Entries tagged with customization - Channel 10

Kin Theme for Windows Mobile

Sarah Perez — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 18:23:00 GMT

If you have a the HTC HD2, you can now skin your phone with a new Kin-inspired theme, courtesy of Jaxbot on the XDA-Developers forum. Called KinLauncher, this theme for Windows Mobile has been configured specifically for HD2 phones, but is being tested now by forum members for use on other devices.

Included in the theme are customizable buttons for Messages, Phone, Email, Browser, Music, Camera, Settings, Alarm Clock, Recent and The Spot. Unlike the Kin, however, the tiles are not dynamically updating in this version, although that may be added in the future.

For now, it’s more about achieving the Kin’s look and feel, not its functionality. As Engadget explains, it’s a “Kin-esque homescreen, but not much else.” That’s as the developer intended, though. But now that he realizes the demand for this, he replies on the thread, “apparently there's a market for such, so I'll work on some improvements, such as message notifications, the Loop, Facebook links, etc.”

Bing's Best 3 is Here

Sarah Perez — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 14:13:00 GMT

Happy Birthday Bing! The web search service is one year old as of June 2nd and instead of getting presents, they’re giving us one: a brand-new theme pack filled with the best photos from the homepage. Like the two prior “Bing’s Best” themes (available here), this updated wallpaper pack is designed especially for Windows 7 computers as it utilizes the OS’s new “themes” feature that automatically switches through your wallpaper backgrounds for you on an interval you specify while also allowing for custom sound schemes, screensavers and window border colors.

In the newest Bing theme pack, “Bing’s Best 3,” there are 19 new wallpapers that include things like an underwater sinkhole, a baby sea turtle, and the Dry Tortugas (Hey - I’ve been there!)

You can grab the new theme pack from here.

New from Microsoft: Surreal Terrority Windows 7 Theme

Sarah Perez — Tue, 11 May 2010 14:01:00 GMT

I love that Microsoft keeps updating their collection of themes for Windows 7 because - I have to admit - I quickly grow bored with my desktop background and color schemes. I like to switch it up pretty often and the themes feature in Windows 7 lets me do that easily. With themes, my wallpaper isn’t static – it rotates through a series of images on an interval I specify.

The latest theme to grace my desktop is the gorgeous, brightly-hued creation from artist Chuck Anderson called “Surreal Territory.” The theme includes a few different images of landscapes and sky but with a twist. Instead of the natural colors found in nature, the sky is colorized with rainbow-colored tones. Just lovely.

But if that’s not your thing (too girly?) there are plenty of other new themes to choose from including one with images from NASA , for instance, which shows off the infrared imaging of NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. And who doesn’t love a good space theme?

Windows Phone 7 Series Theme Now in Beta

Sarah Perez — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 14:23:00 GMT

Remember when we mentioned how some developers were creating unofficial Windows Phone 7 Series’ themes for 6.5 devices? Well, the first of those themes recently went live. The theme from XDA-Developers forum member Jaxbot just launched into beta this weekend. Currently, his theme offers a “people hub” with contact info and Facebook status updates, a Bing search feature that includes Bing’s photo of the day, live tiles made using Javascript technology, a program launcher, a lock screen, and more.

The next version of the theme will add more hubs, better animations, and more social network integrations, Jaxbot says. He’s also asking for feedback as to what, specifically, users are interested in regarding these features. Additionally, Jaxbot posted info for developers who may be interested in making their own live tiles, too.

To install the new beta theme to your 6.5 device, perform the following steps:

Install the .CAB file from here
Click on the icon in the Start Menu to launch the theme
You can also exit the theme using a long top on the right side of the screen, if desired.

To see the theme in action, check out this video on YouTube.

