.
MS decided to call it Windows 2000 Professional, as opposed to Windows NT5.0, so a lot of home
users thought that, since it's marketed with a year, this was the upgrade from Windows 98/98SE.
Strangely, it seems to me at least, that most of these either didn't notice the word "Professional"
emblazoned on the packaging, or weren't really all that bothered about it
I think they should have stopped producing versions for home and business. I am a home user and think that Windows 2000 is better than Windows 98 but it does have its limitations, as with XP.

They should take the best bits of the home editions (support for multimedia devices, esp. TV cards and DVD players - mine always worked properly under 98 ) and the best bits of the of the business version (2000/XP) and intergrate them into 1 single version of Windows that is for both home and business.

Windows 2000 and XP are not very good at supporting TV cards and DVD players IMO. I have found that the drivers from the TV card manufacturer (Hauppauge) are next to useless as they always crash or blue screen the computer (although the open source ones are better but still crash the computer at times). Support for DVD player software is no good either - the sound and video DVD's always produces stutters worse than Gareth Gates under 2000/XP and always works fine under 98.

I blame Bill Gates for this situation we are in - if he had merged both the home and business product lines ages ago then I would probably not be stuck in this bloody situation where certain mutimedia hardware/software works fine under 98 yet not under 2000/XP :evil: :evil:
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Pete
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Location: Dundee

Well that's what XP did didn't it. XP is basically 2000 but can run a heck of a lot more stuff.
"He has to be larger than bacon"
Chris
Posts: 845
Joined: Fri 15 Aug, 2003 19.03
Location: Surrey

Hymagumba wrote:Well that's what XP did didn't it. XP is basically 2000 but can run a heck of a lot more stuff.
But there still there are "home" and "professional" versions. They are still splitting them 2 ways - I was saying there should be 1 version only that they use on all computers.

I still think XP is the same as 2000 (except that it has the new interface) because I always have the same problems under it with the TV card and DVD player that I had when using 2000.
MarkN
Posts: 323
Joined: Fri 15 Aug, 2003 19.39
Location: South Wales

Neil Jones wrote:Version 4.10.1998 is Windows 98 Gold (original release).
Version 4.10.2222 is Windows 98 Second Edition.

It therefore follows that Win 2000 and ME are version 5.
Nope!

Windows - the MS-DOS GUI:

Windows 1, (Windows386???), 2, 3, 3.1, 3.11, "95" (4.0), "98" (4.10), "ME" (4.90?). There has been no version 5 product in this branch.

Microsoft OS/2 / Windows NT:

MS OS/2 1.0, (IBM OS/2 2.0 - not by MS), MS OS/2 3.0 (not released?), Windows NT 3.1, Windows NT 3.51, Windows NT 4.0 (last version with the OS/2 subsystem included, I believe), "Windows 2000" (5.0), "Windows XP" (5.1), "Windows Server 2003" (5.2), "Longhorn" (6.0; not released yet)

Windows 6.0? Surely that should be Windows NT 6.0!
sparkybpotter
Posts: 19
Joined: Fri 30 Jan, 2004 00.35

Most people have no idea that xp is part of the NT family in fact most people don't know that Nt exists, so i dont think NT would make it back in the title, don't forget the DOS family of windows was killed.

And if there was one version, you would have to pay £260(£150 upgrade) just for it, i wouldn't pay that for extra features as a home user, I wouldn't use.
alowerevil
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Location: Portsmouth
Contact:

Here's one I made earlier...
Image
[/bluepeter mode]
Image
DJGM
Posts: 528
Joined: Fri 15 Aug, 2003 15.39
Location: Manchester
Contact:

alowerevil wrote: Here's one I made earlier...
Image
Hmmm, not bad. Although, I think "Windows 6.0" would still be a better moniker than "Windows 6".

Eitherway, that mock outer carton design certainly looks better than the image in my earlier message.
cwathen
Posts: 1333
Joined: Fri 15 Aug, 2003 17.28

It's nice to be somewhat disturbingly anoracky at times isn't it? Anyway, to add my own sub splitting of hairs to this, Windows 3.1 and 95 weren't 'home' versions of Windows.

