The Worst OS

SirNitram · Post by **SirNitram** » 2004-08-13 07:01pm

Windows 3.1. Not Windows 3.1.1, the classic. The one that overwrote the FAT table on each boot up, destroying all data.

Xon · Post by **Xon** » 2004-08-13 08:31pm

White Haven wrote:The pre-95/NT versions of windows were shells, not really OSes. Hell, they ran from inside a full install of another OS...more of a Linux DE, really, than an OS in its own right.

Not really.

While versions less than Windows 3.11 were not what many would class as a true OS, they did everything a OS should do (just very poorly). The DOS enviroment can be considered a bootloader.

White Haven · Post by **White Haven** » 2004-08-14 12:39am

The Disk Operating System

functioned as a perfectly workable OS for the software designed for it. A limitted one in the end, yes, but a workable one...and more importantly, just about uncrashable. It didn't try to do too much, but it ran Master of Orion, Starflight, and X-COM, and it never, ever crashed. More than one can say about anything Microsoft-based since, yes?

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2004-08-14 12:46am

White Haven wrote:The Disk Operating System functioned as a perfectly workable OS for the software designed for it. A limitted one in the end, yes, but a workable one...and more importantly, just about uncrashable. It didn't try to do too much, but it ran Master of Orion, Starflight, and X-COM, and it never, ever crashed. More than one can say about anything Microsoft-based since, yes?

MS didn't originally write DOS- they bought it

. That, and the fact that DOS didn't do much in the first place contributed to it's stability.

Oh, and MS is selling a version of Windows in Asia that only allows 3 apps running at a time

. People would simply pirate Windows or install Linux. This is the worst operating system

And Intel is also selling a processor w/ no L2 cache.

Stuart Mackey · Post by **Stuart Mackey** » 2004-08-14 12:48am

Faram wrote:Blah whiners!

take a tour of DosShell and you will know hell!

I found that to be very easy to use..primitive, but easy.

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2004-08-14 01:11am

Oh yes, did anyone forget to mention Microsoft Bob

.

The Last Rebel · Post by **The Last Rebel** » 2004-08-14 07:01am

I've never, personally, had problems with any OS I've used. However, Some of the newer versions of WIndows didn't get alone with this computer I'm using...I think NT or ME made the thing start smoking

I'm using Win 98SE, and I've had no real problems
(that I can't figure out!).

Col. Crackpot · Post by **Col. Crackpot** » 2004-08-14 09:27am

White Haven wrote:The Disk Operating System functioned as a perfectly workable OS for the software designed for it. A limitted one in the end, yes, but a workable one...and more importantly, just about uncrashable. It didn't try to do too much, but it ran Master of Orion, Starflight, and X-COM, and it never, ever crashed. More than one can say about anything Microsoft-based since, yes?

three of the greatest games ever!

In his basement my father has an old Tandy 1000 8086 8mHz with 640K and a 20 meg drive THAT STILL RUNS ON THE ORIGINAL 1986 INSTALLATION OF MS-DOS! The old Tandy RGB monitor still worked last time i checked. DOS ran great and was somewhat user friendly as long as you had some type of auxilliry program. In the pre dos shell days i ran a program called sidekick that was basicly an EGA version of dos shell. something microsoft stole the source code for i'll bet.

Terr Fangbite · Post by **Terr Fangbite** » 2004-08-14 11:49am

What is Microsoft Bob?

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2004-08-14 02:28pm

ggs wrote:While versions less than Windows 3.11 were not what many would class as a true OS, they did everything a OS should do (just very poorly). The DOS enviroment can be considered a bootloader.

It could even run 32-bit apps with the hack that was Win32s

Col. Crackpot · Post by **Col. Crackpot** » 2004-08-14 03:34pm

Terr Fangbite wrote:What is Microsoft Bob?

it was a stupid app that ran with windows 3.1 that created a cutesy user interface that resembled a shitty 16-color living room. it wasn't really an operating system.

Terr Fangbite · Post by **Terr Fangbite** » 2004-08-14 06:21pm

So it was on the level of the skipping dog in microsoft word that runs up shouting "Hey, you want to write a letter!"

GoldenFalcon · Post by **GoldenFalcon** » 2004-08-14 06:33pm

Col. Crackpot wrote:
Terr Fangbite wrote:What is Microsoft Bob?
it was a stupid app that ran with windows 3.1 that created a cutesy user interface that resembled a shitty 16-color living room. it wasn't really an operating system.

I think I saw that at Universal World once when I was a kid...did it have some face at the bottom-right saying random things like "Where's the popcorn?" when you clicked on it?

White Haven · Post by **White Haven** » 2004-08-14 06:58pm

Bob is even less of an OS than 3.1 is, again, just another desktop environment that runs overtop of an actual OS.

EDIT: To be fair, there was a 9x version of it that way quite a good deal better.

AnimeJet · Post by **AnimeJet** » 2004-08-14 08:47pm

I know you said no more ME.. but.. god, i was used to restarting my computer over 10 times a day at one point because of that.. thing..

Col. Crackpot · Post by **Col. Crackpot** » 2004-08-15 01:28pm

White Haven wrote:Bob is even less of an OS than 3.1 is, again, just another desktop environment that runs overtop of an actual OS.

