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Although Windows 95 is now 30 years old, that doesn't stop some people reminiscing about the OS that made Microsoft a household name. As such, a user on reddit going by the name international-dish78 made a post earlier this week in which they painstakingly recreated the original Windows 95 setup wallpaper in 4K for everyone to enjoy. And after obtaining permission to use the assets and share, we felt that it deserved a little more attention. First a bit of background, official details about the wallpaper are hard to come by, but according to the Windows Wallpaper Wiki (not affiliated with Microsoft) the setup background features a collage of images comprised of just two colors (blue and black) with a gradient map applied over it. The images are a circuit board, keyboard, mouse, cables, and CDs. It is believed to have been produced in-house (along with the photos), but it is unknown who designed it. What is known, is that the keyboard was owned by Kevin Kennedy, who lent it to the designer, Kennedy claimed that the group "in the next office" actually created the image. The image itself is just 320x400 (boot screen), but stretches out to 640x400 on setup, stretching even more to fill the monitor size when drivers for the hardware are loaded during setup. This is a 1440p version Gallery: Windows 95 Setup wallpaper assets We've included a full copy of the images that you can download (Neowin obtained permission from the creator to repost). The full assets are available on OneDrive, along with the ~1985MBmb Photoshop document (PSD). The original on which it is based is also included. Having worked in desktop support back in the 90's, the image certainly brings back some memories of the countless PCs I installed Windows 95 on for clients. In any case we think the effortis pretty cool and worthy of a thumbs up. Were you around in the Windows 95 days? What are your memories of the OS, let us know in the comments below. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

Whether you are a Neowin reader or not, you are probably aware of the iconic Microsoft Windows pieces of music used for start-ups or reboots. The Windows 95 reboot music also happened to be one of those and it looks like it is not just technology nerds or geeks like us who understand its value. The U.S. Library of Congress (LoC) has inducted the Windows 95 sound into its National Recording Registry (NRR). For those unfamiliar, the NRR is essentially a list of sound recordings that "are culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant, and inform or reflect life in the United States." Alongside the Windows 95 theme, Minecraft's Volume Alpha has also been chosen, alongside 23 other mainstream songs. The press release says: The LoC has also explained why it chose the Windows 95 reboot theme by Brian Eno exclaiming that it was a crucial point in the home PC revolution: You can listen to it below Meanwhile, about Minecraft's Volume Alpha by Daniel Rosenfeld (also known as C418), the LoC writes: You can listen to the songs below: Here's a shorter version: You can read the full press release here on LoC's official website. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of March): 1,357 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

These days, the release of a new PC operating system, or indeed most any PC software product, is handled almost exclusively online. We just download the update on our systems, and then complain about any bugs that might show up on Reddit. However, a few decades ago, we actually went into stores to buy software. That was certainly the case for Windows 95, which launched 28 years ago on August 24, 1995. It may be hard to believe now, but back then, the debut of this successor to Windows 3.1 was more than just the release of an OS. It was a true media event, similar to the launch of a big-budget video game or movie release today. On the launch day, The Washington Postremarked about how Microsoft had spent as much as $300 million to promote Windows 95. It did stunts like turning the lights in New York City's Empire State Building to red, yellow, and green colours, which were the same colours that were in the Windows 95 logo. In Toronto, the CN Tower went a bit further with a huge 300-foot banner showing the now iconic Start button on the OS. Microsoft held its own launch event at its Redmond, Washington headquarters on that day. Bill Gates, of course, was there to demonstrate the event, and the company brought in comedian and Tonight Show late-night talk show host Jay Leno to make a bunch of fairly unfunny jokes. Microsoft helped to create a VHS tape that was sold alongside the Windows 95 launch to show people how to use the OS. It was promoted as the first "cyber sitcom" because it had actors Jennifer Aniston and Matthew Perry. They took some time from filming their hit show Friends to film this rather cringy presentation, as they learned the ins and outs of Windows 95. We think they probably got paid a ton of money to do this video, which was embarrassing to watch, even 28 years ago. Speaking of people getting paid, the most visible part of the Windows 95 promotion was Microsoft's TV commercials, which used The Rolling Stones' "Start Me Up" song in the background. This was the