Only One Side Will Be the True Successor to MS-DOS – Windows 2.x

SERIES: GUI Wonderland

CATEGORY: Technology

GUI Wonderland #12a
Only One Side Will Be The True Successor to MS-DOS!
Windows 2.x

PUBLISHED:

April 21, 2026

LAST UPDATED:

April 22, 2026

Written By:

Blisscast

Edited By:

Blisscast

Introduction

Hello everyone, and welcome to a double GUI Wonderland Episode, where we explore the birth and evolution of Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs) in computers; today, we’ll have a look at two parallel projects by IBM and Microsoft, OS/2 and Windows 2.x, which shared some development time, and have a very similar UI. Yes, I could have talked about them in two separate Episodes but, given how they’re both shorter and share some points, I decided to release both at the same time!

You don’t have to necessarily start reading from 12a (this one), so feel free to jump to 12b if you want to start from OS/2 1.x!

As always, I recommend you read the previous Episodes, in order to have a better understanding of today’s topics; the obvious choice is Episode #10 about Windows 1.x, but Episodes #3 and #7 about the Lisa and the Macintosh are always useful!

Double Episode!

All the best GUI Wonderland Episodes come in pairs:
Click on the picture to switch to Episode 12b about OS/2 1.x!

Windows 2.x

Release date	December 9, 1987
Discontinued	December 31, 2001
OS	DOS
Developer	Microsoft
Price	$100 (2.0), $199 (2.0 386), $99 (2.1 286), $195 (2.1 386), $25 (2.1 upgrade for 2.0 users)

This is a major release of Windows and, similarly to the previous one [ep 10], it is not a complete operating system, but it’s simply a graphical user shell that is meant to be run on top of MS-DOS; thus, it inherently gains its limitations, albeit the developers had time to fix some things with this release, as well as add new features such as icons on the desktop and keyboard shortcuts.

Weirdly enough, it was meant to be the final incarnation of Windows, and the idea was that OS/2 would supersede it soon enough; as we all know, things ended up going a little differently.

History & Development+

The Creation of Windows 2.0

Despite what you may imagine from how history went afterward, Microsoft was fully aware of how MS-DOS was starting to be inadequate for current and future computing, especially if GUIs were truly going to become the only way to go from that moment onward; poor Windows 1.x could barely run on the most common machines of the time (which were running on Intel 8086 and 8088, and not on the newest 80286 and 80386), and it’s not like Windows 2.x could potentially do much better.

Thus, Steve Ballmer, negotiated an agreement with IBM on a successor to Windows, a true operating system; ideally, the interfaces of both programs were going to be as similar as possible, so that, one day, Windows 2.x users could switch to OS/2 and encounter a familiar environment, albeit with many new functions and additions. In the meantime, though, they needed to develop another version of Windows, so that they could also fix all the issues caused by the rushed Windows 1.x release [ep 10]; plus, it’s not like OS/2 would be ready right away, as it was much more complex than Windows 2.x, so they needed some kind of new release to appeal to the existing market, and slowly accustom people to the wonders of the new UI.

Windows 2.0 April 1987 build, find out more below

Remember Tandy Trower, the manager who succeeded in shipping Windows 1.x after everyone else had failed [ep 10]? Well, he was back, and he was tasked with working on this same project, so that Microsoft’s Application Group could work on a new version of Word and Excel, which were becoming very popular on the Macintosh; the problem was that most of the original Windows development team had been tasked with working on OS/2 instead, and even Trower himself had to work alongside that same team in order to maintain consistency between the two UIs.

Something that we can really appreciate is how Trower suggested that they created a separate team who also employed real graphics designers, rather than simply software developers, to craft the new UI, hoping to achieve a truly user friendly and consistent interface, rather than whatever the developers found easiest to make; this is in line with the development of the Lisa [ep 3] and the Macintosh [ep 7], where UI was above every other aspect of the software. Plus, if you remember [ep 7], even the Macintosh’s icons were designed by a graphics designer, Susan Kare, who then designed the one found in Windows 3.x. This team worked so well that they ended up influencing the usability of many Microsoft products, and even the full overhaul in Windows 95!

