Flipo-taku

Looking back, I made a mistake purchasing this VAIO. The max resolution on the 15.4″ widescreen with XBRITE HiColor technology is a measly 1280×800px. And due to such a low max resolution my desktop often gets cluttered not only by icons, but by windows. I cant browse the web while watching a video without pausing the video and switching over the the web browser.

As a result of the short commings of my low resolution, I searched for a couple apps to make my desktop space a bit ‘bigger’. Here is what i found.

Start Killer
“Start Killer removes the Start button from your taskbar.”

Plain and simple. Why might you ask? Rarely do I use more than a few select programs. When I use these programs I need quick access to them, I want them on the fly in one click. This can be achieved by creating a shortcut on the quick launch of the task bar. Now, when too many icons are too present on the taskbar, it competes with space with other applications open on the taskbar. This means space must be maximized on the task bar. I find that the start button makes a perfect candiate for space maxmization because it takes too many clicks to get to what I want and has too much of what I dont want. So, I removed it with this simple application. Available free in the link above.

Samurize
“Samurize is an advanced system monitoring and desktop enhancement engine for Windows 2000/XP/2003/Vista. IT professionals, overclockers, gamers and desktop modders alike use Samurize for system information, weather reports, news headlines and much much more.”

I guess I just wanted something similar to Vista’s desktop without Vista. In fact, Samurize is much more powerful that the Vista desktop.

Weather 2004 Plug-In
B&W icons for weather

DeskSpace
“Expand your desktop.”

I remember my roommate last year showing me Ubuntu the first time. One of the cooler features was the multiple desktop with a 3d switching interface. I wish i knew it was also available for PC’s earlier.

DeskSpace allows you to run multiple instances of your desktop with a visual switch interface. Ill let the screen shots do the explaining.

And there you have it, just a couple apps to streamline my small desktop.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 18th, 2008 at 6:04 am You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.