The 30-Year Secret of Windows Revealed 0 10

The Windows 95 operating system (OS) introduced a fast reboot feature, but it could operate with errors. This was stated by engineer Raymond Chen in his blog on the Microsoft developers' site.

One of the veterans of the IT giant explained how the fast reboot feature appeared in Windows 95, which was released over 30 years ago. Chen explained that it was triggered by holding down the Shift key and rebooting the computer. The Microsoft engineer revealed how this feature worked.

According to Raymond Chen, the mechanism of this option worked as follows. First, the 16-bit core of the OS would shut down, then the 32-bit virtual memory manager. After that, the processor would return to normal operating mode. The specialist noted that for many users, it remained a secret that during a fast reboot, the OS did not sequentially shut down all running programs.

However, users of this feature often encountered an error. During a fast reboot, Windows would free up a large amount of RAM. If any running program managed to occupy it, the computer would switch to a regular "slow" reboot.