Microsoft Works (1986) 84 Word Processor Spreadsheet Communications Database DOS

Microsoft Works was an all-in-one scaled-down Word Processor, Spreadsheet, and Database geared towards the home user. It was released in variants for early DOS, Windows, and Macintosh. Microsoft Works competed against Lotus Jazz, FrameWork, AlphaWorks/LotusWorks, PFS First Choice, and many others.

• 1.x (DOS)
• 2.x (DOS)
• 3.x (DOS)

Norton Anti-Virus (1990) 2 Utility DOS Windows

Originally written by Symantec and sold as Symantec Antivrus for Macintosh, it became part of the "Norton" branded products sold by Symantec after they acquired Peter Norton Computing. Norton Anti-Virus became a popular product on DOS, Windows, and Macintosh (SAM was renamed to NAV in 1998) and battled the then-new threat of malicious software. In 2015, Symantec unified their security product lineup under the single "Norton Security" product. It was also bundled with Norton SystemWorks.

• 1.0
• 1.5
• 2.0
• Michelangelo Edition

McAfee VirusScan (1995) 4 Utility DOS Windows OS2

McAfee VirusScan was a very popular and reliable virus scanner during the late 90s. Notably, they distributed a free shareware version of their product. VirusScan was often pre-loaded with OEM computers.

• 2.x
• 4.x

Windows SDK & DDK (1986) 30 DOS

The Microsoft Windows Software Development Kits (SDK) provide sample program code, extra libraries, and documentation to aid application developers producing Windows applications. Microsoft Windows Driver Development Kits are similar sets of samples and libraries but specific to device driver development, and much more in-depth.

• Windows 2.x

The Print Shop (1984) 1 Publishing DOS

The Print Shop is a home oriented publisher capable of creating calendars, banners, greeting cards and other printable goods. It started off on the Apple II and Commodore 64 where it became popular for its simplicity and ease of use. From day one, it featured interactive editing, on-screen artwork/layout selection, print previewing, and a library of customizable clipart.

• For IBM PC (DOS)
• The NEW PS (DOS)
• Deluxe

IntelliPoint (1996) 17 DOS Windows

IntelliPoint is a set of mouse driver software for Microsoft's IntelliMouse series mice. It adds customizable buttons, mouse orientation, special effects, customizable pointers, magnification tool, and a tool bar, This software is redistributable but posted here for convenience.

• 1.x

Sound Blaster Drivers (1990) 35 DOS Windows

The Sound Blaster is a series of sound cards from Create Labs. For a time, the Sound Blaster was considered a de-facto standard for DOS based gaming. Initially it competed against the uncommon IBM Music Feature card, and the Adlib cards. The original sound blaster provided 8-bit mono digital sound in addition to Adlib-compatible FM music synthesis and stereo CMS Game Blaster compatible square-wave music. Most DOS games work best with the earlier ISA cards. Later PCI cards use completely different hardware and only provide Sound Blaster compatiblity through software emulation.

• Sound Blaster 1.0
• Sound Blaster 1.5
• Sound Blaster 2.0
• Sound Blaster Pro
• Sound Blaster AWE32
• Sound Blaster AWE64

Ability (1985) 9 Word Processor Spreadsheet Presentations Communications Database DOS

Originally released in 1984 by the Canadian company Xanaro that went bankrupt, and then by Migent, Ability is an integrated office suite for DOS that includes word processor, spreadsheet, database, telecommunications, business graphing, presentation graphics capabilities, and built in file management. It features good integration between the different components, with the ability to import, share, and dynamically update data between them. It was advertised as a very easy to use and a quick to learn system.

• 1.0
• Demo
• 1.2
• Plus 1.0
• Plus 2.0

Backpack Drivers (2002) 0 DOS Windows

This CD contains device drivers for all Micro Solutions Backpack hard drives, CD-ROM drives, and disk drives as of 2002. Backpack drives were mostly external parallel port connected, and very useful on systems that could not be expanded otherwise.

• 2002

PartitionMagic (1995) 15 Utility DOS Windows

A tool from PowerQuest, and later Symantec, that enables manipulation of partitions through its own bootable media. PartitionMagic can shrink, grow, or move partitions without the need to backup and restore files in that partition. It supported a variety of file systems, and the core DOS-based parition tool fit on a bootable 1.44mb floppy disk. It was extremely popular, and made installing or removing multiple OSes much easier.

• 2.x
• 3.x
• 4.x

QuickBooks (1993) 2 Financial DOS

First introduced in 1992, QuickBooks from from Intuit, is an easy to use accounting and bookkeeping program targeted at small businesses and accounting novices. It features check writing, accounts payable and receivable, invoices, cash flow forecasting, and reporting. It provides more functionality than the home-user based Quicken.

• 2.x (DOS)

Logitech Mouseware (1987) 2 DOS Windows

Logitech mice and pointing devices were popular competition to Microsoft or Microsoft clone mice. Logitech mice often had extra features that required Logitech drivers, and early Logitech mice were not Microsoft or Mouse Systems protocol compatible.

• 3.x
• 4.0
• 6.x
• 7.x
• 8.x

New Deal Office (1999) 5 Word Processor Spreadsheet Presentations DOS

Based on GeoWorks, New Deal Office was a graphical operating environment for DOS which later became Breadbox Ensemble. New Deal adds a Windows-95 like user interface with a task bar and start menu. New Deal Office targeted low-end 386 and 486 computers that were not up to the task of running Windows 95. It was also released in a "WebSuite" edition only includes the internet connectivity and web browsing tools.

