Windows Shells

[TekDragon]

This is a subject I am completely ignorant on. I'm hoping to find some advice.

I'm wanting to know the pro's and con's of using various shells.

I'm interested in stabability, system usage, themes, customability, user friendliness, and anything else you want to add.

Please provide links to both the shell and any themes you feel are flag ships for that shell.

[Rbstr]

most are very stable and dont effect perfomance at all, they also don't relay effect functuionality just looks

Run the multipatcher dled here (http://www.belchfire.net/downloads-cat-3.html) and all you have to do is extract theme files to the windows/resouces/themes folder and you can use them(you an also just use the shell)

good place for theme's/wallpaper/otherstuff is www.themexp.org

[Fragmatic]

If you want shells, then I would reccomend:-

Aston - www.astonshell.com/

or

BlackBox for Windows - http://www.bb4win.org/

If you want themes, follow Rbstrs advice :)

[TekDragon]

What does a shell offer over one of those cool themes?

[Fragmatic]

What does a shell offer over one of those cool themes?

They usually completely change the style of the OS.
bb4win is usually not reccomended as a replacement shell if you are a beginner to windows, as it is pretty complicated compared to the vanilla windows shell, but it's very functional, same goes for the aston shell.

So basically -

New shells = increased functionality

[TekDragon]

I was looking at some of the Aston themes, some of them were really nice. You say their very functional?

I'm no newb to computers, I can still work my way around DOS.

[Fragmatic]

It's only usually on the desktop side of things, but yeah, they're great to use once you get used to them :)

Aston is more windows like, whilst bb4win is pretty wierd the first time you use it :p

[dscytherulez]

I use an aston theme called "Ocean Morning". I'd say it's a bit more advanced than XP, but once you know how to use it, it's MUCH more functional. I love my aston theme, and almost everything is fully customizable.

[TekDragon]

Yeah, i saw that one - looked nice. I liked some of his (the author's) other work too.

[Vitter]

I remember seeing a "Trance" Aston theme. Looked very nice.

If you find a good site with info on Aston (i checked their main page, it's very sparce on tech data) post it.

[Rbstr]

I tried Aston for a while but i like the Win XP with this theme i got from Eine better

[Daleon]

There also always windowblinds, a common desktop replacement. Here is a good site with quite a bit of packages:

http://www.wincustomize.com/

Personally not much can touch my kde desktop.

[martyr]

http://www.lwfleamarket.com/images/Military/Mil_074A_ArtillaryShell_75.jpg

[Rbstr]

does this have somethign to do witha shotgun full of dimes? AKA WTF matyr?