Filed under: OS Updates, Windows, Microsoft
In defense of Windows Me, no seriously
by Brad Linder Mar 19th 2008
Windows Me gets a bad rap. Well, to be fair, it's largely deserved. The short-lived operating system crashed like there was no tomorrow. But it was also Microsoft's first consumer-oriented operating to include many features we take for granted today. Long Zheng wrote an interesting article this week listing reasons why Windows Me deserves more respect than it gets, and we were rather surprised to find that we agree with many of his points.For example, Windows Me was the first OS to include Winows Movie Maker, System Restore, Universal Plug and Play, automatic updates, image previews in Windows Explorer, and a generic USB mass storage driver.
The problem is that Microsoft added all of these features to the Windows 98 kernel, which wasn't the most reliable basis for an operating system. It's hard not to think of Windows Me as a highly unstable operating system with a lot of shiny bells and whistles that you didn't think you needed at the time.
Sound familiar? These days a lot of folks like to complain that Windows Vista adds a lot of eye candy, but ultimately doesn't perform as well as Windows XP. But Windows Vista also features an enhanced start menu, search features, live previews of running applications, a better network manager, and a ton of security enhancements (even if some of them are a bit heavy-handed). So maybe Windows Vista is the next Windows Me, but is that necessarily a bad thing?
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Rick H said 4:22PM on 3-19-2008
Vista being the next "ME" wouldn't be a bad thing if consumers weren't pigeon-holed into purchasing it. From a technology standpoint, not only have they created a tremendous learning curve for those of us Admins that are expected to fully know it and support it, but in forcing the new operating system upon us, they have prematurely ended the life cycle of a very mature, stable product. The big difference between then and now, is that while developing its way thru the issues that had come up in ME, and all the way until XP had a firm foothold in the market place, microsoft stood by and supported windows 98.
Microsoft seems to have let their opinions of their product drown out the cries of their loyal customers. what once was a market that favored good product seems to have turned itself in favor of a deep pocket.
-my $.02
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Christina Warren said 5:00PM on 3-19-2008
As someone who used to have to repair systems befuddled with ME (including my college roommates computers -- Gah, nightmare) and also as someone who experienced firsthand the effect of "upgrading" myself (this was right after ME launched) for better Firewire support, only for the entire system to go haywire, I can't really support much of the article.
ME was a stopgate product, pure and simple. It was the most awful mainstream OS ever forced upon the public and it was just God awful. When Windows 98 SE was leaps and bounds better, Windows 2000 was released at the same time and XP was just around the corner, ME was just a big old goose egg.
Vista has its issues -- again, I've experienced them first hand, but almost all of them are hardware/driver related, rather than being fundamental flaws in the software itself. A top of the line system would be unstable in ME, with Vista, at this point, if properly configured I think most users would be OK. Granted, Vista has been a cluster%*!& for a bunch of reasons, but it's not even on the same playing field as ME.
As for those "special features" -- many were introduced in 98 SE, the rest (like Windows Movie Maker) didn't work with OHCI compliant 1394 cards at first (epic fail) and had export options so limited the program was useless. Especially since Pinacle was bundled with a good firewire card for $100 or so (IIRC).
The only thing that kept me from going Mac during the ME era was that in the early days, OS X was just as bad (for different reasons - it was more akin to Vista -- hardware incompatibilities, software not optimized for it) and XP was right around the corner.
*shudder* ME will get my respect when pigs fly :)
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Joshua Clayton said 5:05PM on 3-19-2008
put simply ... "yes"
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ross said 6:32PM on 3-19-2008
I don't understand why people hurt Vista so much. You can argue it's not much better than XP...but it's certainly not worse. If you're using crazy or outdated hardware, you may have some hardware problems, but you should expect that with any operating system upgrade, and if you do, you probably shouldn't upgrade anyway. Otherwise, I really don't know what the basis for hating Vista more than XP is.
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WolvenSpectre said 7:27PM on 3-19-2008
Adding bells and wistles before its time and not calling it a beta test so people are knowing what they are signing up for is so a very bad thing.
I was independant tech support in the ME hayday and all that I have to say can be boiled down to three things.
1) I have never seen another OS that actually crashes neibouring computers on a network without being infected, just by (rarely) sponteanously dropping a ping of death infront of its packets.
2) I have only seen 1 OS that has made an expirienced user of it cry while working properly.
3) I have never reinstalled ME on any computer I had to rebuild that had it on it. The owner always had me put their old 2000 or 98SE back on.
