Yesterday, around 7:00 PM Eastern Time, the last known instance of Windows ME was put to rest. At least that’s how it felt to me. You see my parents (two very bright people I’ll have you know) have been running Windows ME for the past seven years, to my horror. Saturday night they finally purchased a new computer and Sunday night I had everything set up for them.
I had begged my parents for years to upgrade to Windows XP, but they never got around to it. In that timespan, they went through three computer monitors, and “the computer is running so slow” phone calls to their loving son. My reply was always, “you need to upgrade”. When Vista launched, I knew they were going to need new hardware as there was no way their old Dell would be able to run Vista. In the end, the computer did my convincing for me, and I didn’t have the heart or free time to resuscitate it one last time.
The Windows ME machine didn’t go down without a fight, however. I hooked up their cable modem up to the new laptop and of course Windows Vista didn’t have any drivers to handle the device. “No problem”, I thought to myself. “I’ll just hop on the Internet and download the driver.” Then I remembered the only internet connection I had was on the ME machine, the same one that took five minutes to download a simple web page. Add to this a toddler who was giving my wife quite a workout, and the situation was stressful to say the least. We decided to hit the pool while the driver downloaded. I cursed at myself for not bringing my laptop.
Sufficiently waterlogged after an hour in the pool, we returned inside and my download was complete. I plugged the USB drive into the ME machine, rebooted (the only way it would recognize the drive) , and copied the driver to the device. Next I installed the driver on the new laptop and it recognized the modem. R.I.P. Windows ME.
Maybe my parents weren’t the last ones to be running Windows ME, but it sure felt like it. It sure feels nice now that they have bought their new computer. Windows Vista isn’t the greatest, but it sure will be easier for me to manage.
I’m not sure what my parents will do with the old computer. If it was mine I’d probably reformat the hard drive and install Linux. At some point we’ll have to get their data off the old machine onto the new one. That’s a project for another day. In the meantime, my Mom and Dad are very grateful to be able to connect to the Internet on their new computer, without have to wait a lifetime. I told them that was one favor I did for them compared to a thousand they have done for me.
Anyone else know of a Windows ME machine still out there in the wild?
9 comments ↓
A story I know only too well. I recently brought a new pc. My old pc is 10 years old and running Window 98se.
You know my pain then, Ross. Do you feel like you are now par of the future. Isn’t it nice?
Anybody that upgraded to Windows Vista is not part of the future
I actually have Windows 98se on the really old computer the kids get to pound around on. They’re old preschool.
Didn’t upgrade, purchased with the new P.C. Still, I guess it’s the same thing. I’m so ashamed
Also forgot to add that my new computer includes Microsoft Windows Vista Premium. Apart from a few niggles, I’m very happy with it.
So… what you’re telling me is that they went from bad to worse? (ME to Vista). Tough call which one is more of a miserable failure.
I tell you my girlfriend used Windows ME since 2001 to 2006. I got to know when the PC refused to boot. And I was shocked - ME is like the worst version ever… She sent to repairs before telling me and I told her to ask them to put Windows XP - which they could not since the PC refused to take it (a PIII 100MHz EB all integrated)..
Thought the guys weren’t competent enough and tried to do it myself.. didn’t take Windows XP… blue screens during setup. and searching for the problem I switched every piece of hardware in and out with no success… And I didn’t have ME or 98SE… And everything works… seems the motherboard would be the prob. Finally we upgraded to a Pentium D945 with XP :D..
“Anybody that upgraded to Windows Vista is not part of the future” No … Anybody trying to run Vista on old hardware is just a stupid lemming. Way to kill a system.
I re-furb old computers all the time. They go to students or friends who cannot afford new computers. Windows ME works fine if you set it up correctly.
ME runs faster than XP on most systems. Like all versions of windows you need to install anti spyware, anti virus and a firewall.
ME with the free version of ZoneAlarm is running a better firewall than XP with the built in windows firewall, because it is by-directional.
It was not the ME that was causing your download problem, it was your slow internet connection. DUH…
Running XP or Vista will not speed up a slow dial up connection.
It is all to easy to talk trash, but if you had real OS experance you would know the right OS is the one best suited to the hardware and running a resonable set of defences.
You may not know this but almost all root kit exploits are targeted at XP and Vista, but not ME.
The reason that old computers are screwed up is because they have had more years of users screwing them up. A re-format with a reload of an appropriate OS, along with the appropriate security software, is all that many older systems need to run fine.
You would be totaly supprized at just how fast ME runs if you were to load it on a new and modern computer. You may ask why your XP or Vista is so slow in comparison.
The answer, as given by an IBM rep who was explaining the long boot time of an old B-40 AS400, is “It’s not slow, it’s just doing a lot of stuff.” Yeh, right.
JM - Thanks for the comments. I’m sure if I had enough time to tinker with it, I might have been able to do all the things you suggested. However, this was my parents machine and I wasn’t going to go through the trouble of having them purchase new hardware only to re-install an operating system that was designed when Clinton was still in office and has little hope being compatible with whatever hardware/software they purchase.
Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment here.
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