Forget about Windows XP Service Pack 3, Windows Vista Service Pack 1 and Windows 7, Microsoft is gearing up to kill off a classic. In this regard, November 1, 2008 will mark the death of Windows 3.11 for Workgroups. Released on November 1, 1993, Windows 3.11 for Workgroups managed to survive a whole 15 years on the market, and to live past the last service pack for XP, the first service pack for Vista, and could even see additional development milestones of Windows 7 before Microsoft finally pulls the plug. But make no mistake about it; exactly 15 years after the release date of Windows 3.11 for Workgroups, the Redmond company is discontinuing the availability of the operating system for original equipment manufacturers.

"For those that were not aware, we recently announced that effective November 1st, 2008, OEM's will no longer be able to license Windows for Workgroups 3.11 in the embedded channel. Now we all know that it's been long gone in the standard (retail/OEM) channel, but one of the unique things in the embedded business is that we allow the classic OS products to be sold longer than the other channels. It's finally the end of an era!" stated John Coyne, Systems Engineer in the OEM Embedded Devices group at Microsoft.

Discontinuing the availability of Windows 3.11 for Workgroups for the OEM embedded channel comes eight years after Microsoft cut support for the operating system. As of December 31, 2001, the Redmond company retired Mainstream support for the product, without offering any sort of reprieves. Now the pinnacle of 16-bit Windows is finally moving into history, although pieces of it have survived into modern versions of Windows. With Windows 3.11 for Workgroups, Microsoft introduced support for networking but also a little game which would outlive both Vista SP1 and XP SP3. The classic MineSweeper made its debut into Windows 3.11 for Workgroups.