These Vintage Microsoft Ads Are Seriously Bizarre…

[@MadSimple]

I can't believe your $25 Patreon tier doesn't include a PC

[@harkeofficial]

😱 I better go add a disclaimer…

[@stevenreplogle8644]

No PC Jr either??

[@Hoosteen4]

"Patreon and system sold separately" 💀

[@meow52190]

5 dollar windows 98 machine

[@ItsPyrus]

I'd settle for just the CRT at $50 tbh

[@briandemodulated]

9:10 you even added a drop shadow to your computer self! I love your fun editing so much!

[@Art1stical]

The world was excited about the potential of computers back in the 90s. Now, the world has realized that the potential has been squandered, so the excitement is gone. Love your videos, they really do take me back.

[@iancurrie8844]

This is a great channel. I'm afraid to admit that I rented a VHS copy of the video of Jennifer Aniston and friend breaking into bill gates' office to preview windows 95....more than once. It was a VERY exciting time. The start menu and affordable CD-roms at the same time? That's like a thousand reams of paper worth of data.

[@harkeofficial]

Wait- you could actually rent the tape?! That’s incredible

[@iancurrie8844]

@@harkeofficial Yep! It was at the local house of Pizza and Video to go! I guess it would have been 1994.

[@MagnaLynx21]

Steve Balmer jump scare at the end got me screaming "DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS" while sweating profusely.

[@tylerdoestech]

"Linux is a CANCER!!!"

[@suomynona6149]

Wait where's the jumpscare? I didn't see it

[@crnkmnky]

“Microsoft Windows 2.0, buy now! Except in Nebraska?”

[@crnkmnky]

@@suomynona6149 She showed a quick montage of Microsoft promos which didn't make the cut, including Steve Ballmer as a cheesy Windows salesman.

[@KeroGero89]

I (sort of) use autoscroll all the time: (1) It's useful when I need to move the screen just a little bit where rolling the scroll wheel up or down would move the screen too much. (2) It's the fastest way to get to the very top or bottom of a scrollable area by clicking the scroll wheel and then moving the mouse all the way up or down. (3) I guess I don't leave it scrolling while reading like the ad, but I still use it.

[@UltromanTheTacoman]

6:00 The elephants having shadows is crazy detail!

[@tekdragon]

I LOVE how you just casually mention getting something at a "Ham Fest" like everyone should know what those are! 😄 (Ham operator here XD) Your channel is awesome!

[@harkeofficial]

I actually filmed a side rant about what a hamfest is, but then I cut it out in the end to save time. There will be a whole episode (or more) about that very subject in the future... 😄

[@tekdragon]

@ looking forward to it!! :D

[@crnkmnky]

😯

[@FadedVault]

Ads back then felt so much more real. It was like they actually cared about us as buyers. They had a soul. Thanks for covering this! :)

[@kai5]

Wow, this brings me back to when new software was like an event that everybody celebrated together.

[@Destructerator]

Back when users weren’t the testers laugh😂

[@tsalikaki]

i'm so happy i found your channel, it's like a big, warm, nostalgia hug. i'm 42 and everything you've been covering is literally my whole tech life in eras. you are awesome! keep em coming.

[@ericwood3709]

Windows 95 is more than a shell running on top of DOS, actually. DOS is a 16-bit operating system, but Windows 95 is 32-bit. As far as I understand it, DOS was relegated to handling booting. Windows 3.x and earlier were 16-bit and essentially shells on top of DOS, though. Win 95 was kind of a big leap for consumer Windows both internally and in terms of the user interface. Windows NT existed before Win 95 and was 32-bit from the get-go, but had steeper system requirements as a result and did not have the kind of DOS compatibility that Windows 95, 98 and ME maintained.

[@lmeeken]

I also remember when making the shift to Windows 95, a LOT of my DOS software (including precious LucasArts adventures) simply didn't run the way it had on my prior DOS/Windows PC. While there was some vestigial DOS stuff under there, it really did feel like DOS had gone "bye bye," to quote the ad.