Microsoft Bob is to operating systems as Tang is to orange juice.

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2004-08-15 03:55pm

The Kernel wrote:Anything based on Win9x has my vote. The worst part was that I didn't know how damn fucking unusable they were until I got ahold of Windows NT 4.0 and learned what a real operating system was like.

And I didn't know how dang unusable THAT was until I got ahold of Mac OS X and learned what a real operating system was like

Mac OS9. So disgusting.
*runs away*

(okay, so I have to admit, I couldn't *stand* Mac OS 8, and could barely tolerate OS9, but I had to use OS 8 in the *gasp* simple finder mode...words cannot describe the horror!!!)

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2004-08-15 03:59pm

Pu-239 wrote:
White Haven wrote:The Disk Operating System functioned as a perfectly workable OS for the software designed for it. A limitted one in the end, yes, but a workable one...and more importantly, just about uncrashable. It didn't try to do too much, but it ran Master of Orion, Starflight, and X-COM, and it never, ever crashed. More than one can say about anything Microsoft-based since, yes?
MS didn't originally write DOS- they bought it . That, and the fact that DOS didn't do much in the first place contributed to it's stability.

If I recall, wasn't it originally called QDOS, for "Quick Dirty Operating System", and MS bought it, added a few things they ripped straight out of UNIX (such as directories), and called it "Disk Operating System"?

QDOS fits it better.

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2004-08-15 04:00pm

Terr Fangbite wrote:So it was on the level of the skipping dog in microsoft word that runs up shouting "Hey, you want to write a letter!"

Actually...
That skipping dog in Word and Windows XP Search...was originally debuted in Microsoft Bob

White Haven · Post by **White Haven** » 2004-08-15 05:26pm

Bob was actually downright amusing. Friend of mine and I had an entire world created in Bob when we were a good deal younger, and Bob, well, existed. Something like 20 or so rooms in a space station, with an entire cadre of fictional inhabitants.

Xisiqomelir · Post by **Xisiqomelir** » 2004-08-15 11:47pm

Praxis wrote: (okay, so I have to admit, I couldn't *stand* Mac OS 8, and could barely tolerate OS9, but I had to use OS 8 in the *gasp* simple finder mode...words cannot describe the horror!!!)

System 6 is the best of the Classic MacOSes. In fact, it's available for download still as Apple abandonware.

Linkage

On-Topic:
The worst OS of all time, for artistic reasons, would probably Windows XP, for technical reasons probably that Windows which crashed when left alone for 8 hours and had the root password as "Admin" by default (Having never owned any M$ OS this is all remembered hearsay on my part)

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2004-08-16 12:07am

Xisiqomelir wrote:The worst OS of all time, for artistic reasons, would probably Windows XP, for technical reasons probably that Windows which crashed when left alone for 8 hours and had the root password as "Admin" by default (Having never owned any M$ OS this is all remembered hearsay on my part)

There was a version of Windows that would crash after something like 41 days of uptime and the 9X series had effective superuser rights for everyone, but no Microsoft OS ever came with a default Administrator password.

aerius · Post by **aerius** » 2004-08-16 12:17am

Faram wrote:Blah whiners!

take a tour of DosShell and you will know hell!

DosShell wasn't bad at all, I still have a copy of it to go along with DOS 6.x. I found Norton Commander was better for me but my dad couldn't figure it out.

Out of the ones I've used Windows 3.0 was the worst, I think it had more downtime than uptime and the only thing it would reliably run was Solitaire.

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2004-08-16 03:00am

Xisiqomelir wrote:
Praxis wrote: (okay, so I have to admit, I couldn't *stand* Mac OS 8, and could barely tolerate OS9, but I had to use OS 8 in the *gasp* simple finder mode...words cannot describe the horror!!!)
System 6 is the best of the Classic MacOSes. In fact, it's available for download still as Apple abandonware.

I picked up an old mac notebook for $20. System 7. Was running at the same time as Windows 3.1. I was shocked and extremely impressed- it seemed FAR better than Windows 3.1, like, a billion times better.

I shoulda switched to Mac ages ago. Then again, I would have suffered through OS 9, which was System 7 with slightly better graphics

On-Topic:
The worst OS of all time, for artistic reasons, would probably Windows XP, for technical reasons probably that Windows which crashed when left alone for 8 hours and had the root password as "Admin" by default (Having never owned any M$ OS this is all remembered hearsay on my part)

I wouldn't say that. XP has the NT kernel, which, while not as stable as any of the Unixes (Linux, BSD, OS X), is considerably stabler than the 9x kernel in 95, 98, and ME.
ME was so bad that Microsoft officially stopped supporting it LONG before Win98, and since it used the 9x kernel that was far worse than the NT/2k kernel, I'd go with ME.

XP does NOT crash being left alone for 8 hours (I believe that was 95? Or maybe not even). Though 98FE and windows 95 would crash if you typed C:\nul\nul or C:\con\con in Explorer, AND none of the 9x's could not run for more than 40 days in a row, even if you maintained them perfectly, never connected to the internet, etc, etc.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2004-08-16 03:13am

MacOS 8 contained some rather extensive architectural changes, in particular much of it was rewritten to be PPC native. SMP support was also hacked onto it. MacOS 9 was really supposed to be in the MacOS 8.X series.