Windows Computing In The Late 90's (Windows ME, Windows Media Player 7, And Random Y2K Crap )

I never had catastrophic issues with Windows ME. Now I did have my share of blue screens and those annoying memory/CPU errors. However, I had those on Windows 95 and 98 as well, so those aren't anything out of the ordinary. Windows ME can actually run very well when it's given the appropriate hardware. This though is in itself a problem. Windows 95/98 were much more forgiving about the hardware that it ran on compared to ME. As such, the nature of the problems that affected ME were very different compared to those on previous Windows. For example, on VMware Player, ME would completely lock up after 10 minutes when left in idle. I didn't know what the issue was. However, the problem went away when I deleted everything in the Windows Temp folder. I never had this issue on 95 or 98, only ME. 

While weird crap happening on ME certainly didn't do it any favors, I think one of the reasons for the strong disdain for ME was simply that there was no reason for it to exist in the first place. Many were happy with Windows 98. The XP Beta, codenamed Whistler, which was in development and would have been released in late 2001, was just around the corner. While ME contained many interesting features, they weren't just restricted just to the OS. WMP 7, which is still one of my favorite media players (before it got bloated in later releases), could be installed on Windows 98 as well with the setup executable that Microsoft provided. While Movie Maker was ME-only, you weren't missing much. Movie Maker is about as bare-bones as it gets when it comes to video editors. While released with ME, System Restore was introduced. However, given how if was enabled by default, even on drives that weren't that big to begin with (hard-drives with capacities of 3-6GB were still very common in the tail-end of the 90's), System Restore consumed everything and impacted system performance as well. On low-end system, System Restore was a flaw, not a feature. As hardware became more powerful and after the release of Windows XP, System Restore started to live up to its reliable reputation.

Windows Media Player 7

Despite it not being exclusive to ME, WMP7 was one of the coolest programs to come out of Microsoft in a very long time. WMP was given a total redesign. I know that many like the "classic" look of the program, but with rapid explosion of multimedia content, especially when massive MP3 collections starting to populate computers the world over, Microsoft decided to give WMP a massive facelift, and many they did. The new player felt well......new while also not being (too) bloated either. 

Microsoft added a total look while adding the basic features that people wanted from there media players and nothing extra. The visualizations were really awesome as well. Many were included with WMP7. There was also a "mini" version that could be minimized along with various skins that could be applied as well. One could tell that Microsoft was taking notes from WinAMP when creating WMP7. Unfortunately, WMP started to become bloated as Microsoft changed the direction of program in order for it to become a "media platform". Microsoft was evolving WMP to become there answer to iTunes, and it doesn't really work. I can't tolerate iTunes as is, so taking ques from it just made WMP just as ugly. Then VLC came around the corner, and everything was good again. That is also another story for another time.

Y2K

It's funny when watching anything from 90's media (particular TV) that references the Internet and how people just went completely bonkers (apesh*t would be a more accurate term) about it. You were getting the impression that people were about to crap themselves about it, especially when Y2K started to become a thing.

I'm not going to get into the details of what Y2K is. If you want to know more in detail, then read the Wikipedia article linked below. What I will say that there was this fear. However, I was rather indifferent. Microsoft already updated Windows to protect against the Y2K bug, along with various hardware and software venders. The Clinton Administration, working alongside the private sector, led a initiative that update various systems that the public relied on. Thus, very little happened on January 1st 2000. There was a few small hiccups, but nothing noteworthy. The paranoia of what would happen far exceeded what actually did. In this country, Christian Fundamentalist exploited people's fears (what else is new) so they could profit from it. At the end of the day, did any of the Evangelist/Televangelist cruds apologize for the false fears that they stoked? They caused far more pain and suffering than anything Windows ME ever did! That's for sure!

Windows ME (Wikipedia) : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Me

Windows Media Player (Wikipedia) : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Media_Player

System Restore (Wikipedia) : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_Restore

Y2K (Wikipedia) : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_2000_problem

Windows Movie Maker (Wikipedia) : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Movie_Maker

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