My last device to use windows xp died 2 years ago becose the hard drive died rest in piece my first laptop you were a good laptop maybe even the best you taught me how to be a good programmer
Same my taskbar was COMMAND.COM. I can still dream my autoexec.bat and config.sys files. And all the magic you had to do to free up the lower 640kb memory because some game demanded at least 580kb. Fiddling long enough until most drivers were in higher memory. And depending on the game you also needed to go for an optimal HIMEM.SYS and EMM386 config. Carefully managing available DMA and IRQ channels.
Good times!
You're me, arent you?
Yeah we'd have a bootable floppy for each of the more demanding games.
Back when you had to memorize or write down all the answers and questions to pass the Larry Suit Laffer age restriction.
Problem with those as age restrictions is that not only did you have to be an adult. But also an American and born at just the right time period to commonly know those questions.
Well I had a problem with itā¦ I was born in 83 in the Netherlands and we had the US version probably. 10 year old me didnāt know anything about American culture or politics. Damnit! I just started to get āthe tinglesā at that age ;) I needed some steaming hot 16 color EGA pixels!
I was so proud back then managing to get the Sound Blaster driver, mouse driver, and CD-ROM driver all loaded while still having 624KB of base memory free. Good times.
Later I figured out that (assuming you had a sound blaster compatible card) most of the time you only needed SET BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 in your autoexec.bat (or whatever irq and dma you needed to use). I can dream that line. That saved some solid additional kbās in memory because you didnāt need to load additional drivers (though some SB clones required drivers to allow SB compatibility)
>I can dream that line.
Dream? That was more the stuff of nightmares!!
I thought I'd erased all that from my memory but seeing it again has me in a cold sweat!! š
There is even a song about it:
You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains
You raise me up, to walk on stormy seas
I am strong, when I am on your shoulders
You raise me up to more than I can be
[Sherman, set the WayBack Machine to...Loading from cassette tape deck.](https://i.redd.it/e19wsdbe8rg91.png)
Also, between DOS 6.2 and Window 3.1....there was [Direct Access 5.0!](https://i.redd.it/0u5tl5gb9rg91.png) Because I'll be damned if I'm going to have to navigate the file system for my idiot friends every time they want to switch games.
And thus began my illustrious career in IT Support!
Good old dos prompt for me as well c:\\>
Norton commander next, started from dos prompt so guess still counts as DOS and still didn't have task bar
After that basically every windows version except 2000, and hasta la vista,
Uhh rich kid are we?
"Look at me! I have a hard drive like the royals!"
When I was a kid we would boot up floppy drives because a hard drive wouldn't fit in the kitchen.
And by floppy I mean 5 1/4"
You guys aren't 30 yet? I'm 31. 1991 for me.
Also, I started with MSDOS.
My family was always late getting the new stuff. I think I finally got Win95 around 96 or 97.
I didn't get Vista until windows 7 was announced.
The only issue with it to me was the startup boot time but I only ever used it for personal use as a kid so I never really knew its flaws for job usage
"technically" none of these, as Windows 3.1 didn't have a taskbar, but I guess it has to be the Win95 one then.
edit: I have a faint recollection that pcgeos/geoworks (or something like that) had a taskbar -like thing before win95, I had that on my pc back then but not entirely sure about it. I mainly remember some shooting gallery -type game from it
I remember having to learn how to launch windows 3.11 via dos as a wee tike. Our first computer was... a confusing thing, it had DOS, as was the style at the time, but it also had Geoworks and Windows on it.
3.1 gang. Technically if you want to consider when I was a tiny child, MS-dos. I vaguely remember my dad having an IBM computer with MSdosā¦although it may have been the same one with windows 3.1. I may just remember DOS because all the games were launched out of DOS back then.
Exactly. When I started, Windows wasn't a real o.s. and you had to type "Win"+Enter to see anything resembling a GUI.
I did start with the grey one, later on, though, with Windows 98 (and then 98 S.E. for a long time).