The Macintosh’s icons by Susan Kare

Back to our poor Windows 2.x, even if Trower only had eight months to get it all done, he still managed to do it all; he finally got the chance to add all of the features that he had to skip during the development of 1.x, such as overlapping windows, or a proportional system font. Then, he tried to add in as many UI upgrades, whilst never forgetting to be compliant with OS/2’s UI; some of these things were only possible because of a clever trick that allowed you to use extended memory (part of RAM) in PCs, and not just the base amount that the processor permitted you to use.

Fundamentally, Intel processors found on IBM PC compatibles only allowed you to use 640 KiB (kibibytes, not kilobytes) of conventional memory for applications, which meant that anything beyond that amount was reserved to other system functions and was not available to the user; still, there were ways to circumvent that, and that’s how Windows 2.x and other programs such as Lotus 1-2-3 managed to have more RAM available for their needs! It was less difficult to achieve this on a 386, but most people could not afford it, so that’s why they couldn’t assume you’d have one; if you’re curious, here’s a video that shows you how this process worked in the 90s, thanks to some really awesome programs!

Even if not everyone had a 386, there were still some useful improvements that could be added to a version that required it, apart from fully preemptive multitasking; one of them involves the fact that the 386 was able to go into “protected mode”, which was more stable than the “real mode” found on other processors, but made you unable to run code not designed for it, such as DOS applications.

After a lot of work, in 1987 not only one, but two flavors of Windows ended up coming out; Windows 286 and Windows 386, which were then renamed to Windows/286 and Windows/386 once Version 2.1 was released.

Beta Build

Windows 2.0 April 1987 build – 1987-04

This is the earliest build you can find, and it was shown in the Microsoft Systems Journal magazine in May 1987. We can see that the UI has the same color scheme as Windows 1.x, but you can now overlap windows, and you have more ways to control them.

Things start not going so well anymore: a nice lawsuit from Apple

⚠️ A Little Disclaimer ⚠️

Before we start with this section: I’m not a lawyer nor a law student, so if there are any inaccuracies, you know why.

It all started on March 17, 1988, when Apple filed a lawsuit against both Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard, stating that they had violated Apple’s Macintosh copyright; according to Apple, the Macintosh’s “look and feel” could not be copied as it was protected by copyright, so that’s why they sued both companies.

True or not, what makes this even more interesting is that Apple and Microsoft had a previous agreement regarding Windows 1.x, where Apple licensed certain parts of their GUI to be used in the first version of Microsoft’s OS; it all started in 1985, when Microsoft risked getting sued by Apple for that same version of Windows. If you remember from our episode about GEM [ep 9], Apple “loved” suing companies if their GUIs were a bit too similar to the Macintosh and the Lisa; that also happened in 1985, and they managed to force DRI, the company behind GEM, to make some changes, as the similarities were simply too big to be ignored.

Still, Apple didn’t end up suing Microsoft just yet, as Gates managed to obtain royalty-free rights to the Apple patents and copyright regarding their GUI, and in exchange, Microsoft would keep developing Macintosh versions of their popular Word and Excel; the problem in all of this was that only version 1.x was covered, and now Microsoft had released version 2.03. Thus, you can imagine why Apple wanted to do something about it.

Similarly to what happened with GEM, they wanted the court to understand how the entire interface as a whole had a similar look and feel, even if not all elements were exactly copied; this meant that the court had to consider the GUI an audiovisual product, and not just a piece of code.

The court didn’t want to accept to stop at a look of the interface as a whole, but they wanted to examine every component separately, and only then evaluate if Microsoft and HP had actually copied Apple; the court also split a GUI in 5 ideas (windows, icon images representing office files, manipulation of said icons, menus, and the opening and closing of objects), and copyright didn’t apply to those. Apparently, when you merge an idea and its expression, then such expression will only be considered a copy if it’s the exact same; plus, in this case, it’s not like you had infinite ways to represent certain icons or objects, especially due to the limitations they had.

To this, we must add how Apple’s GUI ideas came from Xerox, so even if they could have some sort of copyright protection, then that would be applied to the original expression, found on the Xerox Alto and Star, and not on the Lisa or the Macintosh.

Later on, it was concluded that only 10 of the 189 items that were copied were problematic, and among these there were overlapping windows and the manipulation of certain types of icons; afterwards, after yet more scrutiny, it was found that even those 10 were not copyrightable, some because they were not original, and others because there was literally no other way to represent them.