Gorgeous Metro UI-Inspired Windows 7 Theme

Sarah Perez — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 14:15:00 GMT

There’s a new Windows 7 theme in the works over on DeviantArt and it’s inspired by the new metro UI featured in the upcoming Windows Phone 7 Series devices. Created by DeviantArt member, fediaFedia, the theme is designed for use in Rainmeter, a desktop customization platform for Windows. With Rainmeter, you can skin Windows, add gadgets, and even embed data streams like email, RSS, Twitter, etc into your theme. And it appears that the new Windows Phone theme will do just that – the screenshots show feeds and Twitter posts within the theme’s background in addition to tiles like those you’d see on a WP7S device. And the tiles work, too! According to the theme’s description, there are “nearly 30 interactive panels” included with the theme and 24+ different colored skins, including glass.

This theme is still in the works, though – you can’t download it just yet. But keep an eye on this page for updates.

Add Spaces to your Taskbar

Sarah Perez — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 18:38:00 GMT

Over on the (unofficial) SevenForums site, one user has come up with a way to insert spaces into your Windows 7 taskbar so you can create separated icon groups. The trick involves creating some blank shortcuts that lead to a fake program and pinning those shortcuts to the taskbar.

To facilitate the process, he provided a zip file containing multiple “blank shortcuts” and blank.exe files. (Don’t worry – we scanned them with Microsoft Security Essentials – they’re safe. Other forum users tested them too).

After extracting the files, you’ll have a folder called “Blank” and a ReadMe.txt. Before pinning the Shortcuts to the taskbar, you have to move the entire “Blank” folder to C:\Windows. Then grab a shortcut and drag it to the taskbar. Now, instead of seeing a blank (white) icon, you’ll just see a space! The zip file contains four different “blank” shortcuts and you can only use one of each.

What a great trick!

Wow, Where Did All These Themes Come From?

Sarah Perez — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:46:00 GMT

Rob Margel recently discovered a great March theme for Windows 7 users at download.live.com which features shamrocks and other spring-related imagery. I thought I’d go check out the Windows 7 Personalization gallery to grab it and whatever else was new, too. However, for some reason, the Shamrock theme isn’t there. No matter, since Rob posted the direct link for the download. However, I was surprised to see the gallery had a ton of new themes since my last visit only a couple of months ago. There are now several regional themes like Canada, Australia, Czech Spring, China, Baltic Beaches, France, India, Hungary, Germany, Italy, and a dozen or so others. Plus, there are new animal themes like “dogs in summer,” “cats everywhere,” and “Year of the Tiger.”

But lately, I have to admit that I’ve found myself addicted to Smashing Magazine’s Windows 7 theme collections which they release monthly. They offer themes made up of artistic backgrounds that come packaged as two different options – those with an embedded calendar and those without. I like to grab those without the calendar myself so I can reuse them later on when I’m ready for a change. You can grab the last collection here.

Get the Windows Experience Pack

Sarah Perez — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 16:02:00 GMT

Have you tried the new Windows Experience Pack yet? Released just last week this free software download lets Windows users customize their PC with new backgrounds, screensavers, and other features for Windows Live Messenger.

Designed primarily for Live Messenger users, this program offers additional personalization options including display pictures, emoticons, and Messenger scenes. You can then coordinate your Messenger avatar with your Windows 7 theme as the Experience Pack lets you create a desktop background featuring your personalized avatar against a “destination” background – like the beach, the mountains, an African safari, a hiking trial, etc.

The avatars are created using a combination of your own photo and a cartoon figure for a mashed creation a bit like those in the famous “Elf Youself” holiday animations.

While this download may seem a little silly to some of us more, err, mature users, you can bet that the kids will get a kick out of it. So go ahead and post this link to their Facebook wall: http://experience.windows.com.

