I was curious about this so I did a little historical lookup.
I can only ever find the modern “smooth 3d” Windows icon in any Windows XP image, screenshot, release event image, anything. XP has only ever used the modern 3d flag.
Image
The last time Microsoft seemed to have used the square flag with tail Windows image was in Windows 2000 or ME, pre-XP launch.
Image
I did find images of ME also using the 3d flag, but I can’t confirm they’re actually of original OE Microsoft branding. MS did still sell retail copies of 2000 and ME alongside XP for a short while, so it’s possible they updated the older OS branding (not that anyone wanted 2000 or ME at that point). But why would they backtrack XP’s branding??
I really have no clue where this XP image with the square flag is from, it’s either art someone created to backdate its design aesthetic or its an AI hallucination.
You might be right. In doing a little more searching around (read that as brute forcing Google to do what I'm asking it to do after numerous tries) all I find of that kind of logo with XP seems to be either wallpapers, which are automatically suspect, and a few that call themselves "90s style" which infer they are made in the 95/98 style vs. the real XP. So yeah, probably.
Rhaedas@fedia.io 2 weeks ago
I think it stayed similar from 95 - 98 - XP. Some XP started to show a 3D version, but there's the flat simpler one out there too.
empireOfLove2@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
I was curious about this so I did a little historical lookup.
I can only ever find the modern “smooth 3d” Windows icon in any Windows XP image, screenshot, release event image, anything. XP has only ever used the modern 3d flag. Image
The last time Microsoft seemed to have used the square flag with tail Windows image was in Windows 2000 or ME, pre-XP launch. Image
I did find images of ME also using the 3d flag, but I can’t confirm they’re actually of original OE Microsoft branding. MS did still sell retail copies of 2000 and ME alongside XP for a short while, so it’s possible they updated the older OS branding (not that anyone wanted 2000 or ME at that point). But why would they backtrack XP’s branding??
I really have no clue where this XP image with the square flag is from, it’s either art someone created to backdate its design aesthetic or its an AI hallucination.
Rhaedas@fedia.io 2 weeks ago
You might be right. In doing a little more searching around (read that as brute forcing Google to do what I'm asking it to do after numerous tries) all I find of that kind of logo with XP seems to be either wallpapers, which are automatically suspect, and a few that call themselves "90s style" which infer they are made in the 95/98 style vs. the real XP. So yeah, probably.
tjsauce@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
XP had the 3D logo, but the still had a classic theme, so for the most part it still looked and felt like Windows 9x more so than Vista could.
afk_strats@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Check out some enterprise artifacts. That stuff was slower to brand if I remember correctly.
pHr34kY@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
It’s c:\windows\system32\logo.sys
Image