[@cleverlyblonde]

Windows was a graphical UI from Windows 1.0 to Windows 3.1, but that is where things began to change. With Windows 3.11 a lot of DOS stuff was replaced by Windows doing things on its own, and this leads nicely to Windows 9x where DOS gets the system running, but then is pretty much replaced by the Windows OS itself unless you needed to use DOS device drivers or run DOS apps. The biggest issues people had with Windows 9x being unreliable was due to poor drivers that were not well made or updated for it so it had to fall back to DOS or Win3.x modes. Windows 98 introduced a new driver model but drivers for it did not really take off in time. Windows NT existed as a parallel operating system line that did not rely on DOS and booted directly. You could run some DOS apps in its DOS v5 layer but not if it tried to talk directly to hardware. The focus, system requirements and bundled features made it only relevant to businesses however. Microsoft had hoped to merge the two product lines with Windows 2000 so it came with a number of consumer and gaming oriented features, but they could not get their eggs in a line in time for it. They then created the last of the Windows 9x series - Windows Millenium as a stop-gap until everything got united in the end with Windows XP. People don't remember it now but there was a lot of issues with Windows XP - there were missing drivers for consumer stuff (and that mattered as it was based on NT, not 9X, so you needed other drivers), the wifi support left a lot to be desired and there were some awful security issues. But eventually it all got sorted. Of course MS kept XP waay too long so when Vista came out, people had forgotten all about it. But that is another story 😅

[@ericwood3709]

@@cleverlyblonde Awesome clarification! I knew there was some kludge involved in the 9x series, but as a Mac kid I was not all that aware of the intricacies and haven't looked into them since. I did learn that Microsoft was going to make a consumer version of Windows 2000 before they ended up going with XP. I have tried a beta version called Neptune, and it seemed pretty nice. I wonder why they didn't go with it in the end. I can confirm that it runs Bonzi Buddy :D

[@sikkepossu]

@@cleverlyblonde Windows XP's "firewall" was hilarious. If you just kept trying to get through closed TCP/UDP port it let go after a while and allowed the traffic go through. LOL 🤣

[@cleverlyblonde]

@@sikkepossu It is tiredsome work to press against the gates 😂

[@StupidChris19]

“Multimedia!” was such a big buzzword back then. Such a big deal. But it’s not a word people even really use any more, is it?

[@GWinterbornYT]

At the corporate level it’s still part of the nomenclature for certain positions. One common title, and my most recent title, for the job I tend to have for office gigs is “Interactive Multimedia Specialist.” I think it’s mostly seen in e-learning and online training circles. People don’t generally use it at a consumer level anymore.

[@knyght27]

Wow, you mean the thing has video AND music?

[@suomynona6149]

The multimedia design career is pretty recent, if I'm not wrong it was created around late 2000s-early 2010s and recently started to take over. This career (as the name says it) involves graphic design, photomontages, illustration (both traditional & digital), video & sound editing, 2D & 3D animation and modelling, web and videogame design and programming, VR & AR. Source: I'm a multimedia design student and saw all of the above on my career.

[@SimonCallahan]

I remember the 90s, especially the CD-ROM boom, used it quite a bit. Everything was "multimedia", which is technically true because the software used text, video, and sound in collaboration to create whatever the software was. By that logic, though, movies are multimedia, as were existing video games. In some cases games would have the phrase "interactive" in front of "multimedia" because it made the game sound cooler. But again, by that logic, every game is interactive multimedia.

[@crnkmnky]

I became forever obsessed with that word when my family got a "Multimedia PC" (a hardware specification) for Christmas in 1992. It was a Tandy machine with a CD-ROM, soundcard, color monitor, modem, and Windows 3.1. Having used Mac II c's and Apple II g's before that, I hadn't realized good sound and color were still uncommon.

[@evanlee93]

The transition clips are actually so insanely period accurate wtf. Instantly subbed.

[@andromaeda24]

Love this!! Also such an honour to be a new member of your Patreon. You're making the videos we want to see on this platform with such kindness and joy towards your topics.

[@harkeofficial]

Thank you so much 🥲

[@BinnisRetro]

I really, really miss the world where Encarta was a thing. It was a great piece of software that sparked the imagination. The internet of today doesn't compare because Encarta was curated to present interesting topics in a lovely way.

[@harkeofficial]

I couldn’t agree more

[@suomynona6149]

Encarta helped me with homework ❤

[@jamesslick4790]

I run Encarta 98 (from an ISO image) on a Windows 98 virtual machine. Still a cool program!

[@bit-map]

i'm loving your channel and videos so far. i'm so jealous of that strong bad email dvd.

