Windows NT 3.51 is the third major release of the

Windows NT Windows NT is a Proprietary software, proprietary Graphical user interface, graphical operating system produced by Microsoft as part of its Windows product line, the first version of which, Windows NT 3.1, was released on July 27, 1993. Original ...

operating system An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware and software resources, and provides common daemon (computing), services for computer programs. Time-sharing operating systems scheduler (computing), schedule tasks for ...

, developed by

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...

for the data server and personal workstation markets. It was released on May 30, 1995, eight months following the release of Windows NT 3.5. The most significant enhancement offered in this release was that it provides client/server support for inter-operating with

Windows 95 Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft and the first of its Windows 9x family of operating systems, released to manufacturing on July 14, 1995, and generally to retail on August 24, 1995. Windows 95 merged ...

, which was released almost three months after NT 3.51. Windows NT 4.0 became its successor a year later. Mainstream support for Windows NT 3.51 Workstation ended on December 31, 2000, and extended support ended on December 31, 2001, while Windows NT 3.51 Server mainstream support ended on September 30, 2000, followed by extended support on September 30, 2002. Both editions were succeeded by Windows NT 4.0 Workstation and Windows NT 4.0 Server, respectively.

Overview

The release of Windows NT 3.51 was dubbed "the PowerPC release" at Microsoft. The original intention was to release a PowerPC edition of NT 3.5, but according to Microsoft's David Thompson, "we basically sat around for 9 months fixing bugs while we waited for IBM to finish the Power PC hardware". Editions of NT 3.51 were also released for the

x86 x86 (also known as 80x86 or the 8086 family) is a family of complex instruction set computer (CISC) instruction set architectures initially developed by Intel, based on the 8086 microprocessor and its 8-bit-external-bus variant, the 8088. Th ...

, MIPS, and

Alpha Alpha (uppercase , lowercase ) is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of one. Alpha is derived from the Phoenician letter ''aleph'' , whose name comes from the West Semitic word for ' ...

architectures. New features introduced in Windows NT 3.51 include

PCMCIA The Personal Computer Memory Card International Association (PCMCIA) was an industry consortium of computer hardware manufacturers from 1989 to 2009. Starting with the PCMCIA card in 1990 (the name later simplified to ''PC Card''), it created v ...

support,

NTFS NT File System (NTFS) (commonly called ''New Technology File System'') is a proprietary journaling file system developed by Microsoft in the 1990s. It was developed to overcome scalability, security and other limitations with File Allocation Tabl ...

file compression, replaceable WinLogon ( GINA), 3D support in

OpenGL OpenGL (Open Graphics Library) is a Language-independent specification, cross-language, cross-platform application programming interface (API) for rendering 2D computer graphics, 2D and 3D computer graphics, 3D vector graphics. The API is typic ...

, persistent IP routes when using TCP/IP, automatic display of textual descriptions when the mouse pointer was placed on toolbar buttons (" tooltips") and support for Windows 95 common controls. In view of the significant difference in the kernel base, Windows NT 3.51 is readily able to run a large number of

Win32 The Windows API, informally WinAPI, is the foundational application programming interface (API) that allows a computer program to access the features of the Microsoft Windows operating system in which the program is running. Programs can acces ...

applications designed for

. More recent 32-bit applications will not work, as the developers have prevented their application from working with any Windows version earlier than Windows 98, and also because some applications do not work properly with the older Windows NT 3.51 interface. Despite this, Microsoft in their application releases muddied the issue, releasing

32-bit In computer architecture, 32-bit computing refers to computer systems with a processor, memory, and other major system components that operate on data in a maximum of 32- bit units. Compared to smaller bit widths, 32-bit computers can perform la ...

versions of

Microsoft Office Microsoft Office, MS Office, or simply Office, is an office suite and family of client software, server software, and services developed by Microsoft. The first version of the Office suite, announced by Bill Gates on August 1, 1988, at CO ...

right up to Office 97 (the last version of Microsoft Office supported on NT 3.51), but relying upon

