Does anyone use active desktop?

[downhiller80]

When it first came out everyone snubbed it for being too resource crazy. Is that still an issue and/or has it been improved in win2000?

Seb

 

[Gatsby]

From my own experiences, I know they can vary but the first thing I;ve alawys done is disable active desktop. i;ve seen it slow down perfectly good machines to a crawl.

Gatsby

 

[Ulysses]

I don't think it should be an issue with Win 2K like it was with Win 98 or Win 95. And besides, you've got all that new RAM, right.

 

[SUOrangeman]

I use the QuickLaunch bars from ActiveDesktop. I've added folders from my Programs menu, and my IE favorites, and My Computer for two-click access to most anything on my system. Oh yeah, I'm also using a two-layer toolbar for this.

-SUO

 

[hungrypete]

active desktop sucks. It's not the sluggishness, but it seems to seriously increase the number of hangs and crashes. I just convert whatever desktop pic I want to use to a bmp. I dont like web content on my desktop or my folders.

 

[GT1999]

ARE YOU NUTS?! Active Desktop sucks, IMHO.

 

[NOSOUP4U]

Does Microsoft even support it anymore? They surely don't promote it.

The first thing I do is turn it off after every new installation.

 

[Gloaras]

I would never use it under Win95/98, it is a memory hog. But I have it running under 2k and it is great. I keep metacrawler on my desktop at all times and I can search for things whenever I want. Pretty cool and it doesn't take much ram at all. I am not sure about WinME though. Haven't tried it yet.

 

[Noriaki]

The startmenu bar enhancements (which are part of active desktop) are great. But the part of active desktop where you have a webpage on your desktop is terrible. It's the first thing I turn off after a fresh Win98 install.

 

[Rand]

Active Desktop is a real resource hog under 9x still even on WinME. I never turn it on. It's not bad on Win2k but I still leave it off because it really doesnt offer that much of interest and it seems to make the OS more prone to crashes in my experience.

 

[Buddha Bart]

WinME comes with some rollover images/links built into it. (at least teh dell distro does)

I use it for the quicklaunch bar. I've got damn near everything down there

bart

 

[DesignDawg]

I am a BIG supporter of the Active Desktop. As a matter of fact, whenever I install NT4 on a system, I install MSIE 4, JUST TO GET the active desktop features. Why?
I have never noticed a performance hit. I think that's a lot of talk
I can't STAND having ICONS on my desktop.
I can't stand having to go to my desktop or my start menu to launch something.
I run all my apps maximized, so having anything OTHER than a quicklaunch bar would be a hassle.
I ALWAYS have a dual monitor setup, and without active desktop, you can not have different wallpaper of each monitor.

Good enough? Seriously, though.... When I first started haering talk about "resource hog....slow your system down, blah blah..." I thought I should probably turn it off and give it a try without it.
NOT A DAMN BIT of difference on Win98, Win NT4, or Win2K. Not one bit. I even timed things to see if there was at any point any slowdown of my system. --All slowdown was inconsistent and negligible enough to have been just as likely caused by a rank fart near my case or an airplane flying over.

Active desktop ROCKS.

Ricky
DesignDawg

 

[Mem]

Sebfrost To answer your question No I do not use active Desktop,the funny thing is on my old PC it was more stable with it off(not active)when I use to put it to active mode I would get the odd crash,have not tried it on my new Thunderbird system yet.

 

[downhiller80]

OK what I want is to have a scrollable wallpaper. I thought I could do this with active desktop by using an HTML page with just that image on it, but even then it won't let me scroll.

Any ideas?

Seb

 

[SUOrangeman]

Seb, maybe with a wheel mouse (will let you scroll)?

-SUO

 

[DeeK]

I use IE-off from the Windows 98 annoyances website to shut off IE integration in Win98. Makes a heck of a difference.

 

[HepDude]

DeeK - Can you elaborate ?

 

[Isaiah]

I do not use active desktop and I turn it off in all the computer I build



Isaiah

 

[dirtboy]

I'm using Active Desktop with Win2k without trouble...