1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:06,680 2001 was a busy year, Apple was poppin' off Napster and Sega, meanwhile threw in their 2 00:00:06,680 --> 00:00:12,840 respective towels, we got three new game consoles, one from a brand new challenger, scientists 3 00:00:12,840 --> 00:00:18,480 found this little guy, and America had her worst day ever. 4 00:00:18,480 --> 00:00:23,120 And for those of us who still remember all of that, Windows XP holds a special place 5 00:00:23,120 --> 00:00:26,840 in our hearts. But was it really that good? 6 00:00:26,840 --> 00:00:31,020 Or was it just better than the Millennium Edition and Vista Dumpster Fires that Book 7 00:00:31,020 --> 00:00:37,200 ended in? To find out, we gathered some of our young and young at heart friends to see if they 8 00:00:37,200 --> 00:00:42,160 could navigate Microsoft's most iconic Windows ever. 9 00:00:42,160 --> 00:00:45,520 There's lots more where that came from, but before we get to it, there's one more thing 10 00:00:45,520 --> 00:00:53,600 that came out in 2001. This segue, well not this one exactly, one like it, whoa does this thing even work? 11 00:00:53,600 --> 00:00:58,820 We're still gonna get to our sponsor though. Windows XP was chock full of important milestones. 12 00:00:58,820 --> 00:01:03,760 It was the first consumer version of Windows to be based on the more stable NT kernel. 13 00:01:03,760 --> 00:01:09,160 It was the first to require Microsoft product activation online, and it was the first major 14 00:01:09,160 --> 00:01:13,760 overhaul of the start menu since it was introduced back in Windows 95. 15 00:01:13,760 --> 00:01:19,400 It was also the first Windows to use graphical effects like alpha compositing and drop shadows 16 00:01:19,400 --> 00:01:25,000 to pretty up the interface, and it introduced clear type for better readability on LCD 17 00:01:25,800 --> 00:01:30,000 displays, which were just starting to approach affordability for the home user. 18 00:01:30,000 --> 00:01:34,600 There were also big changes to the control panel, Windows Explorer, networks and internet 19 00:01:34,600 --> 00:01:40,480 connectivity, multi-language support and multimedia tools, many of which have changed a fair bit 20 00:01:40,480 --> 00:01:46,160 since then. So let's see if our test subjects are able to navigate our challenges. 21 00:01:46,160 --> 00:01:51,080 I'm Katie and I'm 18 years old. I am McIntyre and I am 17 years old. 22 00:01:51,080 --> 00:01:56,920 Ah hi, I'm Elijah, junior writer here. I am 26 years old and I have actually never used Windows XP. 23 00:01:56,920 --> 00:02:02,160 I've never even used Windows 7. Whoa, Windows XP is running on this display. 24 00:02:02,160 --> 00:02:05,600 Man, I haven't used this since like 2001. 25 00:02:05,600 --> 00:02:11,120 I remember it was my favorite operating system all the way until probably Windows 10. 26 00:02:11,120 --> 00:02:15,600 You know, the funny thing is it actually looks really alike. Like Windows hasn't actually changed all that much. 27 00:02:15,600 --> 00:02:19,680 Wow, the local area connection with the little two monitors or whatever. 28 00:02:19,680 --> 00:02:22,720 Oh my God, I forgot all about this stuff. Oh my God. 29 00:02:22,840 --> 00:02:25,840 Control panel? The good one? Oh, I can't search anymore. 30 00:02:25,840 --> 00:02:28,840 No. I have to actually hit the search button. I want you to set up the screen saver. 