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Windows Me is... Alright.
Posted on September 7, 2023 at 8:25 PM.

Sure, it's another Windows 9x based system.

Released in the mid 2000s, Windows Me was focused more towards digital media for home users and how Microsoft wanted users of Windows 98SE, Windows 98, or even Windows 95 to upgrade. Even though Microsoft recently released Windows 2000, a huge successor of Windows NT 4.0, and even one time, Microsoft recommended power-users and some companies who were running Windows 98 to upgrade to the NT-based system.

When Windows Me was released, alongside Windows 2000 months prior, confused a lot of people into picking which version to upgrade.

The marketing for Windows 2000 was targeted towards businesses and power-users who wanted the benefits of Windows 98 and the new technologies with the stability and reliability of Windows NT 4.0. Considering Windows NT 4.0 lacks native plug and play, advanced power management, and technologies later computers would have, some took advantage and upgraded their systems to Windows 2000. For home users, while there were many commercials made about Windows 2000, many of which were focused towards business use, and at the time, home users were running Windows 9x based systems.

Then Windows Millennium Edition started to show on store's shelves a few months later. After only a year of development, first announced back in 1999, Microsoft claimed Windows Me to improve digital media, while incorporating some features from Windows 2000 (which Microsoft did not mention at all, lol), and went far out as to host the infamous "Meet Me" tour, where people can try out Windows Millennium Edition at a shopping mall.

Now, of course I wasn't even old enough to experience it, but from what I researched, it wasn't a success as only a few people came. Of course, with every typical Microsoft passion, would announce a "Win Me" sweepstakes, a chance to win a trip to Seattle and of course a copy of Windows Me, followed by another sweepstakes which they called it a "Schweepstakes", where you can win software prizes and all that jazz.

Windows Me's home page, circa September, 2000. Click to view larger image.

The Operating System itself.

While it caused confusion for most people, who thought are going to get the home edition of Windows 2000 powered by Windows NT, which ended up being false, since Windows Me was another version using the Windows 9x codebase, while businesses and power-users were already using Windows 2000, powered by the NT kernel, let's talk about the operating system itself.

Windows Me looks very identical to Windows 98, but with some new features like Windows Media Player 7, Windows Movie Maker, System Restore, System File Protection (which, fun fact, was first introduced in Windows 2000 known as Windows File Protection but this version was limited.), and other technical features I can discuss later. Many people had doubts into upgrading to the new system, considering Windows 2000 was released months earlier, while some people took the chance into upgrading anyway. There were some people who liked the new version to some, not so much, which I can explain why with the best of my ability and knowledge later. I have a copy of Windows Me installed on an old laptop, dual-booted with Windows 2000, in which I can use Windows Me as intended instead of using a virtual machine which is more buggier than physical hardware, I can give you my opinions about the system in a non-biased way and instead of me saying "Ohh Windows Me bad!".

Been using the operating system for a few months and even though it looks idential to Windows 98, there were some improvements made to the system, such as including a newer version of DirectX, which games took advantage of, and having Windows 98 installed on it before, Windows Me did boot up a hair-faster than Windows 98. Till this day, I have not experienced a major issue with the operating system, or even a complete system crash. Though there were one time where the system froze to a point I had to reboot when installing my graphics driver, things seem to work the way I wanted.

I did try out the new features that came bundled with the system and all of them worked as expected. Though with System Restore, there was a critical bug which any restore points created after September 9, 2001 will fail to restore the system, but was fixed when installing updates to the operating system. So far, my experience with Windows me is alright. Sure, it's not the best, but it gets the job done for me nevertheless. Now, let's move on to the technical side of Windows Me.

The technical side.

Yes, yes, yes. I know, you know, Windows Me was another release of Windows 9x, but why would Microsoft break their promise of having Windows 98 to be the last consumer-based system to rely on MS-DOS, considering they broke that promise by releasing Windows 98SE? Well, from my guess, it's Microsoft's attempt of consistency. Considering the consumer side got the new stuff, many businesses and power-users were stuck using Windows NT 4.0, which some would loved to upgrade to Windows 98, but considering you're switching from Windows NT to Windows 9x, powered by MS-DOS, upgrading to those systems wasn't possible, not to mention having NTFS as your file system, and then moving to FAT32. And then comes the new version of Windows 2000, formerly known as Windows NT 5.0 which was delayed several times, and considering development of the new OS started back in 1997, Microsoft didn't set a time of which the new system would release, but it would be a direct upgrade for users running Windows NT 4.0. Of course, during the early development of NT 5.0, I assume Microsoft did not make it a priority for home users to use NT 5.0, but the main priority was to make a next generation OS, for people to upgrade to, or buy new.

