r/reactos • u/TobyGobi • 3d ago

ReactOS 0.4.16: surprisingly capable, but modern browser support feels like the biggest usability wall

Spent today testing the new 0.4.16 x86 release across Hyper-V, VirtualBox and VMware Workstation.

Hyper-V gave a 0x7E during boot. VirtualBox installed successfully, although I managed to break the keyboard/mouse input after allowing the post-install hardware wizard to automatically install a device (it did warn me in all fairness) . VMware Workstation was the best experience: default virtual hardware, ACPI PC Uniprocessor, FAT32, and I just cancelled the hardware wizard after first boot.

From there ReactOS was surprisingly functional. DHCP/DNS worked immediately, Internet connectivity worked, Applications Manager worked, Firefox 48 worked substantially better than Chrome 49, and I was even able to authenticate successfully to Microsoft 365. Outlook Web eventually hit the wall with the old browser, but authentication succeeded.

I also successfully ran Chicken Invaders, so obviously enterprise application compatibility has been validated.

The biggest thing this left me wondering was, what is the current plan for getting a genuinely modern browser running on it?

For people considering ReactOS as a possible way to extend the life of older PCs, the OS itself already feels much more usable than I expected. But so much everyday computing happens in a browser that Firefox 48/Chrome 49 became the limiting factor almost immediately. A current browser would change how useful it feels, even while the OS remains alpha.

Very cool project. I started this expecting to play with it for 20 minutes and somehow lost most of a Monday to it.

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u/AotoriHibiki 3d ago

I'm having lots of fun with ReactOS. Completed more than 50 games on it this year.

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u/MasterJeebus 3d ago

Thats great that it can run so many games. Do you think you could make a list of the games that worked with it?

3

u/AotoriHibiki 2d ago

Yeah I have a playlist on youtube with the games and benchmarks that I've found to run well. On real hardware no less. I'm currently on a 4th gen core i7 with GTX 960.
I'm adding new stuff every few days.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utbSTrXztI8&list=PLt6dEzOE4KNGEAOlZIW2IT-V6NmBS8zo1