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Pimp Your XP
An anonymous reader writes "Ezinearticles.com has up an interesting article on how you can improve Windows XP to mimic and even surpass Vista — at least some of its new features. Several of the suggestions cost money and others are free. From improving the user interface with Stardock to mimicking new security features with open source software such as Sudown, the article discusses many ways that die-hard XP users can enhance their environment without moving to Vista."
...but how do you simulate the hardware incompatibilities? I suppose you could get all your old peripherals a pour coffee in them, but I don't think that's really going to give you the same sense of frustration that you'd get with Vista.
ccalam - acoustic versions of new songs.
I'm not sure of the value of tacking on features to XP to make it more like Vista, especially when such features cost money. I mean, if you want Vista-like stuff, why don't you just pay the upgrade fee and get a complete, well-tested package instead of a bunch of disjoint shareware utilities?
This game will waste your life. Don't clicky!
The author mentions costs all the way through this article, this costs, that costs, and none of it is cheap. I got an OEM vista ultimate for £120 ($240) which from the looks of it is actually cheaper than the cost of pimping my XP.
Not to mention, this is a hell of alot of software, I mean, he's talking about installing several toys that will run 24/7 and of course this is gonna sap your processing power, and its not integrated, so it'll probably end up using more resources than vista.
Can't go wrong with Explorer Breadcrumbs -- I'm using it on XP right now, and I don't miss Vista one bit.
Indeed. I used to change my shell every other week or so for a few months, just to try something new and tinker.
I found that LiteStep was a PITA to use. Too much playing with config files.
SharpE was a decent and simple to use. Same with geOShell.
AstonShell is a nice shell with lots of features, but it costs money and it can't do anything that LiteStep can't.
I tired BlackBox for windows when it was first released and liked it quite a bit. Very minimalistic.
There is quite a lot of shells to choose from, though, sadly, not as many as there used to be. DarkStep was a stripped down LiteStep shell that I REALLY liked, but the maintainer abandoned the project many, many years ago. Seranade looked promising, but the site doesn't even exist anymore.
Love sees no species.
Is that both of those games are DX9! We still don't have any DX10 goodness (save for the Lost Planet DX 10 Demo and Company of Heroes if the patch came out)
I patented screwing your mom. But it got revoked for "prior art."
No offense to the author, but the linked article is barely informative. I don't even know how this made it to the front page. But
the subject is interesting, as there is a bunch of cool freeware software to make XP be like (or even better than) Vista. You
don't need to spend a single dollar. So this is my real list of programs to Pimp your XP:
1. Lauchy: www.launchy.com
Some may say that this is the poor man's QuickSilver. Maybe it is, but in the Windows world there are few programs as useful as
Launchy. Install it and you won't need to access your start menu anymore.
2. Quizo's Explorer toolbars: http://quizo.at.infoseek.co.jp/freeware/indexEn.ht ml
These are 2 free toolbars that make Windows Explorer as good as Directory Opus (IMHO) for free:
* QTTabBar: Adds firefox-style tabs to windows explorer. It also adds a cool incremental search feature, and a customizable
toolbar where you can add folder shortcuts, etc
* QTAddressBar: Explorer breadcrumbs!
3. FileBox eXtender: http://www.hyperionics.com/files/index.asp
This is one of the most useful little pieces of software that I've used. I adds 2 buttons to the title bar of every windows dialog
and of every windows explorer window. One button gives you access to your "favorite folders" (which you can easily change) and the
other one gives you access to your "folder history". With these, going back and forth between folders to open or save files
becomes a snap. The only problem is that the default button icons a kind of ugly, but they can be easily changed.
4. Findexer: http://tomseffect.com/
Substitutes the windows explorer sidebar for a place where you can put links to your preferred folders. If you use FileBox
eXtender (see above) this might not be as useful, but I still like to use it.
5. TaskBar Shuffle: http://www.freewebs.com/nerdcave/taskbarshuffle.ht m
Another really useful program. With it you can reorder the window buttons in the windows taskbar. It can even automatically group
windows from the same program without collapsing them. You can also reorder the tray icons in the system tray.
6. Free Launch Bar: http://www.freelaunchbar.com/
Make the windows Quick Launch bar much more useful with this free replacement. It adds the ability to have folders inside the
quick launch bar, and have shortcuts within those folders.
7. LClock: http://www.softpedia.com/get/Desktop-Enhancements/ Clocks-Time-Management/LClock.shtml
A nice replacement to the windows clock in the system tray. It looks much better and is more useful as it shows a calendar when
you click on it. But the reason I recommend it is that it can also hide or reduce the size of the start menu button! Once you
start using Launchy (see above) you will not use the start menu very often, so I like to recover the taskbar real state that it
uses unnecessarily. To do so, with LClock you can reduce it by substituting the start menu image with a much smaller one.
8. MenuApp: http://www.freewaregenius.com/2006/11/02/menuapp/
Customize the explorer context menu with this tool. It comes with a lot of built-in actions, such as Command Prompt here, Create a
Folder, copy filename to path, etc.
There are other tools that you can use, but which I personally don't (although I've tried or used them in the past):
1. RocketDock: http://www.punksoftware.com/rocketdoc