The time between 1990 and 2005 saw much more dramatic changes in consumer operating systems than the time between 2005 and 2020 though. Especially Windows has been on a slow usability downward spiral since around Win2k.
Even Windows 2k felt a little frivolous compared to the more somber Windows NT. Windows NT 4 looked alright, but Windows NT 3.51 (or whatever) was rock solid and felt buttery smooth.
Yes, there was some tearing when you played several AVI videos at once on the desktop, but anything else would have been SGI level sourcery and black arts and not expected.
Windows NT 4 felt faster than Windows NT 3, but NT4 felt jittery. NT 3 never slowed down, it was like cream.
Once I saw Windows NT 3 on a trade-show on Alpha CPUs. That felt just like the future arrived, an evil smirking corporate future which laughed at whatever I knew about optimization, 68k assembler, blitter objects and sound chips.
The future was here, and it was here to tell me that none of that arcane juggling mattered anymore. The only thing that matters from now on is raw speed, of the core and the bus.