[@harkeofficial]

Haha I didn’t even notice it was in the shot! I was so excited when they released those back in the day, I had to get one 🥹

[@bit-map]

@@harkeofficial I have an og Cheat shirt and a Strong Bad hoodie. Idk why but stuff from the old Homestar Runner store feels like ancient treasure to me!

[@GendoPrime]

That Zoo Tycoon commercial brings it all back, after seeing that I begged my parents to get it for me for Christmas, needless to say I ended up with a used copy of SimEarth.

[@francmar8684]

Dude I’m so glad I found this channel. You’re doing some awesome stuff here!

[@Thiesi]

6:45 - Wait a second - are you implying here you're _not_ getting all dressed up and dancing like crazy every time a Windows or macOS update hits?!

[@MarkTheMagnificent]

With how frequent Windows updates are, I've gotten rid of my gym subscription!

[@rahzark]

I loved the MS-DOS 5 video, but I can't imagine having to watch stuff like that in your actual job. Its a corporate culture I've never been a part of and looks almost alien to me 😂

[@Zectifin]

as someone who works for a giant tech company, it reminds me of many of my corporate training videos. Had one recently where they tried to recreate an 80s point and click adventure for one.

[@Lruiz3865]

I haven't finished my CS major, but seeing how my major used to be and all of those ads are so cool, it almost feels nostalgic 😅 I know I'm the new generation, but I think it's always good to see where things started and how they grow to be what they're nowadays ❤

[@NightChime]

I use autoscroll sometimes when I'm viewing a gallery, or skimming for a specific piece of information.

[@QUANTUMJOKER]

I loved Encarta 94 when I was little, and make a point of installing it (along with Microsoft Dinosaurs, Casualty Kid and a bunch of other encyclopedias and educational games) on my vintage Macs. Encarta 94 had the first version of the trivia game Mindmaze, which is full of fun human and animal characters and pretty decent voice-acting. The fox has stuck in my mind for nearly thirty years. "Yo - I'm the fox and I'm here to say: click on the door if you want to play!" "Bravo, dude - that's the way! You're so smart, you blow me away!"

[@noahsander-]

the bitcrushed voice is so sick

[@jaseflex]

I came across your channel since I am into retro stuff and I really like your content. I, myself born in the late 70s when technology was in its infancy really enjoyed growing up with all the old school computers. You have a great charisma and I see how it makes you happy to go back to the past and reliving the retro stuff. Please keep making this great content.

[@jasonproductions9391]

I use auto-scroll all the time whenever I'm reading something, it's usually easier (and quieter) to just move the mouse up/down a little and then back to the middle than scroll with the wheel

[@stellarobado4269]

Yeah, sometimes my middle finger tired of all that scrollin'

[@RedSntDK]

I've used it for at least 20 years, but even in 2024 you'll hear your computer spin up the fans when you do so.

[@scorch527]

Same, but I've never used it 'no hands!' as the ad implied it was meant for.

[@MrHumbuck]

I used it the same. I also sometimes used it to speed to the bottom of a page faster than I could with the scroll wheel- although I suppose there's probably a keyboard shortcut for that

[@KarlWitsman]

That WAS Total Retro Madness. I recall seeing the Encarta ad. We had Encarta too, but the day that I saw it included FREE with a package of Velveeta cheese, well, I knew that it was near the end for CDROMs, at least for most people.

[@harkeofficial]

I have a stack of cd-roms that came from cereal boxes, but VELVEETA?!!!

[@crnkmnky]

​@@harkeofficial Chex Quest, baby! 💿😎

[@Katy133]

I went and watched the entire Windows 95 Launch Promo and enjoyed taking in the nostalgic feel from it. It make me think of games I played as a kid that had FMV elements to it like DK Castle Explorer and Uncle Albert's Fabulous Voyage.

[@AllboroLCD]

in 2010 I attended Comicon in NYC, an I had gotten to meet Bill Plimpton. The man responsible for the animated ads on the WIN95 CD. Later got to screen a full length feature of his at the IFC. I did not realize it was him until I saw the film and couldnt shake the familiarity of the art style. Very cool moment Ill always remember.

[@erbkaiser_]

This is such a fun channel. No idea why KZbin decided to randomly recommend it, but I'm glad it did. Subbed.

[@malevolentia28]

I actually use autoscroll regularly. Obviously not the "look ma, no hands!" way. I do it in short bursts. Like, a 3 seconds mid or slow scroll down when I know the place of the thing I want, still keeping my hand on the mouse. And I'm in my 20s btw.