first time the rock band had licensed one of their songs for a TV commercial. In an archived article on the Jupiter Research site from 2006, Brad Silverberg, who helped to lead the development of Windows 95, recalled how the company managed to get the band members to sign off on the deal. He also mentioned that Microsoft did not pay The Rolling Stones $10 million or $12 million for the rights to the song, as was reported by other media outlets at that time. he said: I'm not at liberty to disclose the exact amount, but it was a small fraction of that. It was the Stones, who after doing the deal, leaked the big number figure so as to set the market price for their next deal. Silverberg added that the band first gave Microsoft a later version of "Start Me Up" and not the original version. Apparently, that was because the more recent track was made with newer band members who would get a lower royalty price. Microsoft insisted on the original track, as originally agreed, so the Rolling Stones finally sent that version. While there were long lines in some retail stores to purchase that big box of disks with Windows 95, The Washington Post said not everyone was lining up to buy Microsoft's hyped product: There was no mad rush to obtain Windows 95 at the Office Depot on New Hampshire Avenue in Silver Spring early this morning. About a dozen customers were on hand when the store opened its doors at midnight, and a few more trickled in after that. By 12:30 a.m., the half dozen employees had the store pretty much to themselves. In the end, all of the hype and promotion paid off for Microsoft as Windows 95 helped to boost PC sales in general and made using a personal computer easier overall for the general public. It's an era in the tech industry that won't be duplicated ever again. Source

Retro-computing fans can download the final updates released for '90s-era OSes. The Windows 95 desktop. Andrew Cunningham If you have any interest in retro-computing, you know it can be difficult to round up the last official bug fixes and updates available for early Internet-era versions of Windows like 95, 98, and NT 4.0. A new independent project called "Windows Update Restored" is aiming to fix that, hosting lightly modified versions of old Windows Update sites and the update files themselves so that fresh installs of these old operating systems can grab years' worth of fixes that aren't present on old install CDs and disks. These old versions of Windows relied primarily on a Windows Update web app to function rather than built-in updaters like the ones used in current Windows versions. Microsoft took down the version of the site that could scan and update Windows 95 and 98 sometime in mid-2011. The Windows Update Restored site is a lightly modified version of Microsoft's original code, and the site itself doesn't use any kind of SSL or TLS encryption, so ancient Internet Explorer versions can still access it without modification. You'll need at least Internet Explorer 5 to access the Windows Update Restored update sites; that browser is no longer available directly from Microsoft, but the Windows Update Restored site offers download links to IE5 and IE5.5 in all supported languages. Version 3.1 of the Windows Update Restored site—the only one currently functioning, though support for others is planned—supports Windows 95, both editions of Windows 98, NT 4.0, ME, and some versions of Windows 2000 (but not the newest version, with Service Pack 4 installed). If you're using an early-2000s Windows version like 2000 or XP, a similar project called Legacy Update might be a better choice. Windows 2000 and XP updates are still available from Microsoft's Update Catalog, and Legacy Update simply allows those older operating systems to communicate with the company's modern websites and servers. A straightforward reimplementation of Windows Update is useful for retro-computing enthusiasts who want to download bug fixes while keeping their systems historically accurate. "Unofficial service packs" exist in various forms for all of Microsoft's old operating systems, but they're usually packaged with "helpful" modifications that can extend old operating systems' capabilities but also introduce their own bugs and vulnerabilities. It should go without saying that even a functioning version of Windows Update doesn't make any of these operating systems safe to use on the modern Internet. Updates for Windows 95 stopped in 2001; Windows 98 and ME stopped getting new updates in 2006. The existence of a functioning update site doesn't change the age of the updates available. Modern browsers, antivirus products, and other software stopped supporting these OSes years ago, and they're best used for non-Internet-connected things like playing games, interfacing with legacy hardware, and strolling down memory lane. Some outfits, like Nixsys, are still selling new systems powered by old components, specifically for running old versions of MS-DOS and Windows. Source

