Windows ME

Casting off the legacy

Microsoft's very conservative approach to hardware migration meant that this wasn't a task that could be rushed. It knew well enough that it couldn't lay down the law with the hardware vendors, insisting that they get good NT or Windows 2000/WDM drivers out there. After all, these vendors, which write the bulk of the drivers that work with Windows, had amply demonstrated over the years that they had huge difficulty keeping up with the API changes in the graphics card arena, and that they simply didn't have the resources to adequately fund the writing, R&D and testing of more platform drivers. Hence the mindset behind the WDM approach - write for 9x, but gain a Windows 2000 driver from it.

It could be argued that this approach backfired because WDM represents essentially a new target platform for the driver authors. However, it's clear that this approach was an honest and honourable attempt to get the third-party developers moving towards a future unified Windows platform.

In terms of what you got in the package, Windows 98 brought IE 4, more ease of use and better Wizards. Again, a very familiar verse in a well-trodden hymnbook - add in new things, don't move the core too quickly, and charge for the upgrade. Between the release of Windows 95 and 98, one major shift had already happened. DirectX had taken the games world by storm and, in the matter of a few short years, games had moved off the DOS platform and into the Windows one. As hardware specifications accelerated towards orbit, the ability of Windows to support high-speed, high-quality immersive games became unquestioned, and Windows became the computer-based gaming platform of choice. Indeed, it wasn't long before it had clearly matched, maybe even outstripped the established games console marketplace for quality and gameplay, if not for installation issues or startup costs.

On the opposing front, Windows NT had become frozen in time in 1996 when NT 4 was launched. There was a big effort being made to get NT 5 out of the door around the 1998 timeframe, but the schedules continued to slip. This slippage, of course, made the creation of the one true unified Windows into an impossible dream. Despite this, after the release of Windows 98, Microsoft claimed that the 9x product team had been disbanded and merged into the monumental effort required to get Windows 2000 out of the door. As the deadlines for Windows 2000 continued to slip, and it became obvious that the inplace upgrade route from Windows 98 to Windows 2000 Professional was fraught with complexity, and thus with no guarantee that such an inplace upgrade would actually work, Microsoft fell back onto the standard technique for 9x development. Take a bunch of new things and wrap them up into a new 9x release.

Windows ME is born

This is where ME has come from - its heritage is undeniable. ME should really be called Windows 98 Third Edition, but the marketing people have palpitations at the number '98' now we're into a new millennium. Exactly the same recipe has been used. Take the latest browser (now Internet Explorer 5.5), wrap in some multimedia goodies in the shape of Media Player, and throw in some helpful Wizards for getting beginners connected to the Internet. Finally, be brave enough to take away support for config.sys drivers, 16-bit drivers and most of the more ancient of legacy support, and then polish the chrome bumpers and slap on a £79 upgrade sticker. Make sure the salesmen are wearing clean shirts and straight ties, and that their teeth sparkle. This is the essence of the ME experience.