Your Complete Guide To Windows Customization

You can create a Windows desktop environment that not only accommodates your needs, but also looks stunningly beautiful. Everyone likes different things when it comes to their desktop experience. Some people use computers just for fun, others to work and many even use computers for the creation of music, videos and other forms of self- expression. Whatever your situation may be, having a computer that matches your aesthetic preferences will enhance the quality of time you spend in front of the monitor.

Your Complete Guide

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1 Introduction

1.1 An Introduction To Desktop

Customization

You can create a Windows desktop

environment that not only accommodates yourneeds, but also looks stunningly beautiful.Everyone likes different things when it comes

to their desktop experience Some people usecomputers just for fun, others to work andmany even use computers for the creation ofmusic, videos and other forms of self-

expression Whatever your situation may be,having a computer that matches your

aesthetic preferences will enhance the quality

of time you spend in front of the monitor

1.2 Why Should I Customize My Desktop?

If you're anything like me, when you start touse a new computer the first thing you'll do is

to make it "yours" Essentially, you adapt the

computer to fit your needs in a faster manner.For instance, you might Download GoogleChrome, install your favorite antivirus

software and uninstall the things that you don'tdeem necessary Only then do you get towork

It doesn’t have to end there Many go aboveand beyond to make their devices feel really

"theirs" Rooting your Android device,

jailbreaking your iPhone or iTouch, and usingcustom themes on your phone is fun – andjust the beginning The ubiquity of mobiledevices has really pulled the strings andstarted a mini revolution in this regard

That’s fun, but the grand majority of peoplestill use desktop and laptop devices in order

to get their work done Sure, mobile devicesare becoming increasingly productive tools,but at this point in time the desktop is stillking

But just because your computer is mostly for

work doesn’t mean you can’t also make ityours You can use tools that will customizenearly every aspect of the visual aspect ofyour Windows experience These tools areuser friendly and are easy to operate – even

by absolute beginners

And I know where to find them

1.3 How This Guide Is Written

This guide is best read straight through I tried

to arrange things logically, and you’re notgoing to want to miss out on any particulartool That said, if you're interested in onespecific section of the guide, by all means goahead and read that section specifically –you're probably already set in all the otheraspects of your desktop customization

experience

If you simply want an easy way to get a slicknew theme and don’t want to bother too muchwith any choices, go to Section 6, which

contains an easy list of the most popularthemes from various websites, along withsome other applications that ease the

5 Ways To Customize Windows

Customize Your Windows 7 Desktop withEmerge, Enigma, and Rainmeter

Make Your Computer Truly Yours

Geeking-Out Your Windows Desktop TheNon-Geeky Way With Rainmeter

2 Themes

2.1 An Introduction To Desktop Themes

No matter whether you're using Windows 7,Windows 8 or even Windows XP, making yourdesktop look stunning is not only very possible– it's easy

We need to look no further than our very owntaskbar in order to find the first traces ofcustomization possibilities, and it only getsbigger from there For example, on Windows

7 and Windows 8, right-clicking the taskbarwill bring up this:

Clicking on properties will land us here:

As you can see, we already have severaloptions to change the appearance of our taskbar Ranging from the position of the taskbar

itself, to whether it hides automatically, tousing small icons, and even to letting it existwithout text This is an utterly simple way ofdemonstrating how much just a few clicks can

do to adjust Windows to your personal style.But we can do much, much more

2.2 Where Can I Get Themes For My

Computer?

There are a lot of official, and unofficial,sources where obtaining themes is simple.Microsoft has their very own themes site, and

we will also go through a few of the unofficialsources later

2.3 How Do I Use Themes Properly?

We're going to get started using the officialresources available to us To begin, right-clickyour desktop to see this familiar menu:

As you might imagine, we want to click on

"Personalize", which will bring us here:

This gives us a great overview of our

immediately available options and gives us ahint about what we're going to do next Bydefault, Windows 7 comes with an array ofthemes installed All it takes is clicking on atheme to change your Windows desktopexperience with custom sounds, wallpapersand screensavers Basically going from this:

To this:

It takes all but a couple of clicks using thisofficial method Now this is all well and good,but what if you don't like any of the pre-installed themes? No problem! All we have to

do is click on "Get more themes online" in thescreen we were just in, and we will be taken

to the official Windows themes website Itshould look something like this:

Let's say that after some exploration, I wentinto the Art section and I found a theme that Iliked All I have to do is click on "Download",

as shown below:

From there all we have to click on the

downloaded file and Windows will take care

of the rest The theme will be installedautomatically, and we will be greeted by the

“theme and the personalization” screen:

Pretty neat, huh? This, combined with theother tweaks I previously mentioned, is as far

as Windows’ default options will take us

Of course, we’re not stopping here We’rejust getting started

Next, I'm going to show you one of the

unofficial themes – and I'm going to also showyou how we can install it as if it were anyother program First off, head to

http://deviantart.com and type in "Windows 7themes"

It goes without saying that you can changethis "Windows 7" search to "Windows 8" orwhatever other Windows edition you're using.For now, searching for "Windows 7 themes",your results will look like this:

By default Deviant Art will sort the result bymost popular of all time We could changethat with a simple click on the sort menu, butfor now we're going to select one of thepopular themes called "Elune" After clicking

on the theme itself, we will get the themepage with a log of the theme's history as well

as author comments and installation

instructions:

These instructions (as with most instructionsthat come with themes) involve installing a

program called Universal Theme Patcher,then moving a few files around It's a relativelypainless process, but luckily for Elune there's

an even simpler way to install it

To elaborate - Elune comes as part of thetheming software called Custopack Tools Sowe're going to go there and download thesoftware:

And install it as any other program Afterdoing so, we'll be greeted by the followingscreen:

We're going to click on "Download

CustoPacks", which will take us to thefollowing website where we can click on theElune theme:

This will prompt you to download the theme,which installs pretty seamlessly with the help

of CustoPack Tools After the theme file isfinished executing, we're going to go back toCustoPack Tools and click on "CustomPacksready to be installed" – this will bring us here:

As you have guessed, all we have to do now

is click The theme will be installed for us, with

no further action necessary After a few

moments your entire Windows interface willtake on a new form The changes are

noticeable immediately ​– your desktop shouldlook something like this:

As you can see, there are many changes inthe whole visual feel of the desktop Thesechanges are subtle but numerous, and theymake everything feel much more modern, new– and yet, familiar It doesn't stray too faraway from the more important Windows 7elements like transparency and cohesiveness,but it does look unique It should be

mentioned that this particular theme alsochanges the way your login screen looks,though this can be edited with CustoPackTools

2.4 Should I Use A Third Party Theme Installer?

My personal recommendation is that youinstall the themes manually whenever

possible However, using a dedicated installercan save you time and effort if you're not inthe mood to go through the manual process

2.5 How Do I Revert To The Original

Theme?

Going back to basics is extremely simple.However, there are a few differences that youshould know about depending on the processyou choose at the time you installed the

theme in the first place If you used an officialWindows theme, just go back to

"Personalization" by right-clicking on yourdesktop and change the theme like this:

This will bring things back to normal in a snap.

If you used any software while installing yourcustom theme, the process is the same, butit's also recommended that you uninstall thesoftware used at the time of installation

2.6 Is There More?

There’s always more to know about themes.MakeUseOf covers more than what we’ve justsaid about the default Win7 themes, but you

may want more still If you want a best-of list,see Deviant Art's great selection of Windows

7 themes, along with plenty of other sites,such as the Subreddit /r/customization Youshould easily be able to find something youlike

3 Rainmeter

3.1 What Is Rainmeter?

What do you use your desktop for? Youprobably have a background image you love,and a few icons, but have you ever thoughtabout adding something…else? Like a clock,

or the weather? What about your upcomingcalendar appointments?

Rainmeter is a wildly popular program thatuses your desktop as a veritable canvas – acanvas for everything from custom icons,widgets and visual controls for media players.It’s easy to use, offers a lot of value and issupported by a large community All you have

to do to get Rainmeter is go to the officialwebsite and download the latest stable

release

Rainmeter installs like any other program, soit'll be a snap.

3.2 Getting Started With Rainmeter

Right after you install Rainmeter, you will seesomething like this:

This screen already has a few instructions onhow you can get started The basics ofRainmeter are extremely simple Right-clicking on this screen will bring up the

following menu:

You're going to want to click on "Unload skin",which will get rid of this particular skin Irecommend that you mess around with thismenu, since it's very simple to get a grip on itand you'll get a quick overview of what

Rainmeter is about In any event, right-clicking

on the Rainmeter icon in the tray will bring upthis menu:

In Rainmeter the icons, widgets and

everything else are called "Skins" Clicking onthe Skins part of this menu will bring up theskins you have installed in your system In mycase it looks like this:

Installing Skins is as simple as finding them

and opening them But where could we findSkins?