[@WIMMine]

Same. It's great when you know you have to scroll a long way down to something.

[@byodinsbeardrpg]

Your animated inserts are so clean, nice work!

[@Lyriam80]

Harke, you're awesome. This took me down memory lane, That's for sure.

[@chrisdigitalartist]

I just stumbled on your KZbin Channel! I love your content! So fun to connect with other retro PC enthusiasts!

[@mooberlygaid2969]

Thanks!

[@GiftFromGod]

I think it's amazing they appeared on the computer in a minimized version of themselves just like you appear at times! Also, that MS-DOS guy reminded tremendously of Weird Al Yankovic 0.0 I just found your channel and I love it so much!

[@jeffreyarnold5887]

This is my favorite channel ever. Please never stop I need more of you in my bloodstream

[@janf.1240]

Nice, waiting for more videos in this retro computers series :)

[@AlicijaFilmGeek]

Love your vids - wish they were 10 mins longer as the subjects are always so cool and the insights done in a way no one else is doing them on KZbin

[@xwingfighter999]

Glad my algo got me here, this is fun and very well-made! Thumbs up, keep it up, somethingelse up! 🤘

[@MichaelMossmanNZ]

Wow! Talk about nostalgia central. This is my first experience with your channel, and I must say, I like it! I even went back & watched this video again before commenting, because I knew there were several aspects that I wanted to mention, but I couldn't remember the 1st one LOL. Yeah, some of those old MS-ADS were quite bizarre, to say the least. Comments: 1) Auto-Scroll ... yeah, naah! I actually discovered this "feature" purely by accident (prob with a Microsoft Mouse) and I was like wtf, what's wrong with my PC? After that, I never pressed the wheel-button again! I think nowadays (depending on your O/S) you can set it as a middle-click & assign specific actions. 2) MS-DOS 5 Upgrade video ... 4:22 trumpets as tutor slides in. That is so cool. Like you say, plenty of energy & inspiration there. 5:06 you're out of memory ... sounds like someone needs to tune their config.sys & autoexec.bat files, something that only people who have actually used MS-DOS will know about =) 3) 6:56 Windows 95 Launch Promo ... Wack-O-Meter: definitely 11.3/10 ... I thought that first guy was going to say "Whip it out" ... On a more serious note, although Windows 95 was still technically based on MS-DOS, it wasn't like its predecessor, where it was a two-stage process to boot into Windows (DOS, then Win.com). Quote: it is a hybrid 16-bit and 32-bit monolithic product with the boot stage based on MS-DOS. 4) The most outrageous ad in this collection (IMHO) had to be the teens with MS Encarta. 5) Speaking of being a part of MS-ETC, I was asked to write a Windows 95 exam for Microsoft's certification programme. They paid me USD$1000, which was a big deal back in the day, especially once it was converted to my local currency! Anyway, enough rambling ... thanks for the great content. Definitely earned a sub, and I'll look forward to watching more from @harkeofficial

[@DarkNekoStudio]

Please part 2 please! Also,make a retrospective on those "Hi,I'm a Mac!and i'm a PC!" Ad campaign. It used to play at my local Staples all the time back in the day.

[@aaronboothproduction]

Auto scroll was something I only did by accident - and then immediately panicked trying to turn it off...

[@LewisCollard]

I like the optimism about the adverts. Like, here is some TECHNOLOGY and it is going to be FUN and make things EASIER. I think the closest we get to that today is "yeah, technology is MISERABLE but we make it BEARABLE". A microcosm of that might be how people look at operating system updates then vs today, right? I'm glad there's you and others looking back on this era (and especially for the way you in particular do it), because I don't think it was ever inevitable that technology was going to make anyone's life less fun, and depending on what we do now it doesn't have to be that way today. Thanks for the video! Also great taste in headphones!

[@JALaflinOfficial]

Encarta '96 was my jam!! Really sparked a lifelong love of learning.

[@MattMcIrvin]

The "game and PC sold separately" discussion cracks me up because I actually DID get Zoo Tycoon as a pack-in... with an XBox Kinect bundle, I think.

[@transagenda]

Fire gathering of 90s strangeness! The Microsoft rap was sending me

[@EgoShredder]

1:09 - Yes I did actually use the auto scroll feature and still do! It works great if you set it to a comfortable speed. Really useful for reading long PDF books, or those neverending webpages etc.

