Customizing Vista's Taskbar and Start Menu | BNET

The Taskbar tab

Microsoft has done a fair amount of reorganization and fine tuning on Vista's Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box. Of course, it makes sense that being a new operating system, Windows Vista's new Start Menu would need a bunch of new customization features; however, it's very easy to find and change the old stuff and customizing the new features is a snap.

This gallery is also available as Greg Shultz's article, Customizing Vista's Taskbar and Start Menu.

You can access the Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box in Windows Vista using the same methods that you do in Windows XP. You can right-click on the Start button or the Taskbar and select the Properties command or you can open the Control Panel, select Appearance and Personalization, and then click the Taskbar and Start Menu icon.

Either way you access it, you'll see the new Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box. Right off the bat, you'll notice that the new Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box has four tabs rather than two. Keep in mind that, just like in Windows XP, selecting the Properties command from the Start button will open the dialog box with the Start menu tab showing while selecting the Properties command from the Taskbar or clicking the Taskbar and Start Menu icon in the Control Panel will open the dialog box with the Taskbar tab showing.

The Taskbar tab is straightforward and contains just six check boxes. (The Notification area, which used to be on this bottom portion of the tab, now has its own tab.) The first five configuration options, and their corresponding actions, are identical to those in Windows XP. The new option, titled Show Window Previews (Thumbnails), allows you to disable the live Taskbar thumbnails feature, which of course is one of the new Aero features that displays thumbnail images of running applications as you hover your mouse pointer over any button on the Taskbar.

Since the thumbnails are very helpful in quickly identifying active tasks and will actually show live operations, such as a download in progress, I'm not sure what advantage disabling it will have. However, some folks may not like the additional graphics overhead and clearing the Show Window Previews (Thumbnails) check box will revert the Taskbar back to the way it worked in Windows XP--it simply displays the title of running applications as you hover your mouse pointer over the button on the Taskbar.

Alteration advantage:
Even though hiding the Taskbar will give you more screen real estate, I was reluctant to do so in Windows XP because I always needed the Taskbar not only to switch tasks, but also to see the time; however, I've discovered that in Windows Vista I don't have to permanently keep the Taskbar on the screen because of Flip 3D.

If you enable the Auto-Hide The Taskbar option and disable the Keep the Taskbar On Top Of Other Windows option, you'll not only increase your screen real estate, but you'll begin to really appreciate the elegance of using Flip 3D as your main task switching mechanism. Furthermore, having the Clock gadget on the desktop's Windows Sidebar further does away with the need to have the Taskbar visible in order to see the time.

Keep in mind that hiding the taskbar and primarily using Flip 3D to task switch doesn't negate the usefulness of the Taskbar. It will still appear and can be used when you press the [Windows] key or when you hover your mouse pointer at the bottom of the screen.