Windows Me build 2380.2

4.90.2380.2
	Build of Windows Me
Release name	Beta 1
OS family	Windows 9x
Version number	4.90
Build number	2380
Build revision	2
Architecture	x86
Compiled on	1999-09-20
Expiration date
Timebomb	2000-03-15 (+177 days)
Product key
	RBDC9-VTRC8-D7972-J97JY-PRVMG
About dialog

Windows Me build 2380.2 is the official Beta 1 release of Windows Me, released on 24 September 1999^[1].

New features and changes[edit | edit source]

Brought back the boot screen, which now says "Beta One" instead of "Developer Release".
System Restore (also known as PC Restore) is now present on the Start menu, but it is still disabled by default.
Help Center was renamed to Help and Support and updated to appear like the Activity Centers.
HTML Help now bizarrely refers to the system as "Windows 2000 Millennium".
Windows NetMeeting has been updated from version 3.01 to 3.03.
Microsoft Agent 2.0 is now included, which enables Merlin on the new OOBE.
"Minimal Boot" is now an option when booting from a startup disk made in this build.
The "Survey..." button on dialogs now works properly and opens a feedback reporting tool, where the user can describe how this dialog can be better styled.
The ver command for COMMAND.COM now lists the OS as "Windows Millennium" instead of "Windows 98".
In the last part of the clean install, the screen resolution changes to 800×600 instead of 640×480 (when using compatible video drivers). In the 16-color mode, the resolution of 640×480 is still used.
"Updating System Settings" during the final part of setup has been changed to feature two progress bars: One for the component to be installed, and the other for the overall progress. However, this only appears on clean installs, as the design has not been changed when upgrading to this build.
The requirement of a 200 MHz processor has been dropped down to 150 MHz.
The Windows 98 reference on winver.exe has been renamed to simply Windows.

Enabling System Restore[edit | edit source]

To enable System Restore, open the Registry Editor, open the key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\VxD\_VxDMon, and set the SystemRestore value to Y, then restart the computer. Afterwards, System Restore appears in the Start menu (in the Programs\Accessories\System Tools folder), though restoring to a restore point made before enabling System Restore will cause it to disable itself again.

Activity Center remnants[edit | edit source]

The user interfaces of the Activity Centers have been removed in this build.

Remnants of the installation code remains in webvw.dll; including code (and resource strings) to add shortcuts to Media Center, Photo Center and Game Center that did not exist in build 2358. However, the Activity Center installation code is now dead code which does not execute, as the function that previously checked for the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion!MilExtraDirs registry value now just returns FALSE. In addition to this, the Activity Center files which would have been installed are no longer present in webvw.dll's resources.

COM objects related to the implementation of the Activity Centers are still implemented in webvw.dll and are still described in its type library.

The file webvw.dll originates from Internet Explorer, which received an update from version 5.00.3722.1600 to 5.50.3723.1601. It is possible that the code and resources related to installing Activity Center components were split out into accore.dll at this point (for comparison, accore.dll in Windows Neptune build 5111 has version 5.50.3825.1300 and was compiled roughly two months after this build's webvw.dll).

Neptune reference[edit | edit source]

A file named gemstar.sys, with the version number 5.50.5067.1 and product name Microsoft(R) Neptune (TM) Operating System, was found in this Millennium build, but it is unknown whether this Neptune build was ever compiled.

Some speculate it would probably be part of the Milestone 1 stage. Judging by the file dates, it would have been compiled before 20 September 1999.