The concept that there was a very of Windows for the home and a version for business didn't exist until Windows 98 came out.

Windows NT (which started at version 3.1) was designed not necessarily for businesses, but for power users who needed something more robust, or who wanted to run Windows on non-Intel platforms (the original release would run on the PowerPC platform - the most prominent implementation of which came from Apple, so yes somewhat oddly there is actually a version of Windows which will natively run on a Mac!).

Many (most actually) businesses and institutions ran Windows 3.1, many ran Windows 95. Indeed most businesses who migrated to Windows 2000 did so from Windows 95 rather than from NT.

Arguably, not until Windows 2000 which added support for modern hardware and technologies lacking in NT, did the strict 'home/business' duality come into being; if you were a business developing DirectX applications, you had to run Windows 98 before Windows 2000, because NT wouldn't support it properly. Ditto for USB hardware.

And I believe, only Windows ME/2000 were ever specifically plugged as home and business versions (with ME being the 'Home version of the world's favourite software' and 2000 being the 'reliable operating system for business').

Windows XP did merge the two product lines. Or rather, the old DOS-based line was discontinued, and XP Home was released as a cut down version of Professional (all but the final release candidates of Longhorn came only in what is now the 'professional' version; there were no standalone 'home' builds during most of the testing). They are in essence the same thing. Microsoft could ditch that distinction and just market a one size fits all version of Windows as they have done in the past, but why do that when they can make more money with the way they've done it (especially with the server lines)?

The current situation is as close to a single Windows as we'll ever get.
Version 4.00.950x (where x is either A, B, or C) is Windows 95. Flavour B introduces FAT32, flavour C introduces USB but wasn't very good at it IIRC. Lack of a letter after the version implies the original release.
There were 4 builds and 5 variants of Windows 95. The original version was identical in both OEM and retail flavours (except for the setup programme which threw a paddy if you tried to upgrade with an OEM version, but the security was very weak - just renamed WIN.COM to something else and it'll work fine). It notably did NOT include Internet Explorer in any way, shape or form.

The same build was later packaged with IE1 (which curiously identifies itself as version 4 in the about box). Whilst the OEM version was upgraded further, the retail version stayed like this for the life of Windows 95.

Shortly after, an 'A' version (OEM only, as are all subsequent versions) was released. This was a new build with a new version number, but the only difference I can find is that it comes with IE2 instead of IE1 (and does anyone actually know what the difference between IE1 and 2 is? I've yet to find a single difference).

Not so longer after that, there came a 'B' release (what's commonly known as the 'OSR2' version). This added USB support and upgraded IE again to version 3.02. Curiously, the USB support was supplied in the form of a patch which you had to manually install after installation, and IE3.02 was supplied as an upgrade on the installation CD; the native install gave you IE3.0.

Finally, a quite rare 'C' release came out a few months before Windows 98. This was like an embryonic Windows 98; it basically was just the same old Windows 95 OSR2 but with IE4 and the 'desktop upgrade' installed. Although again it was a separate build, I don't think there is any additional functionality in it that can't be gained by installing IE4 on Windows 95 OSR2.
DJGM
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Location: Manchester
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Allow me to do a bit hair splitting myself . . .
cwathen wrote: . . . XP Home was released as a cut down version of Professional (all but the
final release candidates of Longhorn came only in what is now the 'professional'
version; there were no standalone 'home' builds during most of the testing) . . .
Longhorn? Don't you mean Whistler, which was the development codename for what is now Windows XP?
cwathen
Posts: 1333
Joined: Fri 15 Aug, 2003 17.28


Longhorn? Don't you mean Whistler, which was the development codename for what is now Windows XP?
A bit late with the reply, but I did indeed mean Whistler.
James Martin
Posts: 1011
Joined: Sun 15 Feb, 2004 19.26

ME was the home version but I understand that it is incredibly more flawed than 2000.

2000 isn't a bad piece of kit though - does everything Windows XP can do almost and is incredibly reliable.
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