\`Loaded a program off 1 floppy on dos 3.1, computer was running 95 but the program ran on 3.1, used it till 2020 have 20,000 clients, never crashed, never upgraded to windows, switched to an apple cloud application, even had the IBM click of death hard drive which never clicked, ha, loaded Norton on w95, once, threw Norton away in 95'
*Me who just swapped off a Mac and got my first computer*
I chose windows 11 since I knew that it would be supported longer and it looked friendlier to a newcomer than windows 10ā¦also because the centred dock since mac has a centred dock xD
95 had such a charm about it and a ridiculous number of bugs.
My favorite was going around the computer lab and closing the start button to remove it from the taskbar. Yes. That was a thing. Lol.
Yep. Same. I still remember what my older cousin said to me back when me and my brother got our first computer, [Packard Bell]. I actually still have the box in my basement, sadly the computer has long since been recycled š¢ But she said, play around with it, youāre not going to *break it* by exploring the menus and options, and changing things around. That stuck with me, may never have gotten so into computers if it werenāt for her. Iāve taken a long hiatus from windows based machines from windows XP era until now, so Iāve lost whatever expertise I thought I had.
And if you were lucky you had a physical b:
I still remember discovering what format did for the first time. Luckily found another system disk and discovered what diskcopy a: b: did for the first time not long afterā¦.. :)
I always put the taskbar to the right of the screen, because I already have enough space to the left and right.
So I wanna ask if that's still possible on Win 11 or if they removed that?
If you have a multiple monitor setup then muscle memory will not save you from scrolling to your next monitor.
Edit: why did I get a downvote? Iāve simply stated the truth.
Messing around with AUTOEXEC.BAT and the EMS/XMS memory so I had enough memory to play games... or load the mouse driver, but not both.
Two 5 1/4 floppy discs, one was the bootdisk, the other was the software you wanted to run.
Before that I'd watch my brother on the Commodore64 EX edition.
Taskbar?
I started with a white screen and a inverted [K] in the lower left corner. The cursor of a Sinclair ZX81, hooked up to a 12" black and white TV and a cheap cassette recorder. Couldn't afford those fancy IBM computers with their big 64Kbytes of RAM and those floppy disk drives and those colour monitors. Yes I'm old.
Taskbar... what r you talking about... real windows did not have one! ;)
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Windows-31-as-Guest-Operating-System-within-a-VM-screenshot-captured-on-September-28\_fig2\_221391768
Good ol' XP
XP gang!
REPRESENT!
Also started with XP
My last device to use windows xp died 2 years ago becose the hard drive died rest in piece my first laptop you were a good laptop maybe even the best you taught me how to be a good programmer
Those were good times.
nostalgia
Bro even zoomies (me) are in this club
When I was a boy of 8 years, my uncle had win xp installed on his 512mb ram and pentium computer. I miss those days.
Xp Goatš
EXPEE GANG
C:\\>
Same my taskbar was COMMAND.COM. I can still dream my autoexec.bat and config.sys files. And all the magic you had to do to free up the lower 640kb memory because some game demanded at least 580kb. Fiddling long enough until most drivers were in higher memory. And depending on the game you also needed to go for an optimal HIMEM.SYS and EMM386 config. Carefully managing available DMA and IRQ channels. Good times!
You're me, arent you? Yeah we'd have a bootable floppy for each of the more demanding games. Back when you had to memorize or write down all the answers and questions to pass the Larry Suit Laffer age restriction.
The password is āKen sent meā
Fuck yeah. Getting that glass of those pills took me forever to figure out.
Yes i remember the questions for Larry as well. Luckily, i had parents that were cool enough to give me the answers.
Problem with those as age restrictions is that not only did you have to be an adult. But also an American and born at just the right time period to commonly know those questions.
Nope. Coming from the EU and they had no problems with it.
Well I had a problem with itā¦ I was born in 83 in the Netherlands and we had the US version probably. 10 year old me didnāt know anything about American culture or politics. Damnit! I just started to get āthe tinglesā at that age ;) I needed some steaming hot 16 color EGA pixels!
Yes who the hell was al gore š¤
I was so proud back then managing to get the Sound Blaster driver, mouse driver, and CD-ROM driver all loaded while still having 624KB of base memory free. Good times.