Bing4Free Lets You Use Bing.com Images for Desktop Wallpaper

Sarah Perez — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 14:29:00 GMT

There are a number of ways to use Bing.com’s background images for wallpaper: you can use a utility like the Bing Downloader, access stored images via online archives like the Bing Image Archive, or you can even grab an official Microsoft Windows 7 theme pack of Bing’s Best. Now there’s a new tool you can add to the list: Bing4Free. Uncovered by the Life Rocks 2.0 blog, this app downloads wallpapers from bing.com at scheduled intervals of your choosing. You can also specify where the images are saved, how often the images are switched out, and how the images should be placed on the screen (stretched, centered, etc.). The utility isn’t just limited to the images from the U.S., either. It can grab the photos from the localized versions of Bing including China, Japan, Germany, United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. And if you want to get really technical, you can manually add other regions via its config file. Bing4Free is, as the name implies, a free download. However, the software is still in beta so all the usual “proceed at your own risk” caveats apply. You can grab the download directly from Codeplex here.

WindowsBlinds 7 Now Works with Windows 7

Sarah Perez — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 15:31:00 GMT

Remember WindowsBlinds? Back in the day, this was the go-to tool for customizing your Windows user interface. By allowing far more modifications than any theme or desktop background change would provide, WindowsBlinds became a popular way to give your computer a whole new look and feel.

Over the years, the software has received less attention, especially as the built-in themes in Windows improved to allow more granular modifications, like the selection of custom colors for window borders or, as in Windows 7, themes that allow for multiple images which change at designated intervals.

However, if you want more control over the UI, there’s still no better tool than WindowsBlinds. In the latest update to this software, the program has added support for the new Windows 7 operating system, including 64-bit versions. Thanks to this support, users can now skin Aero using a new skin format called UIS0 which is a much easier and faster way to create skins, notes the company blog post. The software also includes skins you can use out-of-the-box like Submline, Aero Metals, Corporate, Aero Woods, Aero Clay, and Sabertooth.

With WindowsBlinds running on Windows 7, you can give your desktop a Windows XP retro look (not sure why you would, but you could!), tweak the standard UI, or go all-out and do a complete overhaul of Widnows 7 down to the Start button itself.

The program, as always, is free to try, but costs $19.95 if you want to own it. You can download the trial version here.

Three New Windows 7 Themes

Sarah Perez — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 13:36:00 GMT

You know I’m into themes – the new feature of the Windows 7 OS which allows you to customize your background, windows, and sound scheme all with one click. Although Windows 7 has some pretty amazing themes already built in, I’m always on the lookout for more (as you can see).

The latest new themes I’ve come across include themes of Windows 7 box art, Ferraris, and even images from Mac’s Snow Leopard OS.

The Windows 7 box art themes are simple and elegant with a glowing Windows log appearing on a green, blue, or black background. Next, German blogger Christian has posted a droolable theme developed by Ferrari featuring some killer pictures of everyone’s dream car. (Well, one of them, at least). You can read the English translation of the German post here via Rob Margel. Finally, for those of you interested in the desktops of Mac OS X, Redmond Pie has posted a theme pack featuring all the latest Snow Leopard backgrounds.

For Those Who Like It Old-School: This App Brings Back the Classic Start Menu

Sarah Perez — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 14:48:00 GMT

I have to be honest, when I first heard about the new Seven Classic Start app, I had to laugh. I get that when new features are introduced to an application, or in this case an OS, not everyone is going to be happy with the change. But $25 seems to be a pretty hefty fee to pay just so you can remain stuck in the past, doesn’t it? Because, you see, that’s exactly how much it costs to re-implement the classic start menu from Windows XP on your new Windows 7 machine.

The Seven Classic Start menu app strips away all the fancy Aero goodness, the side column with links to frequently used user folders, the tucked away All Programs menu and the search box and replaces it with a simplified menu that looks like a dupe from the days of XP.

In the spirit of similar apps like RibbonCustomizer, an Office add-in that brought back the classic menu to your Office apps, the new Seven Classic Start menu will also appeal to those who fear change. But the rate of $25 seems an awfully high price to pay for such a simple program. If it was shareware or freeware I wouldn’t have thought twice about it, but at that rate, I’m curious: who on earth would use this?

