The first version of Windows Media Player appeared in October 1991, when Windows 3.0 with Multimedia Extensions was released.[6] Originally called Media Player, this component was included with “Multimedia PC”-compatible machines but not available for retail sale. It was capable of playing .mmm animation files, and could be extended to support other formats.[7] It used MCI to handle media files. Being a component of Windows, Media Player shows the same version number as that of the version Windows with which it was included.