Then Microsoft announced Codename Millennium in the works in 1999, which many home users were interested in hearing, and then there's Codename Neptune which many people did not know at the time until later. I'm guessing Microsoft choose Millennium as the codename for Windows Me because it's all about Y2K and how big the Millennium was going to be, not to mention Windows NT 5.0 didn't have codenames and the final name for the product wasn't announced years later, so Microsoft just used Millennium as the codename for the next version of Windows, targeted for home use.

Now, Windows Me used MS-DOS as the bootloader and to handle older device drivers (VxD), the system made attempts to sweep MS-DOS under the rug and go with using Win32 programs for diagnostics, such as having ScanDisk to run during logon instead of during boot, which was executed to run the DOS version of ScanDisk. While Me was still using DOS, many older DOS programs continue to run under the DOS VM, with the help of the Virtual Machine Manager in Windows 9x. However, some DOS-native applications want to run in native DOS mode, but as an attempt to hide MS-DOS from Windows Me, real-mode DOS was hidden from the operating system, while in Microsoft's defense to decrease boot-time, it did cripple older applications from running without native DOS. While there is "WIN.COM" in the Windows directory, it is not needed to start Windows Me since the Windows loader was integrated in the VMM32.VxD device driver in the SYSTEM folder and with the newer version of MS-DOS included, it now boots using the VMM32.VxD file instead of WIN.COM, though the file exist for backwards compatibility I assume.

I'd say Windows Me had some many technical changes to make it "stand out" more as an independent operating system, but considering it's 9x based with its monolithic kernel, having everything run in kernel space with many different types of device drivers, the reliability and stability of 9x became apparent with newer technologies in the future. I'd say Microsoft waited this long to kill the 9x family and move consumers to the NT platform because NT 5.0 was already in development and its focus was towards businesses and power-users, didn't help but Microsoft closing the gap in making the final OS to use the 9x code to have newer operating systems for both home and businesses, and to finally begin the transition to "all NT" in 2001.

The good.

It was an improvement to Windows 98 with many key features, such as the System File Protection, an attempt to prevent programs from modifying key system files, to System Restore, which restores the system from an earlier point in time, such as reverting system settings, programs, etc, without touching personal files. Microsoft forced hardware manufactures to stop using the old VxD architecture for system drivers and to move to WDM instead, first introduced in Windows 98. As Microsoft forced hardware manufactures to use WDM instead of VxD, it took advantage of the Windows Me ACPI features and better hardware support. Though, it depended on third party hardware manufactures to get it done and ready for Windows Me release, some decided to keep on using the VxD architecture. I do give credit for Microsoft of not axing VxD completely for Windows Me, since if they were to do that, not only Windows Me will be delayed, but driver manufactures have to rewrite the drivers to work on Windows Me, and since NT 5.0 was at the horizon, didn't make sense. I've been using Windows Me on my old laptop and all works well, I haven't ran into a driver problem since, nor any blue screens.

The bad.

(I'm guessing some of you wanted to hear my thoughts about how bad Windows Me was), but in reality, it all comes down to poor timing and management that some people gave Windows Me a poor grade. While being another Windows 9x product, and with newer technologies progressing forward, Windows Me's stability and reliability is like a house-of-cards. Instead of Microsoft waiting until 2001 to begin the transition of having both consumers and businesses all united on one NT kernel, Microsoft wanted to make two systems in the sake of consistency of being released at the same year. Another key factor is the development time, as I said earlier, Windows Me was developed for only a year, and nearly missing its 2000's release target, could be a key factor of some poor stabilities on some machines. The removal of real-mode DOS also made people mad as some were okay of having to switch to MS-DOS and back to Windows, the removal of such feature made people stick to its predecessor and even as running in a DOS virtual machine on Windows Me did not help either.

For my experience of running Windows Me on real hardware, I'd say it's a decent OS, it wasn't a major upgrade to Windows 98, but it gets the job done nevertheless. Though, some people had genuine problems with Windows Me, and although there were later updates to help fix issues, a year later, Windows XP was released and Windows Me faded into obscurity, just years later.

In conclusion.

While Windows Me wasn't a great OS, it's a decent one. Granted if you are running it on a physical machine and not on a virtual machine, it's just like you're using another 9x based system. If you aren't trying to push the OS to its limits, I'd say things would play out as expected. But to be fair, there are plenty people out there who says they hate Windows Me without trying the product, or have the dislike because of running it on a virtual machine instead of real hardware which gave them the impression on how unstable Me was.

Though again, your mileage may vary when it comes to stability with older systems.

Thanks for reading!

TechnologicalByte

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