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Ben said 7:44PM on 3-19-2008
Good point, I've compared Vista to ME a few times myself.
In fact I don't think that XP was much better than ME, it was just two years older, and so people were used to it's hardware requirements etc.
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james 42 said 12:05PM on 3-21-2008
You can't really compare ME with XP. With XP, MS finally killed off win 95 in favor of win nt.
Mark said 9:13PM on 3-19-2008
Yeah... except for the part where they completely rewrote the network stack and large chunks of the kernel in Vista, improved stability, recovery, and it's in every way (except for "bloat", which to be honest is there, but it is far less demanding for modern hardware than XP was back in the day) superior to XP.
Microsoft doesn't release an operating system in 5 years - people bitch. Microsoft releases a new operating system - people bitch. Microsoft's operating system drops some legacy support for some apps - people bitch. Despite Microsoft giving literally over a year of public betas for hardware vendors to get their drivers up to scratch, they don't - people bitch at Microsoft. Download Squad makes a bunch of childish remarks - everyons agrees.
How many of you have actually used Vista on decent hardware (post-2004) and had problems with it? That doesn't include: I don't like the search features, I don't like the fact that 512 megs of my 2 gigs of ram that I don't use anyhow are taken up, I want my 5 extra frames of Counter-strike back that were way above my monitor's response time and refresh rate back.
Been using Vista since Beta 2 and haven't had any problems aside for some Nero 7 incompatibilities (that were fixed during RC1) and some ATI driver issues during RC1. Just as stable as XP (didn't have any problems with it either, so I can't say more stable), more responsive and generally better to use.
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michael said 9:19PM on 3-19-2008
I so agree with you. Microsoft has to deal with external factors they can't control.
Software and hardware whose drivers don't work on Vista isn't Vista's fault, it's the people who made them. They should wise up and release the darn drivers. Apple has it a bit more easier since they have entire control on the hardware part, but you can't say the same for MS where a lot of people's PC's are just plain crappy.
Anything new will have issues at first, because there's obviously going to be changes. And these changes aren't going to always support legacy stuff, with what equipment you already have, and then the minor stuff. It's just common sense. But I guess people need some reason to dislike MS anyway they can.
Mysterius said 7:37AM on 3-20-2008
Agreed. Though I'm definitely expecting more from Windows 7.
soniiic said 8:50AM on 3-20-2008
exactly what i've been telling people! i'm glad someone else thinks the same!
i personally don't use vista cos i realise my hardware is outdated for it and i'm a poor student, but i did try it out for about 3 or 4 months and enjoyed it. even on my hardware it never crashed- it was just a little slower than my XP installation.
sanman said 9:13PM on 3-19-2008
Personally, I always referred to it as "Windows MF"...
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Jason said 7:39AM on 3-20-2008
I actually think ME and Vista are polar opposites. ME had, as you say, some surface features that were useful, but deep down inside at the core, was really a piece of crap. Vista, has some surface crap that is best disabled (see vista4experts for help on that) but deep down at it's core, is a rock-solid OS.
I'm using x64 Vista right now, and I must say...it's been reliable day in, day out for two months (I did manage to semi-crash it once, but I think that was a freeware non-MS app that may have had iffy compatibility).
http://www.neowin.net/news/software/07/12/29/vista4experts-1001
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hazard said 7:42AM on 3-20-2008
Please do not feed the Trolls ...
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Mark said 7:39AM on 3-20-2008
By Trolls are you referring to Brad, Download Squad, or the likes of me?
hazard said 7:42AM on 3-20-2008
@Brad .. the article is stitched around a pretty lame one liner "So maybe Windows Vista is the next Windows Me.."
Kevin said 7:54AM on 3-20-2008
No offense, but this seems awfully similar to a post a day earlier from istartedsomething.com: http://www.istartedsomething.com/20080318/windows-me-deserve-more-respect/
Actually, the points in your second paragraph are in almost the same order as the points in the above article.
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Brad Linder said 7:57AM on 3-20-2008
And in the first paragraph I mention the author of that article as the inspiration for this one and include a link to his article, which you can also find by clicking the "Read" link and the image in the post.
Scott Pope said 11:37AM on 3-20-2008
Gag, you seem to have forgotten the blue screens of death and the horrible registry problems. Oh and let's remember constant feedback like http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,44150/article.html
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harmx said 12:00AM on 3-21-2008
I remember when XP first launched, everyone I knew (inc. me) hated it,...after a while loved it- same will prove to be tru with Vista I guess- nothing new here!
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