Microsoft Corp will be rushing out its new faster, more economical, more robust version of Windows 3 – release 3.1 – on March 18, having brought it forward from April 6 so as to get in ahead of IBM Corp and OS/2, which is scheduled to roll out its OS/2 2.0 on March 31. Sales of Windows 3.0 have now passed the 10m mark, and Microsoft regards every one of those licensees as firm prospects to upgrade to the new release. Those that actually use the environment, rather than simply bought it, hate it and stuffed it in the drawer, are certainly likely to make the switch to the new release at the first opportunity, because despite the runaway commercial success of Windows, users have had many gripes about aspects of the graphical MS-DOS front-end, most of which should be alleviated by the new release.