[@fiskurtjorn]

7:45 You are not wrong. At that time, I used mostly DOS software. Only a hand-held scanner needed Windows. So, I made a batch file, scan.bat, which basically started Windows with the command line options to start the scanner software and exit Windows upon exiting the scanner.

[@Netist_]

"I love Encarta", she says, as her eyes go wide, pupils dilating.

[@Butterscott_NJ]

The trackball Intellimouse was fantastic. I loved it.

[@ItsPyrus]

Windows 95 wasn't a shell that ran over DOS. It's a bit weird, but DOS is pretty much the bootloader and running as a compatibility layer. It's more the other way around, DOS is running under Windows once you've booted. One could make a stronger argument towards this being the case for Windows 3.x, but it's still not true there. Doesn't really matter to most people now, but I remember some of my DOS games running not so great after we upgraded :( Based 7506 enjoyer btw

[@ItsPyrus]

also is autoscroll some esoteric thing to people? I use it all the time, it's so intuitive.

[@aekaydubs]

I absolutely want a part 2!

[@janf.1240]

Nice video, waiting for part 2 :)

[@sullenpuffin]

I used to work with someone who got a testing job at Microsoft just as 95 was released. He turned up for his first day in the office and found.. nobody. The office was empty, discarded bottles everywhere, marks on the floor where someone had brought in a motorbike and done donuts! No joke. In those days when software got released, there were no rushes to get bugs fixed, no continuous deployment. All the employees took holiday and many got crazy rich from their stock exploding in value. So yeah, those videos felt exciting because the excitement was real!

[@JamesOKeefe-US]

Love this channel ! The editing and presentation is amazing. Just binged all your videos 😊 and subbed.

Can't believe I've haven't found your channel earlier! Love the content! 🎉

[@derekgoss]

I have no idea why the algorithms took so long to bring your wonderful efforts into my world. Have only been subscribed for 4 days, but you are smart, and entertaining. I remember Windows forcing us to upgrade, and how slow a process it was with 56k modems. That was almost 30 years ago, and I was in my 20's...sigh.

[@emilflarsen2]

If you haven't already played "Sam and Max: Hit The Road" you'll love it! It's a point n' click video game with that exact 90's humor.

[@Namingway248]

I don't think I ever auto-scrolled on purpose nor have I ever desired to, but I guess I appreciate the attempt at creating a nifty feature.

[@rgbmew]

I used auto-scroll every day until I switched to Unix systems. Some days, I still kinda miss it, especially on huge documents.

[@RedSntDK]

If you use a Chromium browser you could try this launch parameter: --enable-blink-features=MiddleClickAutoscroll It works for Vivaldi on Debian. I also run a tiny application called XMousePasteBlock to prevent the default middle button paste "feature" that X11 "offers". Really annoying for someone coming from Windows..

[@dykodesigns]

I’m one of those computer users that discovered autoscroll by accident and thought, what a weird feature. I never use autoscroll either. The MS-DOS 5 upgrade training is one of the most fun and iconic. With modern software updates (particularly iOS updates) I scroll through the list and think meh, not very exciting updates. Today’s software updates are so frequent that they become uneventful. In the 90’s tech progressed so quickly and everything was still so new that it was a lot more exciting (as kid in particular). I remember my father getting a sound blaster 16 in 1993 and to 10 year old me that was quite exciting. Same thing with getting our first cd-rom drive about 2 years later, it was a huge feature improvement to our 486. I miss those days.

[@Zectifin]

I would LOOOOVE a part 2!

[@shawnzalewski6861]

I thought i had meditated, studied, and regurgitated a thorough dose of 90s nerd pop culture. you have bomb-dot-commed so many more memories, and a bag of chips...

[@brownatron5000]

That last one felt like a Tim and Eric sketch 😅

[@mh3708]

Tim & Eric definitely aped a lot of their style from this period of media history. The hard green-screen paste-ins, the bad MIDI jazz, people talking their way through a rap - it’s all there.

[@MyAvitech]

To answer some of your questions, you should get hold of Dave on his channel, "Dave's Garage". He was a software engineer for Microsoft in the 90's. He's a great guy, and likes telling stories from his MS days, and a great resource. Also, I just found your channel and subbed. Great stuff.

[@CRAETION_]

absolutely loved this!!

[@DinosaurBytes]

Wow, Windows 95 looks amazing, can't wait for it to release!

[@Thiesi]

Might take quite a while though as we are currently only at Windows 11 so far.

