Best "Desktop Manager"? XP

[Coldkilla]

I know for Linux they've got this nifty "Compiz/Fusion" program, but I was wondering if there is anything just as cool for XP. I'm not sure exactly term I should be using when looking into this kinda stuff ether.

Any info appreciated 😉



Moved to Software for Windows.

minendo
Forum Administrator

 

[sandorski]

LiteStep I used this one years ago and it was very good.

 

[0roo0roo]

no
probably a good way to make your system less stable and slower😛
i just use launchy

 

[jaqie]

Yes there are, a lot actually.
The first one that got me into alternative windows shells was geoshell back when it was new, but the abhorrid laziness of the programmers (after three years plus they still haven't fixed a single bug I reported, including necessary files for the quicklaunch bar not being included in the installer!)
Then I checked out wikipedia's windows alternate shell entry, found a few, tried a few. none really clicked of the ease of use of win explorer for desktop shell, but some came close. I still run a lot of applets I found when going through these things, like DSclock (in transparent mode).

~edit~
And OrooOroo? most of them actually improved stability and cut down on memory usage.

 

[Coldkilla]

I take it that "Aston" isn't on anyones shortlist?

 

[WildHorse]

Lots of shell extensions are listed on Tucows.com, but I don't know of actual shell replacements.

 

[jaqie]

Geoshell is one, as I said earlier. In order to get windows explorer to work, they run it as a DLL. The shell replacement is as I said (un)maintained by quite lazy folk that got it so that it will run with massive amounts of screwing around with it years ago and never took it any further. It's a shame, too, it showed so much promise.

 

[nova2]

I would suggest trying xplorer2 (i haven't tried it yet but it seems good)
and keep using explorer if possible.

my litestep pros/cons (it can be nice but i dont use it anymore due to some of the reasons below)

//cons

> litestep (& taskswitch xp) freeze while waiting for msdev to finish loading large projects
but i can still use explorer shell to switch between ultraedit and firefox!

> its really annoyingly easy to 'accidentally' have a bunch of dir windows (and 'run' windows) open which point to the same location.
I don't have this problem when using explorer shell.

> "find target" is broken in shortcut properties
> "open containing folder" is broken for windows search

--- all lesser cons are below
> groups firefox & thunderbird together
> desktop support needs some improvements


//pros
> can change which keys are used for volume control
so if your keyboard doesn't have volume control media keys, but has other media keys, you can change their function.

> i don't have terrible window alt-tabbing problems like i did with explorer in winxp sp1
but i think this explorer problem is gone for me now.

> shell and its themes are highly configurable

 

[theAnimal]

I use the bbLean shell and it's very stable.

 

[Evander]

Originally posted by: theAnimal
I use the bbLean shell and it's very stable.

If asked about this shell from time to time here on atech but no one ever responded. Since it's supposed to be so minimalistic, did you find a big increase in system performance? Have you got Vista or XP?

 

[theAnimal]

Originally posted by: Evander

Originally posted by: theAnimal
I use the bbLean shell and it's very stable.

If asked about this shell from time to time here on atech but no one ever responded. Since it's supposed to be so minimalistic, did you find a big increase in system performance? Have you got Vista or XP?

I'm on XP. It does use less resources, but I can't say that I really noticed a difference. I use it for the features.