In the meantime, someone else joined in the fun; Xerox also sued Apple, as Apple had copied their ideas to make their GUI! We all know that Apple didn’t just “steal” from them [ep 3], but Xerox wanted to make sure that, if you were allowed to copyright “look and feel”, then they would have been the ones to obtain the benefits, and not Apple; unfortunately for them, it didn’t work out, as they were too late, and had to pursue a charge of unfair competition instead.

Even if Apple tried to defend itself in so many ways, especially after Windows 3.0’s release, eventually, they had to give up in 1994.

Software & GUI+

There were several GUI improvements in this version, such as the addition of “desktop icons”; they were completely new, and it meant that Windows 2.x could be more compliant to the desktop metaphor than ever… almost. Previously, you could only have icons at the bottom of the screen, and they were only there when a program was open; now, you could freely move them around the desktop, and there was no bottom bar anymore, but you could only have icons of open programs (still no files on the desktop).

Aside from that, there was also the possibility to overlap windows, which had to be scrapped from the previous version; this allowed free movement and resizing of windows, which had to follow some kind of fixed patterns before, as they could never overlap; of course, this was one of the reasons Windows 2.x ended up looking more similar to the Macintosh [ep 7], the Lisa [ep 3], and the poor Xerox Star  [ep 2], and you can head to the previous section to find out how that went.

Some terminology was also changed from version 1.x, such as “iconize” and “zoom”, which are now called “minimize” and “maximize”; still, many things still looked incredibly similar to 1.x, as what they were trying to solve with 2.x were problems with DOS and various software limitations.

Moreover, they couldn’t exactly improve things much more because of hardware limitations, and the need to build upon DOS, which forced them to use the FAT file system with its short file names; you can imagine why OS/2 was such an awesome idea, as it didn’t need DOS to work!

Also, the limited MS-DOS Executive [ep 10] would still be launched every time you turned on the system, instead of the much tidier Start Programs window that OS/2 1.1 had.

System Requirements to run Windows 2.x

CPU	8088 processor (80286 or 80386 recommended)
RAM	512 KB of memory (1 MB in Windows/386 2.1)
Storage	Two double-sided floppy disk drives or a hard disk (hard disk required in 2.1)
Video	EGA or VGA adapters
OS	MS-DOS 3.0 or higher (3.1 in Windows/386 2.1)
Mouse	Recommended, not all mice were compatible

The editions and upgrades of Windows 2.x

Based on your PC’s processor, you had two variants available:

• Windows/286, originally just called Windows 2.0, which supported the 8086, 8088, and 80286, but could also work on the 80386; it had no easy access to protected mode (with the 286, you could only go back to real mode by rebooting the PC), and had no preemptive multitasking;
• Windows/386, which was optimized for the 80386, and was available in September 1987, even before the 286 version (which came out in December); it had a protected mode kernel, preemptive multitasking, you could run more than one DOS program at a time thanks to a “virtual 8086 mode”, and could use RAM beyond 640 KiB.

Windows 2.1

This is the first upgrade to Windows 2.03, the base version of this iteration of Windows, and it was released in May 1988; it introduced new driver support or additional computers, display devices, and about 65 more printers than 2.03, which meant that about 127 printers were supported, more than OS/2 1.x. They also introduced a driver called HIMEM.SYS, which now allowed Windows itself to use the first 64 K of extended memory as well, which meant that you had about 50 K more conventional memory to use inside Windows. The only real downside of this version is that you were now forced to own a hard disk, and could not run Windows only from floppies.

Additional Information:

Korean translation:
If you needed a Korean version, you were lucky, as Windows 2.1 was available in that language from May 1990, later updated to 2.12 in September 1990.

Windows 2.11

It was released on March 13, 1989, in both 286 and 386 editions; it mostly received driver updates, could now support high-resolution displays, and was cheaper for organizations to adopt.

Programs

Windows 2.x came with the usual group of programs, such as Notepad, Cardfile (a simple database), Calendar, Calculator, Clock, and Terminal (a communication app, as the CLI was handled by DOS); you even had Word and Excel, an amazing move by Microsoft to compete with WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3 by having Windows come to an already decent bundled version of those programs (this sounded very smart to them, and it happened again with Windows 95 and Internet Explorer, but people did complain about the latter).