Where to Find Windows 7 Logon Screen Backgrounds

Sarah Perez — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 14:29:00 GMT

Recently, I’ve been checking out the different ways to customize my Windows 7 logon screen. There’s this manual registry hack as well as this newer downloadable software program that does the hacking for you. But the only thing that was still making customization a bit of a pain was having to resize the wallpaper itself. You see, the Windows 7 logon screen requires the background to be less than 256K in order for it to work. Luckily for me, David Grossman has put together a useful resource that saves me the trouble of cropping and compressing wallpaper myself. Here on his SkyDrive are tons of images – several of them from the Windows 7 wallpapers themselves – that are already compressed and ready to go. Looks like I’m going to be updating my logon screen background a lot now. Thanks, David!

An Even Easier Way to Change your Windows 7 Login Screen

Sarah Perez — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 14:28:00 GMT

Remember when we told you that you could customize your Windows 7 login screen by way of a registry hack and the creation a new directory for your background images? Well now there’s an even easier way to customize this screen thanks to a new application called the Tweaks.com Logon Changer. With this utility, you can quickly swap out your login screen backgrounds with little effort on your part. Just remember – login screen backgrounds have to less than 256K in size. Most of the wallpapers you download online are going to be much larger than that, so you’ll need to compress them. (Microsoft Office Picture Manager is what I’ve been using to do so.)

To use the Tweaks.com Logon Changer for Windows 7, just download the free application, run it and click Change Logon Screen. That’s it!

Customize Your Logon Background in Windows 7

Sarah Perez — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 13:30:00 GMT

There have been rumors on the net about a new login background in the latest build of Windows 7. Whether or not that’s true is yet to be confirmed, but there is a way to customize your background now using a registry hack and pictures saved on your own hard drive.

The first step is to create a new DWORD value named OEMBackground in the HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Authentication\LogonUI\Background key. Set this to 1 (enabled) to turn the feature on and 0 (disabled) to turn the feature off. Depending on your system, this value may or may not already exist. The next step is to create a folder called %windir%\system32\oobe\info\backgrounds. In this folder, the following files are supported:

backgroundDefault.jpg
background768×1280.jpg (0.6)
background900×1440.jpg (0.625)
background960×1280.jpg (0.75)
background1024×1280.jpg (0.8)
background1280×1024.jpg (1.25)
background1024×768.jpg (1.33-)
background1280×960.jpg (1.33-)
background1600×1200.jpg (1.33-)
background1440×900.jpg (1.6)
background1920×1200.jpg (1.6)
background1280×768.jpg (1.66-)
background1360×768.jpg (1.770833-)

These files must be less than 256 KB in size that they must be named as listed above. When a resolution/ratio-specific background cannot be found, the backgroundDefault.jpg image will be loaded. (You can grab some decent wallpapers from here).

For customizers like myself, this hack totally rocks. (And yes, I tried it and it works!)

Thanks to Rafael of the Within Windows blog for discovering this.

Add a Little Color to Windows Live Mail

Sarah Perez — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 15:23:00 GMT

As much as I’m into customizing my UIs, I’m relatively surprised that I completely overlooked this feature in Windows Live Mail: color! Thankfully, the Live Mail Team updated their blog the other day and pointed it out to me. Of course, I immediately opened my inbox and started tweaking away.

What I hadn’t noticed before is that in the latest build of Windows Live Mail, there’s a toolbar button that has a picture of a paint brush on it up at the top of the window. Click on that and you can change the color of the window frame in Live Mail. (Looking up, I see it’s here in Live Writer, too. Guess who’s blogging in pink now?)

However, the color feature in Live Mail isn’t just for fun – it can be useful too. If you have multiple email accounts coming into your inbox, you can set each account as a different color to help you better identify which messages are which. To do so, right-click on an email account in the left-side column and choose “Set Color” from the menu that appears. After changing colors there, you’ll then notice that the email headers will now reflect which account they are associated with:

That’s actually pretty handy. The Live Mail Team notes that color customizations can also be found in Windows Live Calendar, too, where each calendar can be changed to be a different color as well.

