 Windows XP 2001
Windows XP is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was the direct successor to both Windows 2000 Professional and Windows Me, and it was released to manufacturing on August 24, 2001, with retail sales beginning on October 25, 2001. It was Microsoft's operating system for use on personal computers such as home and business desktops, laptops, tablet PCs and media center PCs.
Development of Windows XP began in the late 1990s as "Neptune", an operating system (OS) built on the Windows NT kernel which was intended specifically for mainstream consumer use. An updated version of Windows 2000 was also originally planned for the business market; however, in January 2000, both projects were scrapped in favor of a single OS codenamed "Whistler", which would serve as a single OS platform for both consumer and business markets. As such, Windows XP was the first consumer edition of Windows not to be based on the Windows 95 kernel and MS-DOS.
Upon its release, Windows XP received critical acclaim, with critics noting increased performance and stability (especially in comparison to Windows Me), a more intuitive user interface, improved hardware support, and expanded multimedia capabilities.
Official Mainstream Support for Windows XP ended on April 14, 2009, and Official Extended support for Windows XP ended on April 8, 2014.
As of July 2021, 0.58% of Windows PCs run Windows XP and 0.18% of all devices across all platforms run Windows XP. Windows XP is still very prevalent in many countries, such as Armenia where over 50% of computers use Windows XP.
Source: Wikipedia
Windows XP Use
 Windows XP was fun to use. It still allowed theming but it was the beginning of the fade out for theming as a whole in the Windows environment. I appreciated the stability that XP brought. But, admittedly, it was the virus that it brought to my computer in 2004 that led me to purchase a Mac! I was fed up with the virus attacks on Windows and working in IT I should not have had to experience that on my home system - or so I thought. That was the end of Windows as my full-time operating system at home. It was now relegated to my business OS, required for my job, and run in a virtual machine where I could easily control it.
Fast Forward to 2021
In 2021 I continue to be disappointed in Microsoft Windows lack of focus on the consumer market. It is clear that Microsoft is still more driven by business than by home user considerations. The operating system we have today, Windows 10, is just no fun at all. I think they should pay more attention to themes like they did in the Windows 95/98/XP days. Especially the Windows 95/98 operating systems - they made it easy to instantly switch your computer theme by flipping a switch which would then really theme-out your system. It would change the window border size, colors and fonts and all other fonts across the system. It would change the wallpaper. It would change the sound scheme. It would change the icon theme. It was all done in an instant and it was complete. It was fun to change these themes around. Today with Windows 10, you can change the wallpaper which will/can have some color effect change on the environment. You can - once you find it buried in the background - change your sound theme. But it’s not all together anymore and you cannot touch those “precious” window borders around your . . . windows! It’s not easy to theme and it’s not consistent and coherent. Windows 10 is a bore.
My next computing adventure took me to Mac OS X in 2004 on a G5 iMac. Nice.
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