Microsoft 32-bit disk access - Wikipedia ei tuo käyttöjärjestelmää 32-bttiseksi muuta
Pointti lähinnä, että sekä windows 9x että 3.x olivat osittain 16-bittisiä ja osittain 32-bittisiä. Vasta nt-kernelin myötä käyttis muuttui kokonaan 32-bittiseksi. 3.x:ssä oli jo useita osia. Kokosin tähän oikealta kuulostavat gpt-vastauksen, jos jotakuta kiinnostaa:
Windows for Workgroups 3.11 introduced a largely 32-bit protected-mode networking subsystem. This was one of the most modern parts of WfW 3.11 and the foundation for Win95’s networking.
- 32-bit NDIS 3 drivers for network cards
- 32-bit TCP/IP add-on (Microsoft’s “TCP/IP-32” package)
- 32-bit NetBEUI
- 32-bit IPX/SPX
Similar to Win9x’s later 32-bit disk access, WfW 3.11 included:
- Protected-mode IDE/SCSI disk drivers
- 32-bit disk caching
- Disk access bypassing the BIOS
This greatly reduced the time spent switching back to 16-bit real mode. The VxD architecture already existed here, though it was much smaller in scope. While less advanced than the later VMM in Windows 95, Windows 3.11 did include:
- A 32-bit virtual memory manager
- Paging in protected mode
- 32-bit protected-mode kernel services built on the older Windows 3.x model
The 32-bit driver ecosystem was limited compared to the later Win95. The following were 32-bit:
- VMM (Virtual Machine Manager)
- IFSMgr (filesystem)
- Some network drivers
- Some disk drivers
- Standard protected-mode drivers for memory and paging
Windows 3.11 did NOT have native Win32 API support, but you could install Win32s, an add-on library that implemented part of the Win32 API. Win32s provided:
- 32-bit flat memory model execution
- Some Win32 API calls
- Cooperative multitasking (NOT preemptive!)
- No multithreading
- This was not used by the OS itself—only for select apps.
Bottom Line - Windows 3.11 had:
- 32-bit disk access
- 32-bit file access
- 32-bit networking stack
- 32-bit protected-mode virtual memory
- Some 32-bit VxDs
- Optional Win32s support for limited 32-bit applications