Pickup trucks full of software boxes, Win95VersionLie, and other tricks. Microsoft wanted people to have zero reasons not to upgrade to Windows 95. That meant making sure SimCity Classic worked, with some memory-reading workarounds. Chris Hsia / Flickr It's still possible to learn a lot of interesting things about old operating systems. Sometimes those things were documented, or at least hinted at, in blog posts that miraculously still exist. One such quirk showed up recently when someone noticed how Microsoft made sure that SimCity and other popular apps worked on Windows 95. A recent tweet by @Kalyoshika highlights an excerpt from a blog post by Fog Creek Software co-founder, Stack Overflow co-creator, and longtime software blogger Joel Spolsky. The larger post is about chicken-and-egg OS/software appeal and demand. The part that caught the eye of a Hardcore Gaming 101 podcast co-host is how the Windows 3.1 version of SimCity worked on the Windows 95 system. Windows 95 merged MS-DOS and Windows apps, upgraded APIs from 16 to 32-bit, and was hyper-marketed. A popular app like SimCity, which sold more than 5 million copies, needed to work without a hitch. Spolsky's post summarizes how SimCity became Windows 95-ready, as he heard it, without input from Maxis or user workarounds. Jon Ross, who wrote the original version of SimCity for Windows 3.x, told me that he accidentally left a bug in SimCity where he read memory that he had just freed. Yep. It worked fine on Windows 3.x, because the memory never went anywhere. Here’s the amazing part: On beta versions of Windows 95, SimCity wasn’t working in testing. Microsoft tracked down the bug and added specific code to Windows 95 that looks for SimCity. If it finds SimCity running, it runs the memory allocator in a special mode that doesn’t free memory right away. That’s the kind of obsession with backward compatibility that made people willing to upgrade to Windows 95. Spolsky (in 2000) considers this a credit to Microsoft and an example of how to break the chicken-and-egg problem: "provide a backwards compatibility mode which either delivers a truckload of chickens, or a truckload of eggs, depending on how you look at it, and sit back and rake in the bucks.' Windows developers may have deserved some sit-back time, seeing the extent of the tweaks they often have to make for individual games and apps in Windows 95. Further in @Kalyoshika's replies, you can find another example, pulled from the Compatibility Administrator in Windows' Assessment and Deployment Kit (ADK). A screenshot from @code_and_beer shows how Windows NT, upon detecting files typically installed with Final Fantasy VII, will implement a fittingly titled compatibility fix: "Win95VersionLie." Simply telling the game that it's on Windows 95 seems to fix a major issue with its operation, along with a few other emulation and virtualization tweaks. Install the Windows ADK and open up the Compatibility Administrator, and you can spy on some of the things Windows does for particular apps to make them work in the System Database section. If it detects files named "Horny.tif" and "bullfrog.sbk", it updates where Windows 95/98 versions of Dungeon Keeper should put those files in Windows XP and later. Windows has to stop Tom Clancy's Rainbox Six from accessing the CD drive while it's already playing a movie or other media, as well as disable Alt+Tab switching while the game is open because the game can't handle losing focus. And it's not just older titles; Street Fighter V gets a little tweak to its DirectX implementation to run on some systems. In 2005, longtime Microsoft staffer and The Old New thing blogger Raymond Chen documented Microsoft's Windows 95 compatibility obsession. Chen writes that Windows 95's development manager "took his pick-up truck, drove down to the local Egghead Software store (back when Egghead still existed), and bought one copy of every single PC program in the store." Everybody was responsible for up to two programs, which they would install, run, and document for bugs. If a staffer finished two, they could come back to grab up to two more. And testers could keep whatever they finished. Mike Perry, former creative director at Sim empire Maxis (and later EA), noted later that there was, technically, a 32-bit Windows 95 version of Sim City available, as shown by the "Deluxe Edition" bundle of the game. He also states that Ross worked for Microsoft after leaving Maxis, which would further explain why Microsoft was so keen to ensure people could keep building parks in the perfect grid position to improve resident happiness. Windows 95 went the extra mile to ensure compatibility of SimCity, other games

Windows 95 turned 25 two years ago, and while we recently had a feature update release for the far more modern Windows 11, many members of the Windows community probably still consider it as one of the greatest things that Microsoft has ever been able to create. So here is a GitHub project that would likely interest them. Dubbed simply as "Windows 95", the project brings Windows 95 to life with the help of the Electron framework and hence, is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux. Earlier today, the latest version (3.1.1) of the application was released, and it brings some major changes. That is because the underlying Electron framework has received a big update. Broadly speaking, the app will now support the latest Chromium 106. The changelog is given below: v3.1.1 Changes: Upgraded from Electron v18 to Electron v21 (and with it, Chrome and Node.js) Upgraded v86 (sound is back!) Electron 21.0.0 also adds an "immersive dark mode on Windows" support that will help set a dark title bar based on the system preference. Other features include Web Bluetooth pairing support, support for the V8 JavaScript engine, and more. The main changes in Electron 21.0.0 are given below, but you can view the full release notes on its website. Electron 21.0.0 Stack Upgrades: Chromium 106.0.5249.51 Node v16.16.0 V8 v10.6 You can download and find more information on the Windows 95 in Electron project at the source link below. Source: GitHub via Deskmodder The Windows 95 in Electron now supports the latest Chromium, Windows 11-based dark mode

