Kaelri
Big Sky (Desktop 29)
Here's something most people don't know about me: as much as I love technology, and follow the latest news from Google, Apple, et al, I actually don't buy gadgets very often. I can't stand spending money needlessly, accumulating crap that I don't know how to get rid of, and, especially, retiring a tool before I've gotten all the value out of it. I just bought my first smartphone this year. And last week, I finally retired my faithful Dell Inspiron B130, which has been my exclusive machine since September 2006.
Now, some of you may scoff. A budget laptop marketed for college students is not the kind of choice you expect from someone who is fairly tech savvy and who uses a computer pretty much 24/7, for work and for play. But after nearly half a decade of constant use, I have nothing but praise for the Little Notebook That Could. Somewhere around here, I've told the tale of how, after I accidentally deleted the boot sector during a botched Linux venture, she miraculously healed herself without the use of a Windows disc or recovery software. I never once had to reinstall the OS, never had to contact Dell support, never had a serious virus or hardware malfunction, never experienced the sluggishness, overheating and physical cruft that my friends have had with their notebooks. Guys, if you take care of your computer, your computer will take care of you.
Nonetheless, the Dell was showing her age. While the very-worn battery and hard drive could probably be replaced, a 1.7 GHz single-core processor just doesn't cut it anymore, especially if you're looking to upgrade to Windows 7. So I've switched to an HP G62x, and after a little over a week of full-time use, I have no regrets. While less mobile than a netbook, and less powerful than, say, a MacBook Pro, these mid-range workhorses can really serve you well as a primary machine, and you can get some surprising deals if you do your homework. I got this thing with half a terabyte of internal storage (no more juggling external drives to watch my movies!) and an ATI Radeon Mobility video card, which, while it wouldn't satisfy a hardcore gamer, has been a real treat for me - not least because it unlocks some Photoshop features that I could never use before. This for under $600. And since I can install up to 8GB of RAM and (someday) an SSD, I'm thinking I can make this one last even longer than its predecessor.
Anyway. This desktop post won't have anything new for the customizers. I'm just marking my switch to a brand new platform. All of my desktops up to this point - throughout all the Lightning Sunset, the browser tinkering, the Rainmeter revival - were done on that little Dell. I'm looking forward to seeing where this new vessel will take me.
- - - - - - -
Before I get into my customization details, I have to say, straight off, that Windows 7 is a fantastic operating system. I know I'm a little late to the party here, but it needs to be said. The taskbar is a sheer joy to use. Jump lists are brilliant, especially pinning files, which eliminates the need for a lot of my old hotkeys. The redesigned Windows Explorer is an incredibly sleek, refined application. Networking just works now. And there are so many little touches: if you click and drag down on the title bar of a maximized window, it will restore the window and move it with your cursor, all without lifting the button.
Really, I'd write a whole review of Windows 7 alone, if there weren't already hundreds of them. Suffice to say, I'm no longer embarrassed to be a Windows user. Not that I really was before, but you know how it is - Linux people telling you you're an ignorant slave, Mac people telling you you have no taste. Especially looking at the directions that both OS X and Ubuntu are going these days, I can say with full confidence that Windows 7 is the OS I would choose from a cold start.
- - - - - - -
Desktop
Theme:
- Visual Style: Shadow for 7 by krissirk. I tried the big names, including Appows and Shine. But this one just hit the mark. So many VS designers like to add their little frills around the edges, but Shadow is just clean, consistent and simple. The subtle Aero transparency is very professional - it makes Google Chrome look gorgeous, among other things. Just a real quality VS. I doubt it'd be much different if I'd made it myself.
- Wallpaper: Big Sky by Fifty Foot Shadows, one of my favorite wallpaper sources. I'm an incurable romantic, so the fact that this is an actual photograph, when a simple Photoshop gradient would have been just as easy, makes it somehow special to me.
Startups:
- Autohotkey, though Windows 7's built-in features have rendered many of my scripts obsolete. But I'm still using keys for window transparency, text replacement, and the How-To Geek's Alt+Drag script. I've also remapped those app keys along the side of the keyboard to make them more useful - for example, one of them summons Launchy with one press, and another shows/hides my Trillian contact list.
- Launchy. The new Start Menu search, which is really wonderful, has allowed me to streamline Launchy's index a bit. (Which is good, because the current Launchy beta is a real memory leaker, unfortunately. Hoping for a fix soon.)
- 7 Taskbar Tweaker. This thing has a bunch of features, but I use exactly one of them: middle-click to close windows on the taskbar. I used Taskbar Shuffle back in XP to do the same thing, and I still strongly believe that this should be a native function for all taskbar-oriented OSes, especially since it's become a standard in every web browser.
- StartKiller. Removes the start button. I already have one on my keyboard, thankyouverymuch.
- Dropbox. No explanation needed, I think.
- Lightscreen. Very, very handy for taking screenshots - stays out of the way and gets the job done.
- http://www.stereopsis.com/flux. Which Flickr doesn't want to turn into a link, for some reason. Hmph.
- - - - - - -
I still haven't figured out what kind of Rainmeter theme I'm going to use on the new OS, and sadly I'm not sure when I'll have a chance to muck around with it. Too busy with work, another side project that moved up about a year ahead of schedule, and some other poorly-timed events... 2011 has been a challenging year thus far. But we'll see where I end up on the currents.