Change Your Windows 7 Media Center Background

Sarah Perez — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 15:53:00 GMT

Did you know you can change your Media Center background? Neither did I until I read this recent post. Although not officially a part of the Media Center software, there is a way to do it. It’s not the easiest thing in the world as it involves applying a new registry file and editing permissions. But if those sorts of things are second nature to you, it’s definitely worth checking out the tutorial on this hack.

If you want to get even crazier, there’s also a guide available on making new, complete themes for Media Center using a software program called Restorator.

However, if all that sounds like way too much geeking out for you, then you can simply download and install this new Media Center theme called “Homeworld” from the Hacking Windows 7 Media Center blog. The download works on Windows 7 Beta1 Build 7000 – both x86 and x64 versions.

Here are some screenshots of what it looks like:

That is just awesome.

How to Make Your Own Theme Pack for Windows 7

Sarah Perez — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 20:15:00 GMT

You’ve been hearing a lot about themes in Windows 7 lately, haven’t you? It’s probably because everyone and their brother is out there creating new theme packs for you to download.

The latest one comes from Mike Swanson, a talented macro photographer known to his friends as the “desktop wallpaper” man. For people like Mike, theme packs are a great way to showcase their photography. Do you want to make your own theme pack? It’s actually not that hard to do at all.

Components of a Theme Pack

To get you up to speed, a theme pack is a file that contains the following items:

One or more desktop backgrounds
Optional customizations for Aero glass, sounds, screensavers, icons, cursors, etc.

Creating a Basic Theme

Creating a basic theme is easy – you just customize your desktop the way you want it, then click “Save theme” on the Personalization page in the Control Panel. Just make sure to choose the “theme pack” type in the drop-down list when doing so. That’s really all there is to it.

Getting More Advanced

If you want to edit the themepack file directly or create a file from scratch in a text editor (geek cred goes to you!), you should check out this resource over on MSDN: "Creating and Installing Theme Files." The documentation there provides details on the various sections of a theme file and what sort of syntax should be used.

More Windows 7 Themes from Paul Thorrott

Sarah Perez — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 20:15:00 GMT

Did you enjoy the Washington D.C. theme from Paul Thorrott that we shared with you last week? If so, then you’ll be happy to hear that Paul has now released four more theme packs like that D.C. one for all us Windows 7 beta testers to enjoy. Three of the new themes focuses on other photogenic locales: Paris, London, and Ireland. And the fourth theme is all about one of my personal addictions: coffee! Yep, the fourth theme pack features lattes and foam-topped cups that make me want to hit up a Starbucks right away. If the above links don’t work, you can download the theme packs from Paul’s SkyDrive folder instead.

More DreamScenes For Vista Users

Sarah Perez — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 22:29:00 GMT

If you’re running Windows Vista Ultimate, then you know about Windows DreamScene, the feature in Vista which lets you set an animated background as your desktop wallpaper. I ran DreamScenes at first because they were something new to try, but after a while I returned to plain old wallpaper. The problem wasn’t that there was anything wrong with the DreamScenese themselves… it’s just that I get bored with my desktop and like to change the background frequently. After going through all the included Dreamscenes a few times, I switched back to wallpaper to keep it interesting.

However, during a recent visit to the deviantART website it occurred to me to search for DreamScenes there. I don’t know why I didn’t think to do this before! As it turned out, there were several new DreamScenes available for me to try, including this nifty glowing white Windows logo on a black background, which I’m running right now:

I also found a colorful variation on that theme here:

Some glowing cosmic lights:

A blue and yellow lit-up design:

And even a Leopard-esque light show:

These should keep me busy for at least a few more months!