16-bit 16-bit microcomputers are microcomputers that use 16-bit microprocessors. A 16-bit register can store 216 different values. The range of integer values that can be stored in 16 bits depends on the integer representation used. With the two ...

versions of

Internet Explorer Internet Explorer (formerly Microsoft Internet Explorer and Windows Internet Explorer, commonly abbreviated as IE or MSIE) is a deprecation, retired series of graphical user interface, graphical web browsers developed by Microsoft that were u ...

technology from versions 3.0 to 5.0. Web browsers based on and including

Firefox Mozilla Firefox, or simply Firefox, is a free and open-source web browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation and its subsidiary, the Mozilla Corporation. It uses the Gecko rendering engine to display web pages, which implements curr ...

were operable up to version 2.0.0.22, released in April 2009; they required a few manual file updates to work without compromising browsing security. Windows NT 3.51 is the last of the series to be compatible with the

Intel 80386 The Intel 386, originally released as the 80386 and later renamed i386, is the third-generation x86 architecture microprocessor from Intel. It was the first 32-bit computing, 32-bit processor in the line, making it a significant evolution in ...

processor.

NewShell

On May 26, 1995, Microsoft released a test version of a shell refresh, named the ''Shell Technology Preview'', and often referred to informally as "NewShell". This was the first incarnation of the modern Windows GUI with the Taskbar and Start menu. It was designed to replace the Windows 3.x Program Manager/File Manager based shell with

Windows Explorer File Explorer, previously known as Windows Explorer, is a file manager application and default desktop environment that is included with releases of the Microsoft Windows operating system from Windows 95 onwards. It provides a graphical user i ...

-based

graphical user interface A graphical user interface, or GUI, is a form of user interface that allows user (computing), users to human–computer interaction, interact with electronic devices through Graphics, graphical icon (computing), icons and visual indicators such ...

. The release provided capabilities quite similar to that of the Windows "Chicago" (

codename A code name, codename, call sign, or cryptonym is a code word or name used, sometimes clandestinely, to refer to another name, word, project, or person. Code names are often used for military purposes, or in espionage. They may also be used in ...

for Windows 95) shell during its late beta phases; however, it was intended to be nothing more than a test release. Internet Archive There was a second public release of the Shell Technology Preview, called ''Shell Technology Preview Update'' made available to

MSDN Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN) was the division of Microsoft responsible for managing the firm's relationship with developers and testers, such as hardware developers interested in the operating system (OS), and software developers developing ...

and

CompuServe CompuServe, Inc. (CompuServe Information Service, Inc., also known by its initialism CIS or later CSi) was an American Internet company that provided the first major commercial online service provider, online service. It opened in 1969 as a times ...

users on August 8, 1995. Both releases held Windows Explorer builds of 3.51.1053.1. The preview program provided early feedback for the ''Shell Update Release'', the next major Windows NT version with the new interface built-in, which was released in July 1996 as Windows NT 4.0.

Updates

Five

Service Packs In computing, a service pack comprises a collection of updates, fixes, or enhancements to a computer program, software program delivered in the form of a single installable package. Companies often release a service pack when the number of individ ...

were released for NT 3.51, introducing both bug fixes and new features. Service Pack 5, for example, fixed issues related to the

Year 2000 problem The term year 2000 problem, or simply Y2K, refers to potential computer errors related to the Time formatting and storage bugs, formatting and storage of calendar data for dates in and after the year 2000. Many Computer program, programs repr ...

Hardware requirements

Supported EIDE addressing schemes include

logical block addressing Logical block addressing (LBA) is a common scheme used for specifying the location of blocks of data stored on computer storage devices, generally secondary storage systems such as hard disk drives. LBA is a particularly simple linear addressin ...

(LBA), ONTrack Disk Manager, EZDrive, and extended cylinder-head-sector (ECHS).

Support lifecycle

References

External links

HPC:Factor Windows NT 3.51 Patches & Updates Guide

Shell Update Release (file dates: 08/09/95)
{{Microsoft Windows family 1995 software Products and services discontinued in 2001 3.51 IA-32 operating systems MIPS operating systems PowerPC operating systems Microsoft Windows