Actually for the time the
hardware required was relatively
expensive. The following is quoted from
Practical Computing,
November 1985 (the title of the review was "
Windows: Brightening Up MS-DOS"):
Windows Premier Edition comes on four discs and takes some time to install. Although the software is cheap, you need a lot of hardware to run it. The manual says Windows will run on a twin-floppy system, but you really need a hard disc for reasonable speed. What's more, if you are running Windows on the IBM PC you will need a graphics adaptor card, and if you want colour you will need the more expensive enhanced graphics adaptor. Although you could conceivably use Windows without a mouse, we found it difficult, the system is clearly designed for one.
Here is another gem from the same review:
One big advantage of Windows is that it lets you switch rapidly between almost all application programs. You don't have to exit the program you are in, and most of the time you will not have to load the new application into memory: Windows will already have done this when it set up the icon. The time saving can be considerable. It takes about 30 seconds to load Microsoft Word on an IBM PC/XT, but only four seconds to switch to it from most other applications under Windows.
It is amusing that something that seems so primitive now was at the time clearly seen as being advanced. Of course, Moore's Law implies that in 15 years time the systems we use now will probably look just as dated and primitive as Windows 1.x does to us.