windows vista

[Discord]

If you really want a pretty desktop, install <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xC5uEe5OzNQ">Linux, Beryl and Emerald</a>.

It does certainly have a lot of flashy things, but I think it's a bit much. I do like the effect you get when closing a window though, that's probably the best bit.

A lot of it is just for show, but many of the desktop effects are very functional. IF you ever use Linux, I definitely recommend trying it out. The problem is that it's not stable enough to run as a full time desktop environment.

How about the CPU/Memory usage? It looks bloody costy to be blunt.

[Endless]

How about the CPU/Memory usage? It looks bloody costy to be blunt.

OpenGL makes CPUs smile. The GPU, on the other hand...

[Renmiri]

I hate Vista!!! Mine is the Home Premium edition and it is still buggy as hell.

What is Aero ? How do I benefit from it ?

And does anyone know how to override the bloody Windows Sound Mixer ? It sucks!!!

[Odaisé Gaelach]

If you really want a pretty desktop, install <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xC5uEe5OzNQ">Linux, Beryl and Emerald</a>.

Wow, some of that looks incredibly like OS X. The Dock bar at the top of the screen, the way that windows minimize with sloping sides...

[crono_logical]

I didn't realise there was software for linux capable of doing such fancy effects already - that's what happens when you only use linux with the command line interface most of the time - although some of the messing about with the dock bar looked more like an eye-candy toy than something vaguely useful or sensible Now I need to find a half decent machine to test it out on myself

[Mirage]

If you really want a pretty desktop, install Linux, Beryl and Emerald. :p

It does certainly have a lot of flashy things, but I think it's a bit much. I do like the effect you get when closing a window though, that's probably the best bit.

A lot of it is just for show, but many of the desktop effects are very functional. IF you ever use Linux, I definitely recommend trying it out. The problem is that it's not stable enough to run as a full time desktop environment.

In my experience, everything that looks fancy in the opensource community is also unstable.

[Renmiri]

Aero is the fancy name for transparent windows and animated thumbnails ?

Much ado about nothing if you ask me. I found the transparent window edges pretty annoying and the animated thumbnails overkill.

Give me my good sound mixer back!!!!

[o_O]

That's pretty much all Aero is. Very overrated.

[q=Grinenshire]How about the CPU/Memory usage? It looks bloody costy to be blunt.[/q]

To be honest, you would be very surprised at what can run Beryl. As Endless said, you're definitely better off with a dedicated GPU, but my laptop with an integrated SiS and 64MB of shared VRAM runs it very acceptably.

[Yamaneko]

I run Beryl on my main workspace. If it ever crashes it falls back to metacity (or kwin). As long as you stay modest with the plugins (stay away from rain effects, blur effetcs, etc.) it's stable enough to work with. Further, the Compiz and Beryl communities are getting back together, so we'll see the stability of Compiz and for those who want the extra plugins, the eye candy of Beryl (named Composite Community).

Beryl and the Beryl manager tend to take up anywhere between 20-50MB of RAM on my system. Blur is the only real plugin that kills cpu cycles. I always disable it.

[Discord]

Aero is the fancy name for transparent windows and animated thumbnails ?

Much ado about nothing if you ask me. I found the transparent window edges pretty annoying and the animated thumbnails overkill.

Give me my good sound mixer back!!!!

No, no! Aero is NOT ONLY the fancy name for transparent windows, it's also a fancy name for the completely useless 3d version of ALT+TAB... START+TAB if I'm not mistaken shows it up... well, at least it looks nice.

On the matter of pretty looks, isn't it great that MS went for the formal black design in Vista rather then the XP-vegetables soup one. A*

[Mirage]

XP Silver never looked very vegetably to me, and I haven't seen a lot of blue vegetables either.

[Yamaneko]

XP's default theme looks like a three-year-old went at it with some crayons.

[crono_logical]

XP's default background made me think Teletubbies when I first saw it

[Renmiri]

Vista's "transparent" windows make me think I need glasses

[Mirage]

Good thing all those things can easily be changed then.