> win95 ushered in the 686 era, and people with 586 machines certainly were complaining that win31 had been faster.

Win95 debuted into an era when 486 was still the most common processor and 586 (aka Pentium) was just building steam.

Windows 3.11 was faster on a 486 than Windows 95, so I’m guessing you mistakenly advanced processor generations in your comment.