I beg to differ. Back then, true preemptive multitasking was pretty much the exclusive domain of the Amiga line of computers when it comes to mainstream, widely available computers and OSs.PaulQ wrote:Windows 3.1 and DOS weren't the best, but at least that combination could truly multitask.
BUT... Microsoft did come up with an OS that does multitask preemptively extremely well and when it appeared on the market, that's when I moved on to the PC. It was called Windows NT... I bought the original of version 3.5.1 and upgraded to version 4 and got an MCSE certification on it.
Version 5 was called Windows 2000, version 5.1 is referred to as Windows XP, version 6 was called Vista and version 7 is called... Windows 7. All these OSs are based on the core kernal of... Windows NT.
A Mac SE/30 did multitask in exactly the same way Windows 3.1 did. With cooperative applications only. No more and no less. I still have one here in the closet to prove it...PaulQ wrote:You can split hairs on the differences between pre-emptive and co-operative multitasking, but the fact remains that the Macintosh computer and its respective OS of this time had no multitasking whatsoever. As inferior as co-operative multitasking was to pre-emptive multitasking, it still beat out having no multitasking available. Also, people often neglect the fact that OS/2 had pre-emptive multitasking back in '92.RobertBe wrote:I'll have to differ on that one. True multi-tasking (like that on the Amiga) for Microsoft didn't come until Windows 95, NT, etc.. Cooperative multi-tasking was in Windows 3.1 (and it didn't multi-task that well, in part because it was not pre-emptive multi-tasking like that on the Amiga).
System 6 did it rather poorly. System 7 did it relatively well.
As for OS/2, I did buy a copy of it back then but the applications specific to that OS were very few. Running most Windows Based applications required to install both OS/2 and Windows 3.1 and then, for multitasking, you were not much better off than having Windows 3.1 and DOS but themselves.
long time no see!