The OS brand that powers most of the computers today was born on November 10, 1983. It was 25 years ago that Bill Gates announced Windows 1.0, which would sport a graphical user interface. At a lavish party thrown at Helmsley Palace Hotel in NYC, Gates announced the new OS that promised dropdown menus, multitasking, tiled windows, mouse support, device-independent graphics, and compatibility with most IBM PCs by the end of 1984.
Microsoft's revolutionary OS was scheduled to retail in stores in April 1984. However, due to many overlapping features with Macintosh, the Windows 1.0 release was pushed back by two long years, and it saw the light of day on November 20, 1985, sans the multitasking feature.
Windows 1.0 was Microsoft's first step in the GUI-enabled OS arena, which was quickly followed by Windows 2.0 in 1987.
As a piece of nostalgia, here's a Windows 1.0 commercial featuring Steve Ballmer.
Source:
Wired
Windows Celebrates Silver Jubilee
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