31 00:02:28,840 --> 00:02:31,840 What is it? Can I search for it? Let's try. 32 00:02:31,840 --> 00:02:34,840 What was it called again? Holy pictures. Oh gosh, this is bad. 33 00:02:34,840 --> 00:02:37,840 Oh my. Oh my gosh, it's right there. Oh, that one for sure. 34 00:02:37,840 --> 00:02:40,840 Oh my God, I forgot about all the screen savers. Oh, where's the like pipes? 3D pipes. 35 00:02:40,840 --> 00:02:43,840 Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. 36 00:02:43,840 --> 00:02:46,840 Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. 37 00:02:46,840 --> 00:02:49,840 Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. 38 00:02:49,840 --> 00:02:52,960 Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. 39 00:02:52,960 --> 00:02:55,960 3D pipes. Yeah. Oh my gosh. 40 00:02:55,960 --> 00:02:58,960 Oh my gosh. There's like all the pipes. Yeah. 41 00:02:58,960 --> 00:03:02,860 Alright, well, properties, obviously. Desktop, screensaver. Wait, does this have the pipes? Hell, yeah. 42 00:03:02,860 --> 00:03:07,860 There you go. It has been applied. I think it's the first person to go to properties to do that. 43 00:03:07,860 --> 00:03:10,860 Uh oh. Where did everyone else go? Oh, it was the control panel. 44 00:03:10,860 --> 00:03:13,860 The dog. I forgot about the dog. I remember Merlin. 45 00:03:13,860 --> 00:03:17,780 Yeah, Merlin was dope. Oh, the dog! 46 00:03:17,780 --> 00:03:21,860 I forgot about the dog! I remember Merlin. Yeah, Merlin was dope. 47 00:03:21,860 --> 00:03:25,900 Who else, Courtney, Earl. I don't remember Courtney or Earl. 48 00:03:25,900 --> 00:03:30,540 I mostly just remember Merlin and Rover. 100% using Merlin. 49 00:03:30,540 --> 00:03:34,140 Switch. Why didn't he switch? Oh, he's going away. And then he comes in! 50 00:03:34,140 --> 00:03:39,420 What an animation. Oh my God. Probably my favorite thing that I used to do in XP 51 00:03:39,420 --> 00:03:43,940 was turn everything off so that I could get higher FPS in half-life 52 00:03:43,980 --> 00:03:45,260 and Counter-Strike. 53 00:03:49,060 --> 00:03:52,260 I took it sweet time. All right, my CD's in. 54 00:03:52,260 --> 00:03:57,940 Now we need to open it. Does this thing even open? I don't even think I've ever even touched one of these things. 55 00:03:57,940 --> 00:04:01,740 I'm trying not to break it. I have no clue. 56 00:04:01,740 --> 00:04:05,220 Okay, now I've just gotten a bunch of options of different audio. 57 00:04:05,220 --> 00:04:08,500 I can play the audio, copy it, 58 00:04:09,500 --> 00:04:14,380 play it from different, I think, apps, I think. I don't know how to do it. 59 00:04:14,380 --> 00:04:19,300 No, there's no copy. This is enable and disable selected tracks. 60 00:04:19,300 --> 00:04:21,100 Is there anything... Proper? 61 00:04:23,100 --> 00:04:26,980 Um... Oh yeah, copy music is there. Oh, there, okay. 62 00:04:26,980 --> 00:04:30,180 Oh, this'll be easy. I want track one 63 00:04:31,980 --> 00:04:35,980 and I want track six and I want track nine. 64 00:04:35,980 --> 00:04:37,860 Let's do one and 24. 65 00:04:39,020 --> 00:04:41,860 Wait, now the 24 is gone. Okay, this makes no sense. 66 00:04:42,500 --> 00:04:46,060 Okay, now they're all gone. Now they're all unchecked. What? 67 00:04:46,060 --> 00:04:50,660 Oh, I can hear it. It's, oh, the high pitch is actually really annoying. 68 00:04:50,660 --> 00:04:54,620 It's doing some sort of coil wine of some sort. Well, it sounds like coil wine. 69 00:04:54,620 --> 00:04:58,020 I don't know if it's actually coil wine, but like, it's that type of sound. 70 00:04:58,020 --> 00:05:01,860 Is it done? Holy crap, this takes forever. 71 00:05:01,860 --> 00:05:06,460 I could probably Google this CD faster on YouTube. 