A former Microsoft employee narrates how he wrote the Windows 95 Start menu. What you need to know A former Microsoft employee narrates how he wrote the Start menu for Windows 95. Windows 11's Start menu has received considerable backlash from users due to its flawed design and redundancy. Microsoft's recent move to bring ads to the Start menu in Windows 11 isn't popular among avid users. Avid Windows users are in a love-hate relationship with the Start menu in Windows 11. But how did the app come into existence in the first place? Microsoft veteran Dave W. Plummer, aka Dave's Garage, known for his contributions across the Windows ecosystem, including adding ZIP file support to Windows over 30 years ago, recently narrated how he wrote the Start menu for Windows 95. In the 6-minute long YouTube video, Plummer admits that developing the Start menu was a team effort. While the former Microsoft employee says the Windows 95 team should take the "lion's share of credit" for developing the Start menu, his efforts are consistent across the app. "I wrote the stuff that paints the stuff that you see in the beginning, and that actually runs the program that you run at the end," added Plummer. It's worth noting that Windows 95 already had a Start menu but was riddled with critical issues. And though it worked well enough, it said Windows 95. Plummer highlighted Microsoft's plans for the product wouldn't support that moniker. According to Plummer: "We couldn't just change it to Windows NT because that was not going to be the name of the product long term it was Windows NT 4 Professional or Workstation or Advanced server, depending on what product skew you have. And so we needed to put that in the Start menu. And if we had that for all the different languages that Windows NT supported, that would be a huge Matrix of these Bitmaps we would have to create in advance and, hopefully, dynamically load on the fly when you went to render the Start menu, and not take up memory and cash it." To avoid these issues, Plummer wanted to render the platform live using Graphics Device Interface (GDI) and painted the blue and black gradient on the Start menu. The software engineer indicated that the system would automatically dither the gradient if your PC didn't have all the colors. Plummer also pointed out that rendering text was also an issue since, at the time, you couldn't draw sideways text. While it was impossible on Windows 95, Windows NT shipped with a neat feature dubbed coordinate transformations that served as a workaround. It allowed Plummer to render the text at a 90-degree angle, allowing it to fit in the bar. And the rest is history. Windows 11 users have no love for the Start menu Start menu in Windows 11 (Image credit: Future) With a bit of context about the development process of the Start menu, it's evident that it's no easy feat. Over the years, Microsoft's Windows team has added different flavors to the Start menu, but Windows 11's Start menu has received a lot of backlash from users. Microsoft's decision to bring ads to the Start menu in Windows 11 isn't making things easier. Windows 11's stringent system requirements and flawed design are among the main contributing factors to why many users continue to stick to Windows 10 despite its looming death slated for October 14, 2025. Interestingly, despite running Windows 11 on a sophisticated $1,600 device, a former Microsoft software engineer shared his frustrations and referred to the Start menu's performance as "comically bad." The lack of love for the Windows 11 Start menu has also led to a few alternative options, including Start11 from Stardock, which lets users replace the original menu with one from various eras or make a custom one. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every single day for many years. 2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of June): 2,839 news posts

Windows 95 introduced the iconic Start menu to the revolutionary taskbar, and Microsoft's OS influence is still felt 29 years later. On August 24, 1995, Microsoft officially released Windows 95, its revolutionary operating system previously codenamed 'Chicago', to the public. I still remember when my parents upgraded the family PC from Windows 3.1 with a slew of floppy disks and the help of a tech-savvy friend, who helped sell them on the luxuries of a new, friendly user interface that would replace the archaic likes of the now-extinct 'Program Manager' app. Twenty-nine years later, the impact of Windows 95 is still apparent in modern computing (and even popular culture as Finland embraced Windows95man,) with remnants of its old-school tools and apps still running quietly in the background of