Fun fact.. Windows 95 reports version 3.95 via Win16 API for compatibility reasons.
That's fine for all of those programs who're looking for a 3 as major and for a minor greater than 0.

This way, they know they're not running on an unsupported Windows 3.0.
Let's remember, Windows 3.10, 3.11 and 3.20 existed at the time.

Windows 95 aware 16-Bit programs will detect the minor of 95, by contrast.
While true blue 32-Bit applications will use Win32 API and get a 4.0 or 4.0.950 back.

Anyway, some would say this is old news. And they'r right, I guess.
But maybe it's nolonger remembered, so I wanted to let you know. ^^

If you're having trouble, utilities like Lie about Windows/Lie about Win32 can help.
They allow users to overwrite the Windows version temporarily.

I've never seen an English version of MS Windows 3.20. Do you have a link?

MarkP wrote on 2022-11-26, 17:51:

I've never seen an English version of MS Windows 3.20. Do you have a link?

Hi buddy, I'm sorry, not offhand yet. I'll have a look and write back. 🙂

Windows 3.20 was only used in foreign language releases, I believe.

I also had never heard of this Lie program. Very cool.

Some more screenshots of dithering between older and newer versions of Windows.

https://web.archive.org/web/20110414135622/ht … windows/colors/

MarkP wrote on 2022-11-26, 17:51:

I've never seen an English version of MS Windows 3.20. Do you have a link?

Kahenraz wrote on 2022-11-29, 16:25:

Windows 3.20 was only used in foreign language releases, I believe.

Yes, that's the same conclusion I ended up after searching the web.
Windows 3.2 seems to have had been some sort of successor to an earlier Chinese edition of Windows 3.1x.

Kahenraz wrote on 2022-11-29, 16:25:

I also had never heard of this Lie program. Very cool.

Thanks! Glad to hear! ^^

Kahenraz wrote on 2022-11-30, 07:38:

Some more screenshots of dithering between older and newer versions of Windows.

https://web.archive.org/web/20110414135622/ht … windows/colors/

Thanks! ^^

Here's a little update for the MSX emulator for Windows 95 (which runs on Win32s)..

Surprisingly, many of the games seem to run. That MSX2 emulation isn't too shabby! 🙂
Considering it's a 90s code base, I mean.

Sure, there are some glitches here and there and the sound chip emulation isn't complete, maybe.
And one game complained about not detecting a model 9958 VDP (MSX2 used 9938 or compatible).

But most popular games/applications do run, are playable.
I haven't expected this, to be honest.

That could be a good excuse for building a high-end Windows 3.1x machine. Yay! 😁
A few hundred MHz won't hurt, especially if graphics are stretched/magnified.

Quick update. Found something interesting.

EmuVR is planning to support DOS and Windows 95 inside the VR experience.
- In fact, I've seen at least one YT video about that. A dude also ran Genecyst, the classic Sega Genesis emulator. ^^

Source: https://www.emuvr.net/

So it's not too farfetched that Windows 3.1x and our emulators here could be used inside.
That would be emulation inside emulation.

And if we run DOSBox on the emulated Windows 95 to run Windows 3.1 to run the emulators.. Oh my! 😅

Anyway, just wanted to let you know.

The software doesn't *absolutely* require a VR headset, also.

Edit: Link added.
Edit: My bad, it was not Meka, but Genecyst?

Edit: Here's a quick review, also:
https://www.core77.com/posts/82315/EmuVR-Lets … eality-Settings#

It's quite interesting what one user in the comments said:
"This hits the uncanny valley for me. It's too real.
It's too escapist and nostalgic. It's too easy to imagine falling into a VR hole with this."

Personally, I can't disagree. It's really a bit too good, perhaps. The clock's arm on the wall moves realistically, for example.
Or the sun light that shines through your window, but is sometimes blocked by the clouds moving by.
Then there are the reflections on the CRT TV, the glossy print posters etc..

It's all very interesting, fascinating and very cool!
But.. it also feels sort of like you're caught in a memory inside your mind.
As if you're in coma, maybe at the end of your life, fantasizing about your childhood.
That's the spooky part, perhaps.

Ok, back on topic again.. I'll show more Win 3.1 emulation things soon. 🙂

Update. Good news! I've finally found a copy of the Windows front-end for the Emerson Arcadia 2001 emulator! 😁
I was looking for it for months.. Its homepage had several URLs in the past, but Wayback had not saved a single copy of the program's archive!

