Modifying the Windows GUI

Possibly the best feature rich application to modify your Windows GUI is WindowBlinds by Stardock Corporation.  WindowBlinds has been around for years.  I remember using it a few years back to change the themes in Windows 98.  WindowBlinds is part of the Object Desktop Suite which allows you to change your title bars, scrollbars, radio buttons, Start bar and nearly every other part of the Windows GUI. It works on all versions of Windows and especially well with Windows XP's Visual Styles.

Changing Visual Styles with this application is fairly simple.  Once installed, you can access it through the Appearance tab in your Display Settings Window as shown below:

You can download a variety of great Visual Styles for WindowBlinds at WinCustomize. 

Simply select a new style from the drop down menu as you would normally do it in Windows XP.

But that's not all!  Once you have selected and applied one of the WindowBlinds Skins, you can gain access to some additional features and customize your style even further by clicking on the "WindowBlinds" button.

There are tons of great features and additional customization that can be done such as assigning different skins for different applications, adding controls to windows such as winamp controls and even assign "Smart Buttons" to perform specific tasks. 

One neat feature WindowBlinds skins add to your windows is a "roll up" button in addition to the minimize, maximize and close buttons.  The roll up button allows you to maintain windows open only displaying the title bars.  Here is a shot in of this feature in action:

**click to enlarge**

Here are some additional skins worth looking at:

WindowBlinds is a great application and is highly recommended for those who crave a change and enjoy playing with the Windows GUI.  You can download and try it yourself by visiting the Stardock Corp website.  WindowBlinds is shareware and costs only $19.95. 

If you would like to customize Windows even further, Stardock offers a wide range of applications such as CursorXP, IconPackager and WindowFX.  These applications will allow you to change cursors, Icons and apply numerous special effects to Windows.

Shell Replacement

If you would like to take it a step further, there are applications out there that will offer complete shell replacement.  They will replace the explorer shell and will give you a completely different look and feel.   If this is more up your alley, then the following are worth looking into:

Astonshell.com - Complete shell replacement for Windows.  Low resource use.

Talisman Desktop - Another good shell replacement application with lots of themes and icons sets.

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