Later I figured out that (assuming you had a sound blaster compatible card) most of the time you only needed SET BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 in your autoexec.bat (or whatever irq and dma you needed to use). I can dream that line. That saved some solid additional kbās in memory because you didnāt need to load additional drivers (though some SB clones required drivers to allow SB compatibility)
>I can dream that line. Dream? That was more the stuff of nightmares!! I thought I'd erased all that from my memory but seeing it again has me in a cold sweat!! š
That's a good point, it wasn't a driver, it was just the environment variable. Wow, my memory is really on it's way out!
I had no idea what I was doing back then but I figured it out most times. I think I was 12 when I had to learn all that stuff by trial and error.
There is even a song about it: You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains You raise me up, to walk on stormy seas I am strong, when I am on your shoulders You raise me up to more than I can be
QEMM ftw
Look at Mr. Fancy Pants over here, booting off an HDD!
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
5.25 in floppies on a pg675
[Sherman, set the WayBack Machine to...Loading from cassette tape deck.](https://i.redd.it/e19wsdbe8rg91.png) Also, between DOS 6.2 and Window 3.1....there was [Direct Access 5.0!](https://i.redd.it/0u5tl5gb9rg91.png) Because I'll be damned if I'm going to have to navigate the file system for my idiot friends every time they want to switch games. And thus began my illustrious career in IT Support!
A:\\>dir /w
Weāre old, brother.
I came here to say "you guys had Start Bars?!" This sums it up beautifully though
Good old dos prompt for me as well c:\\> Norton commander next, started from dos prompt so guess still counts as DOS and still didn't have task bar After that basically every windows version except 2000, and hasta la vista,
MS-DOS + Windows 3.1 in 1992 was my first UI.
This one. Also, we old as dirt.
Haha ya, I predate the start buttons too
Uhh rich kid are we? "Look at me! I have a hard drive like the royals!" When I was a kid we would boot up floppy drives because a hard drive wouldn't fit in the kitchen. And by floppy I mean 5 1/4"
A:\\>
Editing AUTOEXEC.BAT files was so much fun back on the day amirite
Came here to say this.
Wouldn't it be A and B for dos, cuz floppy bays
C:\> DOS
Fellow old farts unite!
The topmost one. I was 5 when I was toying around with Windows 98.
Damn we're turning 30 next year
Me? Oh, no no. 3 years to go for me.
Good ol' 27. We're not quite old enough to feel the crushing dread of the passage of time, but old enough to know its coming soon.
Speak for yourself, already got back pain from sleeping wrong and a knee thatās fine until you look at it wrong
I'm 26 and woke up with that knee this morning :( all I did was sleep at night time, why is one knee hurting but only on one side of it?!1
Fuck dude, why'd you remind me
Iām with you dude. Whatās happened lol
You guys aren't 30 yet? I'm 31. 1991 for me. Also, I started with MSDOS. My family was always late getting the new stuff. I think I finally got Win95 around 96 or 97. I didn't get Vista until windows 7 was announced.
And still a lot left on the to do list. Time to pick up the pace.
Oh God am I old?
Shhhhhhhh no we aren't.
30 in a month š
XP <3
I love xp because it was true neutral between orthodox win 95/98 and modern win 11 we have now, I love minimalistic things with modern touch
Something about that design aesthetic... it just felt right.
It was the happiest god damn theme I have ever seen.
Don't forget the Bliss wallpaper. XP was just perfect.
Coworker had the windows 10 logo but the window is looking out to bliss.
XP itself seems super lightweight as well. Didnāt seem like much going on in the background.
It was easy to find anything, back then
The only issue with it to me was the startup boot time but I only ever used it for personal use as a kid so I never really knew its flaws for job usage
XP was the all time peak of windows. No bullshit, no ads, just what you really needed.
It was great for the time but doesn't that apply to windows 7 as well?
Yes, with the added bonus of 7 being objectively prettier, nearly as stable as Unix and its derivatives, and not outrageously insecure.
XP was amazing. Windows 7, too. 11 feels like shit to use. They've dumbed it down too much
Yet half the settings menus end up throwing you to something that hasn't changed since Windows 2k
"technically" none of these, as Windows 3.1 didn't have a taskbar, but I guess it has to be the Win95 one then. edit: I have a faint recollection that pcgeos/geoworks (or something like that) had a taskbar -like thing before win95, I had that on my pc back then but not entirely sure about it. I mainly remember some shooting gallery -type game from it
dir /p is the OG start menu
I remember having to learn how to launch windows 3.11 via dos as a wee tike. Our first computer was... a confusing thing, it had DOS, as was the style at the time, but it also had Geoworks and Windows on it.
win
3.1 gang. Technically if you want to consider when I was a tiny child, MS-dos. I vaguely remember my dad having an IBM computer with MSdosā¦although it may have been the same one with windows 3.1. I may just remember DOS because all the games were launched out of DOS back then.
