LMiller7 said:
alphanumeric said:
Think of it this way, there were the 9x series of Windows operating systems where DOS was an underlying component. Windows 95, 98, ME, etc. To install Windows 3.1 for example, you had to first install DOS. With Windows NT 4 they switched to the NT kernel and abandoned the underlying DOS.
NT 5.0 > Windows 2000
NT 5.1 > XP
NT 6.0 > Vista
NT 6.1 > Windows 7
NT 6.2 > Windows 8
NT 6.3 > Windows 8.1

I think I got that right.
Almost correct.

The first in the NT line was NT 3.1, released in 1993. The NT 3.1 designation was for compatibility with Windows 3.1, limited as it was. Later there was NT 3.5, NT 3.51, and NT 4, released in 1996. Among other things NT 4 had the user interface of Windows 95. Prior versions had that of Windows 3.1. In the entire NT line the CPU goes into 32 bit protected mode very early in the boot process and DOS never plays a part. The NT line continues to Windows 8.1 and beyond.
I almost went and looked it up, something in the back of my mind was telling me there was a 3.x version of NT. At work we went from Windows 3.11 for workgroups to NT 4 Workstation and that's all I remembered. I didn't have a PC at home at that time. I almost got it right though. As we used to say "close enough for government work".