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     FGAZ 18-09                   Page 2                   11 Apr 2022


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     Happy birthday, Windows 3.1!

     From: https://www.theregister.com/2022/04/07/windows_3_1_30/?td=rt-3a

     Happy birthday Windows 3.1, aka 'the one that Visual Basic kept
     crashing on'

     30-year-old software that first introduced Windows Registry and killed
     Real Mode

     Richard Speed Thu 7 Apr 2022 // 12:00 UTC

     ----------------------------------------------------------------------

     Time flies whether you're having fun or simply trying to work out
     which Registry change left your system hopelessly borked, and before
     you know it, Windows 3.1 is turning 30.

     Windows 3.1 was more than a user interface refresh of the preceding
     Windows 3.0. Arriving on April 6, 1992, and still on MS-DOS, the
     operating environment brought forth support for TrueType fonts,
     introduced the Windows Registry and dropped support for older silicon.
     Windows 3.1 insisted on 80286 or above, finally sticking a knife in
     the heart of the Real Mode that was still supported in Windows 3.0.

     As well as a visual update (although nothing compared to what was
     coming a few short years later with Windows 95) multimedia support was
     improved and Microsoft introduced a concept called The Registry.

     The Windows Registry was (and remains) a database of settings hidden
     within the environment, ostensibly intended to replace or complement
     the .INI configuration files scattered throughout the environment both
     by Windows and applications targeting the platform. It is a handy
     database, but one that has become considerably more complex in the
     intervening 30 years.

     Windows 3.1 also increased the maximum memory available: when running
     in 386 enhanced mode, the limit was a mighty 256MB, up from the weedy
     16MB of Windows 3.0 (although care needed to be take with the version
     of the HIMEM.SYS driver.

     The requirement to run in Standard or 386 Enhanced Mode also made
     things a good deal more stable, although the elephant-on-a-traffic
     cone nature of Windows perching on DOS meant there remained plenty of
     opportunities for sudden crashes.

     Windows 3.1 sold very well, with an appealing user interface and
     consumer-friendly multimedia features. It did, however, have a
     relatively short life. Networking shortcomings would be at least
     partially addressed by a quick-fire succession of Windows for
     Workgroups releases, taking the version number to 3.11 by 1993 and
     also dropping Standard Mode. Windows 95 turned up shortly after,


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