[@MichaelMossmanNZ]

@@Thiesi Clever =)

[@TheRealPentiumMMX]

I adore the MS-DOS 5 commercial; it's peak '90s and I love it

[@HowlinAndyDE]

I'm so happy i found your channel. Perfect combination of all the things i like. :D

[@DarkNekoStudio]

I loved and still love Encarta,was better than looking everywhere on internet back in the day...and saved shelf space.

[@kmarkusaurelius]

Really makes you wonder how much coffee was consumed during the making of these videos. SO. MUCH. ENERGY.

[@SimonCallahan]

The MS-DOS 5 rap has the same energy as the "industrial musicals" of the 50s. Those were proper stage musicals, so there were many songs there, but still.

[@RabbitEngineering]

At 11:21 - that's Steve Ballmer, who ran sales and marketing for BillG all during the 90s (later became CEO) all that craziness is his doing.

[@5stepsmusic]

I occasionally use auto scroll. Makes it easier to scroll through long websites, documents etc quickly. Just don't move your mouse too far or you'll immediately fly to the other end of whatever you're scrolling through haha

[@angelofmusic997]

I think it would be really cool to see you exploring those programs like Bookcase 95. Maybe a future video idea?

[@leon-set]

would love a part two !

[@CaptainPlainJaneway]

I can't even imagine what the official Microsoft tiktok is like. "Let's rizz up this data set with a Pivot Table. Skibidi power query."

[@photoelectron]

My parent's had compton's encyclopedia, 97 i think ? and yea, I'd spend days just interacting tf out of all the information... not sure if it was on that one, but i remember there was a comparison of different speeds, like human, car, airplane, rocket and light; you'd click play and see how much time i'd take for each to travel some distance, light always being instantaneous, but you could also slow down time until light took a few seconds and then everything else would just be at the start and my kid brain was blown like wtf, rockets are slow compared to it... anyways, recently found you on tiktok and i love the vibe of your videos... congrats on that microsoft partnership !

[@karlsaintlucy]

I'm having flashbacks to that castle trivia game that came with Encarta, which you should totally play if you haven't already

[@RicardoK-ng5ch]

" Like trying to tame a runaway train" 😆 Soo true!

[@altrogeruvah]

I had the Encarta 98 and my favorite past time was memorizing proverbs from as many foreign languages as I could and 11 year old me tried my best to impress my parents with my foreign language skills haha, I also used to spend hours reading about constellations in the sky

[@lukedrillbrain9850]

Windows 3.1 was a shell that ran over MS-DOS. You had to install DOS first and then Windows 3.1. Windows 95 was the first public Windows version that would simply install Windows from the get-go. However, the DOS command line still existed, and you could go to it. I don't remember if you had to reboot into DOS. I think you may have needed to, but it's been a long time. I am sure, however, that you didn't need to install just DOS and then Windows with Windows 95. I think that last commercial was referring to the change in how Windows 3.1 did things versus the change with Windows 95. However, you are right that DOS did not go away with Windows 95.

[@zzco]

Windows 3.11 was not, however. It was a fully-preemptive, multitasking 32-bit OS under-the-hood. It's why you could run multiple MS-DOS applications as separate floating windows.

[@zzco]

It's just that the Windows at the time was a 16-bit, cooperative environment.

[@lmeeken]

And Windows 95 had many DOS programs it simply wouldn't run. When I tried spinning up my LucasArts CDs, and they just sputtered, it really did feel like DOS had gone "bye bye "...

[@cleverlyblonde]

The key to handle DOS games that did not run under Windows 9x was to either create a bootdisk, OR configure a shortcut to the game that would run the game under DOS and the PC would actually reboot, run the game, then after you quit the game it would reboot back into the GUI again (or it would if you manually rebooted, my memory is a bit sketchy). But I do remember the checkbox in the shortcut properties at least - it was no longer there in Windows ME. Also I think there was an option to boot to DOS in the shutdown and reboot box. Strike that - there was (I looked it up) an option in the shutdown dialogue to boot to DOS. It would boot the GUI on the subsequent (re)boot.

[@AllboroLCD]

RIP Gary Kildall, there would have been none of this without him. I sitll imagine what the 90's computing landscape would have looked like had Billy not stolen his destiny.

[@randalalansmith9883]

I spent the 1990s-not working in tech-but working in media that promotes tech. So I did support roles at trade shows, and all the while, not having a computer at home.