Add “I’m a PC” To Your Windows Live Messenger

Sarah Perez — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 22:28:00 GMT

Are you a PC, too? If so, you can now show your PC pride by downloading the new Theme Pack for Windows Live Messenger which features an array of icons from the new commercials, including the guy who plays the PC and various slogans like “I’m a PC” and “I’m a PC and a human being.” (I stuck with the simple “I’m a PC” myself.)

The pack also comes with new Messenger backgrounds, too, but I wasn’t a huge fan of the default background, blue with “I’m a PC” written in fading white text across it. Then again, I’m not a fan of any Messenger background come to think of it. If you want to adjust your background, too, just open a conversation window then go to Tools –> Backgrounds from the menu there. Remember, you won’t see this menu unless you’re in the conversation window itself.

I was going to set my background back to “none,” but then I saw the white background with math equations in light blue which also came with the theme pack. Hmm, I might consider that one since it’s very light in color which I like as it makes conversations easier to read.

If you want the new Messenger pack, you have to be signed into Messenger first. Then open IE and click here. The pack will then automatically install.

PageRage Dresses Up Your Facebook Profile

Sarah Perez — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 19:08:00 GMT

I’m not sure why you would want this, but a new app called PageRage will let dress up your Facebook profile so it looks more like a profile found on MySpace instead. (Yikes!) That’s too bad because one of the nicest things about Facebook is it’s clean and simple look and feel, without the busy backgrounds and image-heavy designs that are so prevalent throughout MySpace.

With the new Facebook app PageRage, you now can customize your Facebook profile with new themes that change both the background and the color schemes of your Facebook profile page. Some of these themes are basic, solid backgrounds, but others are quite busy.

Before you freak out and think this is the end for Facebook, take comfort in the fact that you can only see the new themed profiles if you have the PageRage application installed yourself. If you don’t want to see themes, just don’t install it.

The app works via a browser plugin which uses something called Yontoo Layers. Yontoo Layers create a virtual layer over your browser window. I’m not sure entirely how that all works, but it sounds a lot like what the Firefox extension Stylish offers.

I know. Facebook themes, ick. I definitely won’t be…oh wait…is that a pink one? Awesome.

Discovering Great XP and Vista Themes

Sarah Perez — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 00:57:00 GMT

I was recently stumbled across a link to this XP Zune theme when searching for ways to jazz up my older laptop. I had forgotten, but I used to really love this theme! The theme was sort of a take off on the also awesome “lost” XP theme - Royale Noir, but with a few tweaks. It’s sort of funny to look at this today, nearly two years later, as I’m running Vista. I still have a very similar color scheme going on now – a dark taskbar and Start Menu and a simple background that shows off my widgets and icons (I guess I’m not much for desktop cleanliness after all). The only variation is that I have blue/greenish windows now. Of course, this led me down the path of looking for a way to customize Vista's themes even more. I know Stardock has professional software to do so, but what about a simple free theme? I ended up here where I discovered a whole slew of themes, skins, and wallpapers for Vista, including the sleek and simple Chocolate Theme (pictured). Nice!

No More Boring Wallpaper!

Sarah Perez — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 16:18:00 GMT

If you're like me, you're constantly changing your background, perusing through a folder filled with potential wallpapers and then selecting a new one only to find, an hour later, that you want to change it again. (Or maybe I'm just a bit too into customization!)

For customizers like myself, there's some great free software called John's Background Switcher, which will automatically change your wallpaper on whatever schedule you desire (yes, even every hour!).

You can choose to have the pictures come from a folder on your computer like "My Pictures," a set of individual photos, or even from the web via photo-sharing sites like flickr, Phanfare, smugmug, picasa, or even Yahoo image search!

Of course, you can also fine-tune the settings as much as you want - specifying whether images should be full-screened, tiles, montages, always in sephia tones, etc. If there's a setting you don't see, the software's creator even invites you to tell me what you want via his contact form.

The software is available for free (donations accepted) and works on all versions of Windows - 93-Vista (but did not state if it works on 64-bit or not). The download link is here.

(image via John's site)