The DOS situation was very similar to 1.x, with certain DOS programs acting up or straight up not working; still, one good thing about 2.x when compared to OS/2 is that you could always boot into DOS and use incompatible programs in other ways. Still, that meant that you couldn’t truly replace DOS with Windows yet, or with OS/2.

Marketing & Reception+

So, how did life go for the so-called last Windows version?

Luckily for them, it went better than with Windows 1.x, as this version was deemed more complete and manageable; still, as we saw in the Programs section, you still needed DOS for many things, and the UI was quite unpredictable in appearance on some devices, as it had to run on weak hardware too. I mean, Apple had an easier time as they also produced the hardware, and IBM didn’t have to rely on DOS, so it had more memory to work with; in the end, we cannot deny that it was only reasonable for Windows not to be as good-looking as those.

Fortunately, 2.1 offered some much-needed upgrades; the preferred version was the 386 one, which was considered to be very functional, plus it also included a lot of drivers that the 286 version lacked. This was also reflected in the sales, as it was the first Windows version to be acclaimed by both customers and critics.

You’d have to wait until Windows 3.0 came out for it to be truly successful, but this was already a decent start!

Conclusion+

And there we are! Microsoft had a few hiccups here and there, but they were on their way to something great; we’ll continue their adventures in a future Episode, but for now our journey ends here!

If you haven’t read OS/2’s side yet, you can do so by either scrolling the page up (on bigger screens), or clicking here.

Our next stop in our journey in GUI Wonderland will bring us to visit Acorn Computers and their Acorn Archimedes computers, with their Arthur (later RISC OS) operating system! Then, if I can make it work we’ll also have a look at a 3D game called Zarch, which you could play on your Acorn Archimedes computer!

Also, before you go, have a look at the References and Further Reading section, to find more materials to read.

Thank you for reading, and I hope I’ll see you in the next GUI Wonderland Episode, in our next Journal Page about video games and others, or anywhere around the site!

Article Credits

1. Text Written by Blisscast
2. Text Edited by Blisscast
3. Cover image drawn by Blisscast
4. Xerox Star Daystar picture taken by Blisscast
5. UI Design by EmeraldDM8

References

1. Wikipedia: Windows 2.0 – https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_2.0
2. Wikipedia: Windows 2.1 – https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_2.1
3. Technologizer: The Secret Origin of Windows – https://web.archive.org/web/20190925182708/https://www.technologizer.com/2010/03/08/the-secret-origin-of-windows/
4. Vintage Computer: WUI, The War Over User Interface by Stewart Alsop II, January 1988 – http://vintagecomputer.net/cisc367/PC-Letter_19880118.pdf
5. Toastytech: Windows 2.x – http://toastytech.com/guis/win203.html
6. Toastytech: Applications for Windows 1.x/2.x Page 3 – http://toastytech.com/guis/win1x2x3.html
7. GUIdebook Gallery: Windows 2.0 – https://guidebookgallery.org/guis/windows/win20
8. GUIdebook Gallery: Sorting out fact from fiction in the Apple-Microsoft lawsuit – https://guidebookgallery.org/articles/sortingoutfactfromfiction
9. Microsoft: Windows Version History – https://web.archive.org/web/20061107143753/http://support.microsoft.com/kb/32905/
10. Wikipedia: Apple Computer, Inc. v. Microsoft Corp. – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Computer,_Inc._v._Microsoft_Corp.
11. New York Times: Xerox Sues Apple Computer Over Macintosh Copyright – https://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/15/business/company-news-xerox-sues-apple-computer-over-macintosh-copyright.html?scp=3&sq=apple+xerox&st=nyt
12. Los Angeles Times: Xerox Sues Apple Over Graphics Software – https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1989-12-15-fi-329-story.html
13. New York Times: Most of Xerox’s Suit Against Apple Barred – https://www.nytimes.com/1990/03/24/business/most-of-xerox-s-suit-against-apple-barred.html
14. Seattle Times: Apple-Microsoft Lawsuit Fizzles To A Close, Nothing Left To Fight About – https://archive.seattletimes.com/archive/19930602/1704430/apple-microsoft-lawsuit-fizzles-to-a-close—-nothing-left-to-fight-about
15. Justia U.S. Law: Apple Computer, Inc. v. Microsoft Corp., 35 F.3d 1435 (9th Cir. 1994) – https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F3/35/1435/605245/
16. BetaWiki: Windows 2.x List of Known Buildshttps://betawiki.net/wiki/Windows_2.x#List_of_known_builds
17. BetaWiki: Windows 2.0 April 1987 Build – https://betawiki.net/wiki/Windows_2.0_April_1987_build
18. Wikipedia: DOS memory management – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DOS_memory_management

