Windows Themes, Skin Packs

jozi

Having looked trough the Post your desktops, Again!!! thread and seen many nice customised windows desktops i'd like to know what programs you use?

I know windowsblinds can offer customised skins but is it any good, is it worth buying even?
I've also started using samurize, which is pretty cool tbh.

So what do you use and what do you recomend?

Judt

I actually don't ue Windows themes... they, along with a load of other crap in XP but mainly the themes, take up a lot of resources.

8T8

Actually Windowblinds doesn't its fairly well behaved app (the early versions weren’t so good which is how they got the bad rep) but the latest version is very light on memory usage.

I'll list the good & the bad for each
Windowblinds pros:
Low memory usage
Easy install of themes
Increases GUI responsiveness (turn on hyperpaint)
Allows effects normally not possible under XP

Windowblinds cons;
Commerical app
Skins can have compatibility issues with some programs
Selection of skins is not to everyone’s taste as Windowblinds allows skins that can be very gaudy and not look like a proper OS so it has a good few of these but it does have a good number of nice skins as well to be fair
Annoying start menu entrys in the Stardock program group

Msstyles pros:
Free
Uses native XP skinning engine so same memory usage as it would normally be
Excellent application compatibility as it’s the OS doing the skinning
Personally speaking good/better skin collection than WB

Msstyle cons:
XP skinning engine cannot do certain thing so parts of the OS remain un-skinned, log on/off, shutdown etc
XP skinning engine cannot do certain effects like transparency and has certain constraints though this has had a more beneficial side effect to me at least by making more refined skins that look like an OS skin
Messy installation method for skins

To use Msstyles download Neowins Multi Patcher 4.0 install it, then download an msstyle (Kol's is a good place to start as he generally makes great skins and does them in msstyle and windowblinds form) and dump it into a folder under your Windows\Resources\Themes folder along with installing any specified fonts in the Windows\Fonts folder. Your skin will now show up in the display properties window under the appearance tab where you can choose a skin and an associated sub style.

Windowblinds themes can be gotten primarly from their own website Wincustomize see the WB catagory just download the skin and open it even straight from the web browser and it will install itself in the WB control panel.

I'm currently using Kol's Thallos theme with Windowblinds as there are bugs that cannot be side stepped with the msstyle version that show up in Firefox though pretty much everything else is okay however with WB Firefox is free from the issue (this is just a particular case most msstyle skins are just fine with Firefox) but I like WB because of the hyperpaint feature as it does actually work and make the GUI feel more "snappy" (what they actually do is use your graphics cards memory to store and recall the items that are painted on screen from what I understand ).

Charlie

I use windows blinds and find that it affects performence in no way. There are so many skins and its so easy to preview them, just download and apply and if its not to your taste just click another skin. I also use objectdock which I find is much better than having shortcuts all over the desktop, makes the desktop seem alot less cluttered plusI think it looks better. I also use icon packager which you can pick certain "sets" of icons to use for your os. Currently all my os icons are mac. All in all I find the programs really simple and customizable, without hogging resources. However if you were just to try one, then try objectdock.

Rhyme

And for the Mac skin in a few of those desktops; http://osx.portraitofakite.com/

Its pretty cool, ive been using it myself for a couple of months.

jozi

I down loaded Neowins Multi Patcher 4.0 and installed it but where do i get the themes? All i seem to find is windowblinds files

KamiKazi

google StyleXp:D

8T8

Dont bother with StyleXP its just a runtime service that uses up RAM and patches the same .dll that Neowin's patcher does plus they TGTSoft charge you for it.

Did you go to KoL's site & click on the visual style section ?

Here is an example as most of this themes along with many more are stored on DeviantArt, his website just nicely links to all of them.

Go here download the theme by clicking on the "download to desktop" icon. Extract the Blue Turquesa folder from the zip file and place it in your Windows\Resources\Themes folder and then go into the display properties

and you will see it listed.

More themes can be obtained from here
Deviant Art
Bant's themes at DA
Get Skinned
Neowin

If it doesnt work then you have not installed the Neowin patch correctly when applying it you must wait for the Windows file protection system to kick in and ask are you sure you want to keep the file you just altered if you dont do that & press the reboot button too quickly then the WFPS will undo the patch and you wont be able to use the themes.

Ruu_Old

i find windows blinds to be very hoggy on my system, celeron 2.2ghz, windows xpsp1 and 512mb ddr ram.

kaimera

google vista transformation pack aswell.