72 00:05:06,460 --> 00:05:10,380 Go to a youtube.mp3ripper. Don't do that, by the way. 73 00:05:10,380 --> 00:05:13,700 And then rip it faster than this. This is crazy. 74 00:05:13,700 --> 00:05:16,780 Hey, I got my three songs. All right, good work. 75 00:05:16,780 --> 00:05:19,940 Now, I want you to make an audio CD with those tracks. 76 00:05:19,940 --> 00:05:26,940 Insert blank C, okay. Well, conveniently, there's a blank CD right here. 77 00:05:28,940 --> 00:05:32,460 It's a CD. Do they? 78 00:05:32,460 --> 00:05:36,660 Oh. Okay, now it's copying to the CD. Nice. 79 00:05:36,660 --> 00:05:40,460 First one's done. This is mine. 80 00:05:40,460 --> 00:05:44,100 There we go. This is 1516. 81 00:05:44,100 --> 00:05:46,780 Okay. So, oh yeah. 82 00:05:47,780 --> 00:05:50,020 Sweet. I got my own CD now. 83 00:05:53,380 --> 00:05:57,620 No, it's not click and drag. Oh, copy. Insert blank CD. 84 00:05:57,620 --> 00:05:58,460 I did. 85 00:06:03,460 --> 00:06:09,540 Huh? They look the exact fucking same. What do you mean look closer at the drives? 86 00:06:09,540 --> 00:06:16,340 One says LG. One says DVD. Is it because this one says Secure Disc? 87 00:06:16,340 --> 00:06:20,420 Or a Supermulti? Yeah, the Supermulti's what you're asking. 88 00:06:20,420 --> 00:06:23,580 Okay, copy. Holy. 89 00:06:23,580 --> 00:06:28,380 This is the past version. That's crazy to me. Dude, this would drive me, 90 00:06:28,380 --> 00:06:32,380 like if my Windows 10 or Windows 11 computer was acting this slow, 91 00:06:32,380 --> 00:06:36,980 I would immediately be reinstalling. I'd be like, something's wrong. I forgot how long you'd put a CD in 92 00:06:36,980 --> 00:06:41,740 and you'd like rip it and then you'd walk away for a while because it actually takes some time. 93 00:06:41,740 --> 00:06:45,780 What a process. We just don't even do this anymore. Wow, I get to open it. 94 00:06:45,780 --> 00:06:48,340 I get the privilege. Sheesh. 95 00:06:49,580 --> 00:06:50,420 Amazing. 96 00:06:53,780 --> 00:06:57,540 Smells like 2000, baby. Which one's what? 97 00:06:57,540 --> 00:07:00,540 It should say all of them. Select the programs you want to install. 98 00:07:00,540 --> 00:07:04,660 Oh, I see it. Okay, okay. 99 00:07:04,660 --> 00:07:08,580 Oh, there it goes. It's installing. Insert Microsoft Suite Disk 2 100 00:07:08,580 --> 00:07:11,860 and then why does it ask me to do Disk 2? 101 00:07:11,860 --> 00:07:15,620 Yeah, back in the day, and this is after floppies too 102 00:07:15,620 --> 00:07:19,060 because you used to have to do this with floppies as well where you'd get like a stack of floppies 103 00:07:19,060 --> 00:07:22,140 and then you'd install them disk by disk. And then CDs came out 104 00:07:22,140 --> 00:07:27,500 and they could hold a lot more information and that was great, but you still had to do a lot of things one by one. 105 00:07:27,500 --> 00:07:32,820 I remember installing Diablo 2 and you could skip part of the install 106 00:07:32,820 --> 00:07:36,740 but you wouldn't get the cinematics because they were all on like Disk 3 or whatever. 107 00:07:36,740 --> 00:07:40,940 All right, let's see if this just auto launches. It did set up. Wow. 108 00:07:40,940 --> 00:07:46,500 This may take several minutes. That's very true. It would take even longer if it was on a hard drive, 109 00:07:46,500 --> 00:07:48,340 which everyone had back then. 110 00:07:53,300 --> 00:07:56,380 All programs. Holy crap. This is the worst organization 111 00:07:56,380 --> 00:07:57,940 I've ever seen in my entire life. 112 00:08:01,180 --> 00:08:05,300 Could not find streets and trips on this machine. Oh, disk on this machine. 