• 3.1b
• 3.2a
• 2000

Norton Utilities (1983) 41 Utility DOS

The Norton Utilities is a suite of disk and system utilities designed to enhance system performance and stability. It started off as a set of disk utilities written by Peter Norton, and later was sold by Symantec. It competed against Central Point PC Tools and the Mace Utilities. In 2003, Norton Utilities was merged with Norton SystemWorks, but later split back out.

• 2.0x
• 3.00
• 3.10
• 4.0
• 4.5
• 5.0
• 6.0
• 7.0
• 8.0

LapLink (1987) 5 Communications DOS

LapLink, from Traveling Software Inc., enables users to easily and quickly move files between two DOS computers using only a serial null-modem cable or a special parallel port connector. No other hardware is needed. Laplink was extremely popular.during the late 80s and early 90s. It was infinitely easier to set up any two arbitrary PCs (often portables or laptops) with LapLink than other methods, such as DOS based networking. MS-DOS 6 bundled a similar set of file transfer tools called INTERLNK and INTERSVR.

• 2.x
• 3.x
• 4.x
• 5.x

DIV Games Studio (2000) 5 DOS

DIV Games Studio, from Hammer Technologies, is an all-in-one software program for DOS for creating your own (DOS) games, using a programming language similar to C or Pascal. The software includes an integrated development environment with code editor, graphics editor and sound editor.

• 1.x

Microsoft Windows Boot Disk (1995) 458 DOS

These disks are original boot floppy disk media for use with Microsoft Windows CD-ROMs. Not all Windows 9x/ME CDs are bootable, not all CDs included boot disks, and DOS will not see a CD-ROM drive unless a driver is loaded. OEMs were expected to provide compatible CD-ROM with the boot media provided with their systems. However towards the very late 90s, most vendors standardized on IDE/ATAPI CD-ROM hardware and the use of the OEM Adaption Kit (OAK) driver. If your CD drive is not IDE compatible (such as an MKE or Panasonic interface) you must manually add your own driver. Note: you can use the Windows 98 boot disk with Windows 95 to make things easier. If you have any UNTOUCHED OEM boot disks with different drivers, please submit them.

• 95 RTM
• 95 OSR2.x
• 98 FE
• 98 SE
• ME

Instant Artist / Print Artist (1992) 52 Graphics Publishing Novelty DOS

Instant Artist, later renamed to Print Artist, is a greeting card and sign creation program that uses vectorized graphics. It was created by The Pixellite Group, the original authors of The Print Shop, and published in 1992 by Autodesk. It was later sold by Sierra On-line. It features a high quality set of generic reusable clip art. The clip art uses vector based technology that was also used in BannerMania.

• 1.0 (DOS)

Microsoft Project (1984) 19 Planning DOS

Microsoft Project is a project management chart and gantt chart generator. It is a Microsoft Office family member, and built on the Office code, although it has never shipped with any Office suite.

• 1.0 for DOS
• 2.0 for DOS
• 3.0 for DOS
• 4.0 for DOS

SimCity (1989) 7 DOS

SimCity is a strategy game in which you are the mayor of your own virtual city and you can control the aspects of it - from city planning of land use, development of infrastructure, zoning of schools, police and fire, and the problems that come with a city such as crime, education quality, etc...

• 1.x

Microsoft Visual Basic (1991) 1028 DOS

First released in 1991, Microsoft Visual Basic was a programming environment where one could build an application by visually creating the user interface first, and then adding code. In contrast, even the smallest Visual Basic basic programs could take reams of program code to write in C or C++. Visual Basic was extremely popular for business application programming. The language itself was an interpreted BASIC dialect, however speed was maintained through the use of reusable compiled libraries (DLLs and VBX controls). These however, limited application development to Microsoft Windows.

• 1.0 for DOS

SpinRite (1988) 16 Utility DOS

SpinRite, by Gibson Research, is a tool that can diagnose, repair, and rejuvenate the low-level formatting and optimize the interleave of MFM and RLL (ST412/506 interface) hard disk drives. Its pattern testing ability is also useful for verifying the operation of SCSI and IDE hard drives.

• 1.x
• II
• 3.x
• 4.x
• 5.0

Microsoft Mouse (1984) 23 DOS Windows OS2

These are drivers provided by Microsoft for the Microsoft BusPort, serial, and PS/2 mice. Introduced in 1983, The Microsoft Mouse is historically important as it was one of Microsoft's earliest hardware products (The other being an Apple II Z-80 CP/M card). The first Mouse for the IBM PC was actually from Mouse Systems, not Microsoft. However, most clone mice emulated Microsoft's serial protocol and DOS driver software interface. The first Microsoft application designed to make full use of the mouse was Microsoft Word for DOS, and they hyped a product called "Microsoft Windows" (not released until several years later) that was to compete against the upcoming Apple Macintosh and the Mouse Systems based Viscorp Visi On.

• 1.0
• 2.x
• 4.x
• 5.x
• 6.x
• 7.x
• 8.x
• 9.x
• 11.x

PKZip (1990) 18 Utility DOS

Pkzip is the most common archiver for MS-DOS based systems. It implements a an open compression method and is much faster than other archivers of its time.

• 1.x
• 2.0x

Qualitas 386MAX (1992) 4 DOS

Qualitas 386MAX is a memory manager that competed with Quarterdeck QEMM and Memory Commander. It features ease use, with automated configuration and optimization. It claims to make more DOS memory available than other similar tools at the time.

• 6.x
• 7.x
• 8.x