Books

1. Vision for the Future, The Making of Microsoft: How Bill Gates and His Team Created the World’s Most Successful Software Company by Daniel Ichbiah, Susan L. Knepper – ISBN 9781559580717 – https://archive.org/details/makingofmicrosof00ichb/ + https://books.google.it/books/about/The_making_of_Microsoft.html?id=dEStdArPXHYC&redir_esc=y
2. Illustrated Microsoft Windows 2.0 by Robert E. Whitsitt – ISBN 9781556220692 – https://archive.org/details/illustratedmicro0000whit
3. Using Microsoft Windows by Ron Person, Karen Rose – ISBN 9780880223362 – https://archive.org/details/usingmicrosoftwi0000pers_d5r5 + https://books.google.it/books?id=GDIiAQAAIAAJ

Magazines

1. InfoWorld vol 9 n 15 (1987) – https://books.google.it/books?id=HDwEAAAAMBAJ&printsec=frontcover&hl=it#v=onepage&q&f=false +  https://books.google.com/books?id=HDwEAAAAMBAJ
2. PC magazine vol 6 n 22 (1987) – https://archive.org/details/PC-Mag-1987-12-22/page/n33/mode/2up + https://books.google.com/books?id=gC-DsOtl2MgC
3. PC magazine vol 7 n 16 (1988) – https://archive.org/details/PC-Mag-1988-09-27/page/n39/mode/2up + https://books.google.com/books?id=UenCawr7OowC
4. Byte vol 14 n 7 (1989) – https://guidebookgallery.org/articles/aguidetoguis + https://archive.org/details/eu_BYTE-1989-07_OCR/page/n313/mode/1up
5. Byte vol 15 n 1 (1990) – https://archive.org/details/1982-10-byte-magazine-october-1-byte-magazine-21533/199001_Byte_Magazine_Vol_15-01_Byte_Awards/mode/2up + https://books.google.com/books?id=jTRVAAAAMAAJ&q=infoworld+%22windows/286%22
6. Computerworld vol 24 n 18 (1990) – https://archive.org/details/sim_computerworld_1990-04-30_24_18 + https://books.google.com/books?id=3tUVCzAncZ0C

Videos

1. Windows/386 promotion – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=noEHHB6rnMI + https://preservetube.com/watch?v=noEHHB6rnMI  
2. THE PHINTAGE COLLECTOR: Before Windows 3.0 Took Off, A Look at Windows/286 – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hB73PwnOVnM + https://preservetube.com/watch?v=hB73PwnOVnM
3. THE PHINTAGE COLLECTOR: Mastering DOS Memory, Part 1: Into Memory Managers, resource conserving Drivers and TSRs – https://youtu.be/oD_m6q7uLu4 + https://preservetube.com/watch?v=oD_m6q7uLu4

Further Reading

1. My Archive.org list for this Episode – https://archive.org/details/@majima-kun/lists/36/windows-2.x-%2B-os-2-1.x-for-gui-wonderland

This contents of this article are for entertainment, commentary and/or educational purposes only, and any copyrighted material used within the confines of it are being used under the fair use provisions of copyright law.
Anything within this article that might fall outside of those confines are entirely unintentional, and we will be more than happy to remove the offending material immediately. You can find links to all sources used by either clicking here or scrolling to the “References” section above, however, if we have missed a credit anywhere, please let us know and we will be happy to rectify the issue.

All rights and credit belong directly to their rightful owners. No copyright infringement is intended.

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GUI Wonderland #11 – Turn your dumb terminal into a workstation today, with X Window System!

by Blisscast November 11, 2025April 22, 2026