Anyway, here it is. The emulator itself was easily found at Zophar, gratefully! 👍

The games aren't included, of course. But the pictures are, since they're a part of the front-end's database.
As a replacement, I've added a text files with the directory listing containing file names/sizes.

A few more notes about the Emerson Arcadia 2001..

It was more of a platform than a single video game console - it had about 30 clones/variants!

HMG-2650
Intercord XL 2000 System
Intervision 2001
ITMC MPT-03
Ormatu 2001
Palladium Video-Computer-Game
Polybrain Video Computer Game
Poppy MPT-03 Tele Computer Spiel
Schmid TVG-2000
Tele-Fever
Ekusera
.. just to name a few.

The Emerson Arcadia 2001 was a second generation game console released in 1982.

Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File ... 982)_2.jpg

Specs:
Main Processor: Signetics 2650 CPU (some variants run a Signetics 2650A)
RAM: 1 KB
ROM: None
Video display: 128 × 208 / 128 × 104, 8 Colours
Video display controller: Signetics 2637 UVI @ 3.58 MHz (NTSC), 3.55 MHz (PAL)
Sound: Single Channel "Beeper" + Single Channel "Noise"
Hardware Sprites: 4 independent, single color
Controllers: 2 × 2 way
Keypads: 2 × 12 button (more buttons on some variants)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arcadia_2001
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signetics_2650

The processor was a Signetics 2650, which also was used in the Interton VC 4000 from 1978,
a console somewhat popular in my home country (this was before my time).
With an equally numerous selection of compatible models.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interton_Video_Computer_4000

It's amazing how much software there is for Windows 3.1. I think that a lot of it got eclipsed by the novelty that was Windows 95, and it has been slowly fading into history. While there are repositories and abandonware sites for DOS and "Windows", there isn't really a place to go to find software that was made exclusively for Windows 3.1, or at least, a way to filter for it in the Windows category.

Kahenraz wrote on 2022-12-03, 09:17:

It's amazing how much software there is for Windows 3.1. I think that a lot of it got eclipsed by the novelty that was Windows 95.
and it has been slowly fading into history. While there are repositories and abandonware sites for DOS and "Windows",
there isn't really a place to go to find software that was made exclusively for Windows 3.1, or at least, a way to filter for it in the Windows category.

Hm. I think that really hits the nail, yes! 😁 - Thank you very much, Kahenraz. Kudos to you. 😎 👍
- Please excuse my delayed response, also. You didn't say anything wrong.

Originally, I wanted to respond with a whole page of impressions of living in the 90s and my childhood/youth with Windows 3.1x.
But then I was worried how people would react to it. For some reason, my point-of-views do often upset people.
I guess I'm one of these people who're either being liked or absolutely hated, not sure.

Or maybe it's because of my rather isolated life, not sure. I had been both a dreamer and a tinkerer my whole life.
Thing is, people who live like me, at some point, do begin questioning certain things that other people are somewhat used to.
That's when people like me do unintentionally "attack" other people's world view. Which they will in turn start to defend, like a mother her child.

So it's better if I do stick to facts that I can prove, I guess. Because I'm really worried harming this thread here.
It was both a lot of work to find all these emulators and a joy to share them with other kind souls and exchange thoughts with them. ^^
I don't want to ruin this for others with my personal feelings or ideology. I hope that's okay. ^^

Good news.. I've found a few dozen emulator front-ends at zophar.net.
So far, about 5 seem to run on Windows 3.1x, some use VB3 runtime (Visual Basic 3 was 16-Bit).
Many of those who fail to run were made with Delphi 3+ and VB5/6, it seems.

Ok, let's start with ADAMEmMam, a front-end for the DOS-based Coleco ADAM emulator.
It needed a bit of work, but now runs fine on Windows 3.1+Win32s.

The Coleco Adam was an early home computer from 1983.
It had both a typewriter and word processor software in ROM (no BASIC interpreter built-in),
as well as an "Elementary Operating System (EOS) OS kernel and the 8 KB OS-7 ColecoVision operating system".
The video chip was similar to the one used by MSX1 specification and TI-99/4A. It also could boot CP/M 2.2.
In addition, it could make use of the existing ColecoVision software and accessories.

