Uploaded July 2015 | Updated September 2026, 3 hours ago
I recently found this video and decided to upload it to my YouTube. It's pretty interesting and also surprisingly answered a few questions about the interface that were bugging me for years. And apparently I was correct! Although interesting this is kinda boring and over an hour long but it is great for Webtv historic reasons.
What interest me is the prototype box was used in this and looks like they had a good number of them witch means there may be some still in existence today. I would love to get my hands on one and explore the build they had running on the box. Although the quality of this video sucks you can still make it out but for those wanting a better view of it check it out here turdinc.kicks-ass.net/Msntv/images/misc/webtv-prototype.jpg
Years ago I posted a picture of the original home page ( turdinc.kicks-ass.net/Msntv/evolve.html ) and there was a lot of people saying that it never existed. I set out to prove it by accessing the Webtv TestDrive server and downloading the earliest build I could find by downgrading my box. It took some doing but was finally able to connect to the network with that build installed and to my surprise when I connected to the home page it was blank. But I did see the early status bar so I knew I was correct. Turns out that the home page images were stored on the server and by the time I downgraded my box the home page had been upgraded a number of times and the original images were long gone. But here it is in this video the original home page. I always suspected that the original home page was a prototype and that when the service launched in Dec. of 96 it launched with the home page that most webtv'ers would recognize.
I recently found this video and decided to upload it to my YouTube. It's pretty interesting and also surprisingly answered a few questions about the interface that were bugging me for years. And apparently I was correct! Although interesting this is kinda boring and over an hour long but it is great for Webtv historic reasons.
What interest me is the prototype box was used in this and looks like they had a good number of them witch means there may be some still in existence today. I would love to get my hands on one and explore the build they had running on the box. Although the quality of this video sucks you can still make it out but for those wanting a better view of it check it out here turdinc.kicks-ass.net/Msntv/images/misc/webtv-prototype.jpg
Years ago I posted a picture of the original home page ( turdinc.kicks-ass.net/Msntv/evolve.html ) and there was a lot of people saying that it never existed. I set out to prove it by accessing the Webtv TestDrive server and downloading the earliest build I could find by downgrading my box. It took some doing but was finally able to connect to the network with that build installed and to my surprise when I connected to the home page it was blank. But I did see the early status bar so I knew I was correct. Turns out that the home page images were stored on the server and by the time I downgraded my box the home page had been upgraded a number of times and the original images were long gone. But here it is in this video the original home page. I always suspected that the original home page was a prototype and that when the service launched in Dec. of 96 it launched with the home page that most webtv'ers would recognize.