3.3 Where Can I Get Custom Skins?

This should seem familiar: let's go back tohttp://deviantart.com and search for

"Rainmeter" You'll see something like this:

After clicking on one of the search results, wecan just click on "Download" like so:

After the file downloads, we'll double click on

it and see this:

We'll just click install, which will make thewindow go away That's ok! It's what we arelooking for We just need to right-click on theRainmeter tray icon, then click on Manage.We'll want to find the folder with the name of

the skin we just installed and expand it We'llhave a look at the multiple components thatthe skin contains For the sake of this

example, we're going to double click on theEker_lina System file:

After double clicking on the file, the widget willappear before our eyes on our desktop:

Voila! Also, you can drag and drop yourwidgets as if they were regular icons Thiscapability can also be disabled, which we'lldiscuss in the next section.

3.4 What If I Want To Modify Something?

With Rainmeter, it's expected that you'll want

to modify the components within the skins tofit your specific tastes and needs, so doing so

is simple Just position your mouse on top ofthe widget in question, then click on "Manageskin" In this example I'll go ahead and modify

the position of my widget I just need tomodify the value in the Coordinates field and

up it from 0 to 500 which will put it near thecenter:

Simple enough You can also modify othervalues such as the ability to save the position

of your widget, make it draggable and/or clickthrough a well as many others

3.5 How Can I Connect Rainmeter To Other Applications?

Some applications, such as music players,can be connected to Rainmeter components.The instructions for connecting these

components vary, but it normally involvesclicking on the "Edit" button explained above,

then modifying a part of the text file thatcomes up.

3.6 I Want To Get More In-Depth.

This has been a rather shallow look overRainmeter As mentioned, Rainmeter doesn’tend there, and there are a lot of things thatyou can do beyond the scope of what we’vementioned There are plenty of other

resources for in-depth Rainmeter

customization out there, of course, but I’llcover some of it right here A good place tostart, if you want to start designing your ownRainmeter files, is this official Rainmetertutorial

These default tutorials contain a lot of whatyou need to know to get into it, and even asthe site says itself, all you need is Rainmeter,and a text editor From there, it’s just a matter

of experimenting

3.7 I Want an Alternative

There's always an alternative, and for

Rainmeter one of the best known out there isSamurize There are already plenty of guidesfor Samurize out there, too If you want todelve into Samurize, try it out, and comparethe two Personally, I prefer Rainmeter, butit’s up to you: both applications make it simple

to put information directly onto your desktop

to Another critical part in this effort will be tocustomize your go-to media player I'm going

to go ahead and address the most popularones, but if I don't include your favorite player

in this list chances are that it's customizable tosome extent and you just need to look upskins for it

4.1.1 iTunes

Apple's flagship media player is amongst themost popular players in the world, for PC andMac alike Apple is certainly stubborn abouttheir products: they want their users to have a

consistent experience across the board.These facts make it a bit hard to customizeiTunes, but it’s not impossible You can do acouple of things to adjust your iTunes player

to fit your personal style

To get started, we're going to open up iTunesand click on the upper left corner and click onPreferences

This menu has a lot of options, but we'regoing to click on "advanced" We'll see thatthere's a few options like having the MiniPlayer on top of all other windows or minimizeiTunes to the icon tray so as to avoid closing

it easily

Unfortunately this is pretty much as far asiTunes will let us go in the customizationdepartment You can also activate the mini

player by clicking on the top left corner, asshown above.

4.1.2 Foobar2000

Foobar2000 is a very popular media playeramongst audiophiles The quality of soundthat this music player offers, coupled withextensive options, makes it an absolute

dream for your customization project

Vanilla Foobar looks pretty dull, and a lot ofpeople dismiss the entire program because ofthat You're not going to make that mistakehowever: Foobar can be absolutely gorgeous

if you take the time to customize it

MakeUseOf provides a lot of information onFoobar2000, on how to start to how to make

it fit you The multiple options allow for a lot ofcustomization, and once you start gettingskins it can look how you want it to

A great site to get Foobar skins from is