Specifications
CPU: Zilog Z80 @3.58 MHz
Support processors: three Motorola 6801 processors at 1 MHz (memory & I/O, tape, and keyboard control)
Memory: 64 KB RAM, 16 KB video RAM; 32 KB ROM
Graphics: Texas Instruments TMS9928A (a close relative of the TMS9918 in the TI-99/4A), 256 × 192 resolution, 32 sprites
Sound: Texas Instruments SN76489AN (a rebranded version of the TMS9919 in the TI-99/4A), 3 voices, white noise

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coleco_Adam

I can't imagine staring at a screen with such garish colors for hours. Maybe it's more functional on a black and white monitor. Regardless, I hope that there was an option to change the background to something darker.

Kahenraz wrote on 2022-12-07, 21:40:

I can't imagine staring at a screen with such garish colors for hours. Maybe it's more functional on a black and white monitor.
Regardless, I hope that there was an option to change the background to something darker.

Haha, yes, indeed! The colours are somewhat.. special. 😆

Normally, the blue on such old systems would be much darker (white text on dark blue background).
Like that colour tone used on Sharp MZ-700/800 series or Amiga OS 1.x.

That way, good compatibility with monochrome monitors was provided, too.
Dark blue was similar enought to black, so it didn't annoy users on either screen type.
It could also be filtered/blanked out without harming/altering the quality of the white letters.

Other systems with that weird cyan blue that come to mind: TI-99/4A and the Thomson TO7-70.
I guess the designers wanted to use black letters for that typewriter experience but couldn't use white as the background:
White was simply too aggressive to the eyes, hence that pastel looking blue (yellow was out of question, green a possibility).

But then again, what if the user not only had a low-end TV, but had grandma's old black/white TV? Or a monochrome video monitor?
He/she would have had ended up with a bright white again. Or worse, bright amber/green with black letters.
And noise/colour artifacts (especially via RF or composite aka CVBS) would have been easily visible on a monochrome monitor/TV.

Ironically, a high-end RGB monitor would have had been much better suited for this bright blue colour tone.
But that's exactly what the Adam wasn't made for. It rather was intended to be used by poor students and kids:

"[..] targeted a very special area: primarily home users who have students or teenage children who are writing term papers and who tend to be naive computer users.
Coleco has tried to make the Adam easy to use and attractive to that group, consciously excluding other groups by the way that [they] configured the machine."

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coleco_Adam

Personally, I wouldn't want to write my term paper on something like that.
In 1983, I would rather have had used my grandma's mechanical typewriter.
(Or I would have had asked at the local library if I could do some work on their CP/M or DOS PCs or terminals.)

Later programs like, say, GEOS or The Final Cartridge III on C64 did it way better, I think.
They either simulated an 80x25 or similar resolution in software or allowed for text scrolling.

Also cool were Printfox/Pagefox. They allowed for real word processing and DTP on a C64.
But that was more than 5 years in the future, also. 😀

Edit: Anyway, I don't mean to judge or offend former Adam users here. I never had an Adam. 😅
Maybe it looked sorta okay on its original video monior (the Adam has both RF and AV out, RGB can be tapped from chip).
Better than on an NTSC TV via RF for sure. Never Twice the Same Colour. Hawr hawr. 😁

Color BASIC on the Radio Shack TRS-80 was quite terrible as well, with a bright green background.

Kahenraz wrote on 2022-12-08, 09:58:

Color BASIC on the Radio Shack TRS-80 was quite terrible as well, with a bright green background.

Ah yes, the CoCo! ^^ Underrated little machine. It was used for early CompuServe, too. Here in Europe, compatibles were the Dragon 32/64.
If memory serves, there's a CS simulation software from the 80s for those who want(ed) to experience it offline.
The CoCo was good enough to draw the original RLE picture format (aka HIRES), before CompuServe used GIF.

https://www.cocopedia.com/wiki/index.php/TRS- … _Color_Computer
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Useful … s/ColorComputer
http://www.trs-80.org/trs-80-videotex/

Here's a video with the cartridge, in wonderful green! 😄
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_rkEoQ803k

PS: I'll post some more information about the other Windows front-ends for DOS emulators soon.
That being said, I still have some real Windows 3.1 (Win32s) compatible emulators here.
So the front-ends aren't the end of the story. I just thought they're a nice change for the moment.

nice thread 😀