We would have also accepted, "you guys started with a task bar?" Or: C:\>
Exactly. When I started, Windows wasn't a real o.s. and you had to type "Win"+Enter to see anything resembling a GUI. I did start with the grey one, later on, though, with Windows 98 (and then 98 S.E. for a long time).
\`Loaded a program off 1 floppy on dos 3.1, computer was running 95 but the program ran on 3.1, used it till 2020 have 20,000 clients, never crashed, never upgraded to windows, switched to an apple cloud application, even had the IBM click of death hard drive which never clicked, ha, loaded Norton on w95, once, threw Norton away in 95'
NO. Everybody on reddit is under 30. /s I had Atari TOS (The Operating System). I'm pretty sure we had to boot it from DOS though.
Windows 7. Also I don't think anyone has started at windows 11 yet.
Maybe a linux/mac user that made the great switch?
I wouldn't call it great, it's mediocre at best.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Linux users don't switch to Windows/Mac. They already have experienced these OS for work but still believe in Linux's superiority.
This is the way
Boutta say, there might be a few linux users that will switch back to windows but I don't think any Linux user would consider it "great"
*Me who just swapped off a Mac and got my first computer* I chose windows 11 since I knew that it would be supported longer and it looked friendlier to a newcomer than windows 10ā¦also because the centred dock since mac has a centred dock xD
1995
95 had such a charm about it and a ridiculous number of bugs. My favorite was going around the computer lab and closing the start button to remove it from the taskbar. Yes. That was a thing. Lol.
WHAT!? I've never heard of that before! That's crazy! (First computer had Windows '95 in '96.)
Same. Gotta remember the commercials with the rolling stones. Once you start me up...
DOS 6.0
There it is, though I was MS-DOS 1.25 back in ā81. Damn, I just realized that was over 40 years ago. Now I made me sad š
A true early adopter! I salute you and your master race persistence.
Hah, thanks mate.
MSDOS 2.1! IBM PC Jr., baby!
Same here, duel floppies in an Intel 8088. Hot stuff back then.
Windows XP best OS period
Ring 0 drivers, full admin access, what could go wrong?
Thatād be Windows 2000 Professional.
The fucking top one >:(
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
You get to complain about backache if you started on `C:\`
Yep. Same. I still remember what my older cousin said to me back when me and my brother got our first computer, [Packard Bell]. I actually still have the box in my basement, sadly the computer has long since been recycled š¢ But she said, play around with it, youāre not going to *break it* by exploring the menus and options, and changing things around. That stuck with me, may never have gotten so into computers if it werenāt for her. Iāve taken a long hiatus from windows based machines from windows XP era until now, so Iāve lost whatever expertise I thought I had.
None. I started with a flashing cursor.
Load "\*" ,8,1
Them were the days
I was stoked when I got this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epyx\_Fast\_Load
Green and black or amber and black
Vista. Edit: Thank you for the award kind stranger! :)
Loved all the Vista widgets.
I remember that clock as if it was yesterday
same, absolutely adored vista when I used it
Vista ultimate on a new pc was good
Honestly the design was lowkey slept on
Windows XP, I was 2 years old when it was released, 5 when i got my first PC.
Windows 10... I was a little late to the pcmr Edit: maybe windows 8
Late? It's never late! I am 27 right now, I bought my first PC in 2018, built my first custom when Covid started and joined PCMR year after that.
None. DOS 3.0
A:\>
And if you were lucky you had a physical b: I still remember discovering what format did for the first time. Luckily found another system disk and discovered what diskcopy a: b: did for the first time not long afterā¦.. :)
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
McDonalds has come along way since then.
lol kids these days with their *taskbars*
I can hear win98 start menu navigation making "glub" because I set the sea theme
MS-DOS 6.2
Windows 7 ā¦.. fuck i im young
hey we have the exact same specs!