[@AdamantineCat]

The win 95 launch promo circles back into 2024 brainrot content and I'm here for it.

[@JamieBliss]

Windows 3 was a shell installed on top of DOS. Windows 95 was built on DOS (and it poked through occasionally), but it was much less visibly so.

[@tobylifers3390]

Retro Hark is so adorable every time :')

[@greymatter800]

Win 3.11 was the last MS-DOS Win shell, as far as I remember. Win95 was the first OS of it's own, not a DOS shell - that's why it was such a big deal. And all Windows versions since 95 were their own OS. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that's how it was.

[@SlyPearTree]

Windows 95 and 98 included DOS and ran on it, it just was configured to start Windows by default, it could be configured not to. First Windows that was an O.S. and not a shell was NT. Window ME was also a shell but they made it more difficult to run DOS only.

[@Programentalist]

@@SlyPearTree Exactly this. DOS wasn't a product any more as such, but DOS was still the base of the Win9x products (DOS 7 something was included with Win95 iirc). If you installed DOS before Win9x, you could still boot to the "proper" DOS install if you wanted. If you installed it fresh you got the newer DOS instead. I remember we used to install DOS first and set it up properly, then Windows, but after a while realized the Win9x DOS was just fine and there was no need.

[@greymatter800]

@@SlyPearTree YT deleted my longer comment, so here's a shorter one. It might be a grey area then. According to Wiki, Win95 kept the MS-DOS part just as a compatibility layer for older drivers, a not the whole main OS. So Win95 didn't rely on MS-DOS as a main file system, unlike Win 3.11.

[@whickervision742]

DOS loaded Win95 and up, and switched the CPU mode. They made it pretty seamless to switch back and forth, and had a 16-bit emulator that could run well behaved DOS programs in a GUI window, like the text editor. And their CLI command window looked and felt like DOS... And it kept environment variables from DOS. They really tried not to blow people's minds.

[@cleverlyblonde]

@@Programentalist Also you could edit MSDOS.sys (it was an INI file in Win95+) to set the Boot parameter to DOS and it would boot into DOS 7.x. But people would create shortcuts to "difficult" games that wouldn't run under Windows 9.x and configure them for DOS and the PC would reboot, run the game, then reboot back into the GUI when you quit it. So booting to old DOS as you said wasn't really necessary. WinME made things hard though, but that is another story.

[@MundoYui]

Damn Harke, your channel is just too good! It's cinema 🚬

[@antivanti]

I like the internal Windows 1 fake commercial with Steve Ballmer and the Direct X one with Bill Gates killing demons with a shotgun in Doom for Windows. But the Windows 95 guide with Jennifer Aniston and Mathew Perry is also wild

[@alexcharteris]

I really loved watching the 'Buddy Holly' music video on the Windows 95 CD-ROM that came with our first PC when I was a kid. Oh, and playing 'Hover'. My fav weird Microsoft promo is the Jennifer Anniston and Matthew Perry Windows 95 Video Guide which was like a bootleg episode of Friends where Chandler and Rachel learn to copy and paste...

[@Syntox]

Every internal corporate training video of this era is the soundtrack to ToeJam and Earl

[@RiskyStrats]

Auto scroll is great for certain situations. When I have a wall of text to read, I prefer it to regular scrolling because it's smooth and doesn't make me lose my place in the text

[@enes_karaca]

I do actually use auto scroll occasionally. Mostly to go to the bottom or top of the page quickly. Click and hold the middle mouse button, pull mouse down a little and you are instantly at the bottom of the page. That move is equal to scrolling the wheel about 500 times. If you click middle mouse once and use autoscroll it stays in autoscroll, you have to click left or middle mouse again to exit out of it. But if you hold down the middle mouse button and do the scrolling it exists as soon as you stop holding down the button. Actually useful to quickly go to a place in a document if you know what you are looking for inside the page.

[@davcar72]

Bro! These used to play on the RadioShack in-store ads. We got a DVD every month. It was a VHS before 1997.

[@AllelineNguyen]

Yep. Tried the auto-scroll feature once, and never again. I remember seeing this feature on a relatively recent mouse as well, so it's still supported in some Microsoft mouse.

[@bonchbonch]

I love how excited people were about PCs in that era.

[@jackmercer4244]

Corporate Jazz... gotta drop some of that 80's goodness in my DJ sets.