Windows 11. In particular, I still rely on the 'more sound settings' panel to wrestle my microphone levels back to their proper numbers after Google Meet automatically adjusts them against my will. Prettier menus offer the same controls, but these retro 'Win32' apps still just work, thanks to Windows 95's foundations. I could ramble about the iconic startup sound or how our costly printer never worked with Microsoft's 'Plug-and-Play' promises. However, one feature stands out more prominently than any other, and its legacy is a mainstay feature in Windows 11 with much less subtlety, even if Windows 8 previously tried to wrangle it into something entirely unrecognizable — the legendary and utterly iconic Start menu. Everything changed with the Start menu The classic Start menu would expand across your desktop until you found your favorite program. (Image credit: Ben Wilson | Windows Central) It seems like a given that a modern operating system should have some form of a taskbar and Start menu unless you're a die-hard fan of the Terminal, like my Linux-obsessed colleague Richard Devine, who is ever-eager to boil the most complex tasks down to the command line without needing to touch a mouse. Still, for your average user, the Start menu was a self-explanatory hub for all your programs and settings on Windows 95. This pop-up menu was always snappy and responsive, at least if your processor wasn't bogged down with multiple programs running on a single core. It gathered all of Microsoft's stock applications (RIP Wordpad) and even listed any newly installed apps alongside them, divided into subcategories intended to keep things tidy. It wasn't uncommon to see a gigantic wall of tiled menus on some PCs as software libraries grew and larger hard drives (up to an unthinkable 32GB!) became more affordable, but a bit of housekeeping could clean it up. The latest Start menu design in Windows 11 24H2 is much bigger and aligned in the center by default. (Image credit: Zac Bowden | Windows Central) The Start menu experience is inherently the same on the latest build of Windows 11, version 24H2. It's an all-in-one solution for your apps, settings, and shortcuts, and even a return to responsive widgets, vaguely reminiscent of the live tiles featured on Windows 8's contentious Start menu replacement, is in the works. It's become a much more simplified version of its former self, reduced to a compact Windows logo now that its use is broadly understood and no longer needs explanation. To have become so ubiquitous is a blessing and a curse for Microsoft. I can't imagine how well consumers would receive Windows 12 if it did away with the Start menu, no matter how well-designed a replacement might be. For now, I'm looking back at Windows 95 with fond admiration of the quintessential taskbar and Start menu combination, to the point that Stardock's flexible Start11 v2 replacement for the stock Start menu helps me restore some of its classic features. Happy birthday, Windows 95. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every single day for many years. 2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of July): 3,313 news posts

A rare collector's item for the tech world recently appeared on social media. Former Senior VP and product manager at Microsoft Brad Silverberg took to his social media account and shared the first-ever copy of Windows 95 ever made. It all started when Microsoft veteran Dave W Plummer posted images of his "Special Edition" copy of Windows 95. The post caught Silverberg's attention who responded to it and revealed that he has the first copy of Windows 95 from the production line. Silverberg then posted some images of the Windows 95 copy upon request from a Windows fan. Along with the Windows 95 copy was a letter congratulating Silverberg and saying: July 14 was the date when Windows 95 was released to manufacturing (RTM), followed by its retail availability on August 24, 1995. It was the time when cloud installs didn't exist and Microsoft shipped Windows 95 in multiple floppy disks, evident from the floppy icon printed on Silverberg's copy. The legacy operating system was a major milestone in Microsoft's history as it unified MS-DOS and Windows products, transitioned from 16-bit to 32-bit architecture, and introduced a number of improvements over Windows 3.0/3.1. Microsoft's new corporate logo introduced in 2012 also finds its roots in commercials of the old operating system. However, Windows 95 might not induce much nostalgia in modern teenagers, some of them posted their reactions publicly as they struggled to use it. Windows 95 revolutionized desktop computing but over the decades dedicated fans have managed to install the legacy operating system on other devices. We have seen Windows 95 finding a home in a myriad of places, including an iPad, web browser, Apple Watch, and Xbox One. And who knew Apple indirectly played a small part in Windows 95's story? Its famous startup sound was produced by ambient music composer Brian Eno on an Apple Macintosh machine. A few years ago, Microsoft celebrated its golden days by giving away Windows 95-themed "Ugly" sweaters. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every single day for many years. 2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of June): 2,839 news posts