113 00:08:05,300 --> 00:08:09,820 Oh, do I need to? Oh, okay. 114 00:08:09,820 --> 00:08:13,780 What the hell is the point of installing the program if I have to reinsert the disk anyways? 115 00:08:14,820 --> 00:08:16,940 So it'll install what it needs to run. 116 00:08:18,100 --> 00:08:21,100 The problem with that is the one with CDs. Oh. 117 00:08:22,340 --> 00:08:26,100 Is that just because like people didn't have hard drives like big enough back then? 118 00:08:26,100 --> 00:08:29,420 Probably? In a lot of cases, yeah. Okay. 119 00:08:29,420 --> 00:08:33,380 We did it. Wait, how do I move? Oh God, I just, 120 00:08:34,820 --> 00:08:37,940 Oh, I can search. Linus. Nope, that wouldn't work. 121 00:08:37,940 --> 00:08:38,780 Cause it's, 122 00:08:40,980 --> 00:08:44,020 What's our address? Right here would be the office. 123 00:08:47,140 --> 00:08:50,860 Yeah, it does not look like this. I found the office. Let's go. 124 00:08:50,860 --> 00:08:54,660 All right. Now let's Doc's Linus. His exact address is no. 125 00:08:54,660 --> 00:09:00,660 I want to go cheatcc.com, cheat code central. Because back then you could actually cheat NVIDIA games 126 00:09:00,660 --> 00:09:04,900 without like hacking. Wow, member of the week, this guy. I don't know who he is, but sure. 127 00:09:04,900 --> 00:09:10,340 Oh my God. Gamecube free CCC email, DVD, PlayStation, codes. 128 00:09:10,340 --> 00:09:14,620 You go to codes and you'd find codes and you'd enter them in. You'd have to search by, oh my God, you'd search. 129 00:09:14,620 --> 00:09:17,700 You'd be like, I want to play, I want the Crash Bandicoot cheat codes 130 00:09:17,700 --> 00:09:20,940 and then you'd scroll down. Oh yeah, cool borders four. 131 00:09:20,940 --> 00:09:25,220 Man, this sucks. Is this because we're using web archive 132 00:09:25,220 --> 00:09:28,500 or is this how long it would take to load a website back then? 133 00:09:28,500 --> 00:09:33,620 A little call of B, a little call of B. Okay. There's an Athlon XP-1800. 134 00:09:33,620 --> 00:09:37,380 Is that, oh, and a motherboard. So that's a combo. 135 00:09:37,380 --> 00:09:40,980 160 CAD for a motherboard CPU combo. 136 00:09:40,980 --> 00:09:44,000 That's pretty good. A broadband router. 137 00:09:46,740 --> 00:09:50,740 60 gig hard drive, 140 Canadian dollars. 138 00:09:53,180 --> 00:09:56,220 Do you want to not be able to install the newest Call of Duty? 139 00:09:56,220 --> 00:09:58,580 Here's $140. Have a good day. 140 00:09:59,980 --> 00:10:03,700 That's crazy. Did you play a lot of pinball? Nope. 141 00:10:03,700 --> 00:10:07,060 Played once in an arcade machine in a bowling alley, but that's about it. 142 00:10:08,100 --> 00:10:11,860 This was like the hot new game machine out with this version of Windows. 143 00:10:11,860 --> 00:10:15,380 Yeah, that's pretty sad. I was ready. Yeah. 144 00:10:15,380 --> 00:10:18,820 I got a new computer. You want to play pinball with me? Here we go. 145 00:10:18,820 --> 00:10:20,780 He's right here. Or is this a girl? 146 00:10:22,540 --> 00:10:25,220 Why'd you hit her? No, I didn't hit her. 147 00:10:28,260 --> 00:10:32,260 I'm right where the arrow, oh yeah, now I hit her. My bad. 148 00:10:32,260 --> 00:10:35,540 Yo, GT83, no, Max Payne. I love Max Payne. 149 00:10:35,540 --> 00:10:39,500 Yo, I want, what's this monitor? Is it 1920? Hell yeah. 150 00:10:39,500 --> 00:10:41,780 I want anti-aliasing off, yeah. 151 00:10:43,100 --> 00:10:47,180 High settings, everything's on high. Let's see how this game runs, baby. 152 00:10:47,180 --> 00:10:50,700 Oh, dude, this is like 30, 60. 