Big Sky (Desktop 29)
Here's something most people don't know about me: as much as I love technology, and follow the latest news from Google, Apple, et al, I actually don't buy gadgets very often. I can't stand spending money needlessly, accumulating crap that I don't know how to get rid of, and, especially, retiring a tool before I've gotten all the value out of it. I just bought my first smartphone this year. And last week, I finally retired my faithful Dell Inspiron B130, which has been my exclusive machine since September 2006.
Now, some of you may scoff. A budget laptop marketed for college students is not the kind of choice you expect from someone who is fairly tech savvy and who uses a computer pretty much 24/7, for work and for play. But after nearly half a decade of constant use, I have nothing but praise for the Little Notebook That Could. Somewhere around here, I've told the tale of how, after I accidentally deleted the boot sector during a botched Linux venture, she miraculously healed herself without the use of a Windows disc or recovery software. I never once had to reinstall the OS, never had to contact Dell support, never had a serious virus or hardware malfunction, never experienced the sluggishness, overheating and physical cruft that my friends have had with their notebooks. Guys, if you take care of your computer, your computer will take care of you.
Nonetheless, the Dell was showing her age. While the very-worn battery and hard drive could probably be replaced, a 1.7 GHz single-core processor just doesn't cut it anymore, especially if you're looking to upgrade to Windows 7. So I've switched to an HP G62x, and after a little over a week of full-time use, I have no regrets. While less mobile than a netbook, and less powerful than, say, a MacBook Pro, these mid-range workhorses can really serve you well as a primary machine, and you can get some surprising deals if you do your homework. I got this thing with half a terabyte of internal storage (no more juggling external drives to watch my movies!) and an ATI Radeon Mobility video card, which, while it wouldn't satisfy a hardcore gamer, has been a real treat for me - not least because it unlocks some Photoshop features that I could never use before. This for under $600. And since I can install up to 8GB of RAM and (someday) an SSD, I'm thinking I can make this one last even longer than its predecessor.
Anyway. This desktop post won't have anything new for the customizers. I'm just marking my switch to a brand new platform. All of my desktops up to this point - throughout all the Lightning Sunset, the browser tinkering, the Rainmeter revival - were done on that little Dell. I'm looking forward to seeing where this new vessel will take me.
- - - - - - -
Before I get into my customization details, I have to say, straight off, that Windows 7 is a fantastic operating system. I know I'm a little late to the party here, but it needs to be said. The taskbar is a sheer joy to use. Jump lists are brilliant, especially pinning files, which eliminates the need for a lot of my old hotkeys. The redesigned Windows Explorer is an incredibly sleek, refined application. Networking just works now. And there are so many little touches: if you click and drag down on the title bar of a maximized window, it will restore the window and move it with your cursor, all without lifting the button.
Really, I'd write a whole review of Windows 7 alone, if there weren't already hundreds of them. Suffice to say, I'm no longer embarrassed to be a Windows user. Not that I really was before, but you know how it is - Linux people telling you you're an ignorant slave, Mac people telling you you have no taste. Especially looking at the directions that both OS X and Ubuntu are going these days, I can say with full confidence that Windows 7 is the OS I would choose from a cold start.
- - - - - - -
Desktop
Theme:
- Visual Style: Shadow for 7 by krissirk. I tried the big names, including Appows and Shine. But this one just hit the mark. So many VS designers like to add their little frills around the edges, but Shadow is just clean, consistent and simple. The subtle Aero transparency is very professional - it makes Google Chrome look gorgeous, among other things. Just a real quality VS. I doubt it'd be much different if I'd made it myself.
- Wallpaper: Big Sky by Fifty Foot Shadows, one of my favorite wallpaper sources. I'm an incurable romantic, so the fact that this is an actual photograph, when a simple Photoshop gradient would have been just as easy, makes it somehow special to me.
Startups:
- Autohotkey, though Windows 7's built-in features have rendered many of my scripts obsolete. But I'm still using keys for window transparency, text replacement, and the How-To Geek's Alt+Drag script. I've also remapped those app keys along the side of the keyboard to make them more useful - for example, one of them summons Launchy with one press, and another shows/hides my Trillian contact list.
- Launchy. The new Start Menu search, which is really wonderful, has allowed me to streamline Launchy's index a bit. (Which is good, because the current Launchy beta is a real memory leaker, unfortunately. Hoping for a fix soon.)
- 7 Taskbar Tweaker. This thing has a bunch of features, but I use exactly one of them: middle-click to close windows on the taskbar. I used Taskbar Shuffle back in XP to do the same thing, and I still strongly believe that this should be a native function for all taskbar-oriented OSes, especially since it's become a standard in every web browser.
- StartKiller. Removes the start button. I already have one on my keyboard, thankyouverymuch.
- Dropbox. No explanation needed, I think.
- Lightscreen. Very, very handy for taking screenshots - stays out of the way and gets the job done.
- http://www.stereopsis.com/flux. Which Flickr doesn't want to turn into a link, for some reason. Hmph.
- - - - - - -
I still haven't figured out what kind of Rainmeter theme I'm going to use on the new OS, and sadly I'm not sure when I'll have a chance to muck around with it. Too busy with work, another side project that moved up about a year ahead of schedule, and some other poorly-timed events... 2011 has been a challenging year thus far. But we'll see where I end up on the currents.