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General Computer Thread

I used Classic Shell to make it less enshittified and less "appy" with the junk that came with the OS.

I love Classic Shell. Don't know what I'd do without it. When I upgraded to W11, I also immediately looked for options to shift the taskbar to the left. I really dislike the default centered position as it feels like it wastes so much screen real-estate.
 
This talk of msdos.

Memory unlocked now of writing batch files old school. Used oen and paper to jot down what I wanted and then the commands. Typed the file once I was happy. Used to make small menus for running dos games.
And boot disks with the appropriate EMS setup for certain games.

I can't remember what the first version of DOS I used was, but when I started mainstream, it was 6 and Win3.1 on a DX2-66.

I had prior experience with a much older machine, though I can't remember which version of dos that was, but no Windows that I recall.Slightly later, Word Perfect 5.1 was a thing I used in college. (Got the DX2-66 later). - Both were saving things on 5inch floppies though.

For the office, it was mainframes til around 96 when we got Win95. - For Docs and Spreadsheets, Ami-Pro and Lotus 123 were the primaries for years until we got completely microsofted.
 
14th October 2025: Microsoft ends support for W10.
19th October 2025: W10 update installs automatically.


I had checked that all the W10 updates had been done by the fourteenth. I am not registered for the "continuing support" thing. So what's going on???
 
Wired mouse that has been working fine for years is really struggling now. Moves fine for a few seconds, then becomes next to impossible to use. I also noticed the red light underneath stopped working. Is it dead? It's cheap so I can just replace it.
 
And boot disks with the appropriate EMS setup for certain games.

Oh man, we have it so easy today compared to those days when we would have to do things to squeeze more memory out of PC in order to play something.

Yeah, I remember having to get EMS and Himem setup to even get the original Papyrus NASCAR Racing from 1994 running in SVGA mode. It felt good when figuring out something like that!

Windows 3.1 and anything prior to that were more or less DOS front-ends rather than full-blown operating systems of their own. Not entirely dissimilar to something like QDOS which was a mouse-driven front-end, a pre-cursor to File-Explorer.

Slightly later, Word Perfect 5.1 was a thing I used in college

My Dad still uses Word Perfect. First was 4.5, then 5.1. Reveal codes!
 
My Dad still uses Word Perfect. First was 4.5, then 5.1. Reveal codes!

In Australia (or at least South Australia) at one point WP was very much the word processor for the legal profession.

Then along came Word for Windows (which I got to see a preview of sometime before it was released - benefit of where I worked being a big reseller) and over time there went WP.

Might have set it up a few times but don't ever recall having used WP, when Wordstar, Word, Word for Windows now it's Libreoffice.
 
I love Classic Shell. Don't know what I'd do without it. When I upgraded to W11, I also immediately looked for options to shift the taskbar to the left. I really dislike the default centered position as it feels like it wastes so much screen real-estate.
I even picked the Win 7 look for Classic Shell. Guess I won't find out if I can use that on W11.
 
Random videos I found, am sure someone might find something interesting here

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I even picked the Win 7 look for Classic Shell. Guess I won't find out if I can use that on W11.


It does work. I'm using the classic menu. No issues. I'll use it any day over the overly big standard menu from 10/11. I've always hated how big and bloated that thing looked. I know they designed it for touchscreen use, but why does usability have to be sacrificed for those of us who aren't into touchscreens. Microsoft doesn't even offer other alternatives as an option.
 
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OMG emm386 and himem.sys oh the not so fond memories
I used those to get enough ram to run Red Baron II on my 286 Packard-Bell...With a whopping 40 MB HDD. I could get a few games, some Warez and some utilities on there. A buddy reformatted my drive with some sort of reserve partition which kept file sizes smaller than 1k using 1k of disc space. It added a few more mb of storage.
 
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