153 00:10:50,700 --> 00:10:54,820 Oh God, my frame's dropped. What? Oh God, there's another one. 154 00:10:54,820 --> 00:10:57,140 So. Oh. 155 00:10:59,860 --> 00:11:05,780 Dude, this game is sick, man. It makes me respect where we're at now 156 00:11:05,780 --> 00:11:09,100 for operating systems, I think. Like even just the simple things, 157 00:11:09,100 --> 00:11:14,020 like hitting Windows in search or the load times for things. 158 00:11:14,020 --> 00:11:17,500 You know, as much as I reminisce 159 00:11:17,500 --> 00:11:20,500 and like to think I miss XP, 160 00:11:20,500 --> 00:11:24,140 it's really easy to just fly through Windows 11. There's a lot of like sub menus 161 00:11:24,140 --> 00:11:29,300 that I originally was like, oh, why'd they get rid of all these? But once you get used to it, it's so much faster. 162 00:11:29,300 --> 00:11:33,140 Looking back then, Windows XP really was a huge step 163 00:11:33,140 --> 00:11:37,900 in the path toward modern Windows. 95 and 98 deserve some credit. 164 00:11:37,900 --> 00:11:41,380 They had vastly more usable interfaces than what came before them, 165 00:11:41,380 --> 00:11:45,900 but they did nothing to solve the issues that were inherent with the DOS-based reality 166 00:11:45,900 --> 00:11:49,820 that was behind the curtains. 2000 addressed a lot of the stability 167 00:11:49,820 --> 00:11:53,260 and security concerns thanks to its business grade 168 00:11:53,260 --> 00:11:57,460 NT kernel, but it was only intended for business users 169 00:11:57,460 --> 00:12:02,100 and was priced to match. So it fell to XP to bring those benefits 170 00:12:02,100 --> 00:12:05,860 to the average user. And aside from just stability, 171 00:12:05,860 --> 00:12:09,620 there are glimpses of the future all over Windows XP. 172 00:12:09,620 --> 00:12:14,100 The start menu moved away from the monolithic all programs list 173 00:12:14,100 --> 00:12:17,700 in favor of highlighting your most used app. It had improved search, 174 00:12:17,700 --> 00:12:23,460 meaning you didn't have to go digging for things quite so often. And it had improved networking and internet features 175 00:12:23,460 --> 00:12:27,400 that were central to ushering in the always connected world we live in now, 176 00:12:27,400 --> 00:12:30,580 where most of what we do on a computer is in a web browser, 177 00:12:30,580 --> 00:12:34,220 say with Wikipedia, rather than load it 178 00:12:34,220 --> 00:12:38,460 onto our machine with a disk like Microsoft and Karta. 179 00:12:38,460 --> 00:12:42,220 Speaking of mind blowing things, this will probably blow our younger viewers' minds, 180 00:12:42,220 --> 00:12:45,260 but thumbnails, slideshows, and the task pane, 181 00:12:45,260 --> 00:12:50,220 those didn't exist before Windows XP. And while Auto Run wasn't new, 182 00:12:50,260 --> 00:12:54,140 there was finally enough functionality in the operating system and bundled apps 183 00:12:54,140 --> 00:12:57,540 for it to be genuinely useful, as we saw in our music ripping 184 00:12:57,540 --> 00:13:02,220 and our disk burning challenges. So XP, you know what? 185 00:13:02,220 --> 00:13:06,860 You stood up to the test of time, even if your usability could have been a little better. 186 00:13:06,860 --> 00:13:10,260 Just like this segue could have been a little better to our sponsor. 187 00:13:10,260 --> 00:13:16,700 If you guys enjoyed this video, maybe go check out the one where we had young people try Windows 95. 188 00:13:16,700 --> 00:13:18,220 They struggled even more.