Let's face it; Microsoft Windows was a lame DOS extender with fancy
   CPU-draining graphics. Even with all the good apps written for it, the
   base was shaky. Too many app writers also hacked and patched Windows
   so much that nothing worked right together. Win95 turned the lame DOS
   extender into as much of a full fledged OS as possible, without
   removing DOS altogether.
   
   The Win95 designers tried to take the best ideas, best patches, best
   hacks, and integrate them "nicely" into the OS. For example, you can
   have virtual desktops with any video card now. The COM port drivers
   take advantage of new hardware by design. It still uses fancy
   CPU-draining graphics, but it's not just a DOS extender anymore.
   
   They supposedly got a bunch of "average" people in to rate the OS and
   user interface as it stood. They took suggestions from many people of
   different walks of life, then totally ignored them. Supposedly, Win95
   is now the OS that anyone can use. Yeah right. You have to give them
   credit for a good effort though.
   
   Not to mention all the features they pirated from Apple, Xerox, Amiga
   Tech, and IBM, do make it a bit easier to get along with.
   
   MS also wants to bury DOS for good. I believe this, because of the
   penultimate Designed for Win95 requirement: The product must run
   in Windows NT Workstation too. Besides... too many people out there
   are ignoring Win95 in favor of NT. R.I.P. D.O.S.

     * 14.1.1. What possessed you to write all this stuff? 
       
   A base need to tell all the Win95 newcomers out there to Please read
   the manual... and since many of these weirdities come up in my work
   every day, it was about time I put it all in one place and use my
   favorite answer to all of these questions: RTFM.

     * 14.1.2. How can I best make use of this information? 
       
   I admit, as hard as I try to make all this as simple as possible to
   read, there are still concepts that are very unclear to new users. I
   draw on many of these concepts to write the FAQ.
   
   So, to make best use of it:
    1. Read the small booklet that came with your PC. Learn a bit about
       its special features (especially features that Win95 might have
       troubles with, like your new voice modem)
    2. Run the Win95 Tour. Ten minutes will save you several hours of
       searching through this FAQ for the simple answers. You can start
       the tour by hitting the Start button, then hitting "Help". The
       very first topic on the very top of the Help window is "Tour: ten
       minutes to using Windows".
    3. Read the slightly larger book that Microsoft supplied with Win95
       (the book with the license certificate pasted on the front, or the
       one that says, "Getting started"). Here you can learn about how to
       start up Win95, how to use Windows Explorer, the simple applets,
       and everything else the tour didn't show you.
    4. Then get your questions in mind and browse the headers of each of
       these pages to find them here, and then see the answers they link
       to.
    5. Ask other people if you're in doubt of the answers, or ask me.
    6. Ask questions that aren't in the FAQ so I can add them to it.