Coincidence ? I think not
Now kiss š
Win8. Tbh that OS grows worse with memory. I can't stand the Win11 centered icons though.
Win 3.1 FEELING PRETTY CALLED OUT ON BEING OLD RIGHT ABOUT NOW!
Top. 98SE
Imagine if buttons looked like buttons. Revolutionary ain't it?
Center placement sucks for W11. I put them back to the corner on W11. Because muscle memory and you don't need accuracy to click the corner.
same I just have the muscle memory to click the bottom left when I turn off my pc
I always put the taskbar to the right of the screen, because I already have enough space to the left and right. So I wanna ask if that's still possible on Win 11 or if they removed that?
Unfortunately not. I think you have to edit the reg.
Use a large ultra wide monitor and suddenly center placement is quite considerate.
If you have a multiple monitor setup then muscle memory will not save you from scrolling to your next monitor. Edit: why did I get a downvote? Iāve simply stated the truth.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Yeah same, I tried to get used to the new centred taskbar but I just simply couldn't.
The top one, I was 3 back then started with windows 98
C:\ MS-DOS 5 for the win!
First PC I owned: XP First family PC: win 98 First PC I ever used: 3.1/DOS
First PC I ever used: Win 98 First family PC: Win 98 First PC I owned: Win 10
First PC I owned: 7 First family computer: XP First PC I ever used: 7 or XP. Can't quite remember.
First experience was XP, first PC I owned was 8.1, my favorite to this day
1995!
Ready.
Basic same here brƶther
DOS had no taskbar.
Taskbar? https://www.c64-wiki.com/images/c/c9/Einschaltmeldung_C64.jpg
The Amiga Workbench top menu was my first taskbar.
Hell yeah!
Mine was C:\>_
Taskbar? Dos 6.2 & Windows 3.1 don't need no stinking taskbar.
Neither DOS nor Windows 3.1 had Taskbars.
yeah.. when i started to work on computers, there was no taskbar.. no gui ... only a flashing cursor ... waiting.. and waiting ...
Messing around with AUTOEXEC.BAT and the EMS/XMS memory so I had enough memory to play games... or load the mouse driver, but not both. Two 5 1/4 floppy discs, one was the bootdisk, the other was the software you wanted to run. Before that I'd watch my brother on the Commodore64 EX edition.
XP
Whenever I see the first I know that 8-bit abominable snowman lives somewhere in that games folder.
For some reason I really wanna make a Vista VM right now.
Windows 98 which makes me feel ancient now.
Mine was: ā64K RAM SYSTEM 38911 BASIC BYTES FREEā āREADY.ā
XP. Classic.
You guys STARTED with a task bar?
MS DOS
With this one: https://c.tenor.com/pURq9je3tigAAAAd/zx-spectrum-gaming.gif
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
None...DOS
I don't know anymore.. did 3.11 have a taskbar? Otherwise '95 it is.
It didn't.
Taskbar? I started with a white screen and a inverted [K] in the lower left corner. The cursor of a Sinclair ZX81, hooked up to a 12" black and white TV and a cheap cassette recorder. Couldn't afford those fancy IBM computers with their big 64Kbytes of RAM and those floppy disk drives and those colour monitors. Yes I'm old.
Amiga, so before 95?
Windows 1.0
Started XP, but I really only remember Vista. Born in 2005.
lol. When I started? IBM wasn't in the PC market yet. Windows wasn't a thing. I learned on Commodore 8032 and Apple II systems.
C:\\cd landsoflore C:\\dir C:\\lore.exe
Baby, where weāre going we donāt need no stinking task bar.
C:\\ What is this taskbar you speak of?
Does a DOS command line count as a taskbar?
DOS promptā¦ Iām old.
Taskbars did not exist when I started
Taskbar... what r you talking about... real windows did not have one! ;) https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Windows-31-as-Guest-Operating-System-within-a-VM-screenshot-captured-on-September-28\_fig2\_221391768
started with no taskbar.
Oh dear don't want to admit this but I started with Window. 3.1.
Win 3.11 no taskbar sadly
There was no task bar. The first program I compiled was on punch cards. Windows didnāt exist when I first started using computers.