Windows Vista Tips & Tricks #2: Customize Aero Glass

Windows Vista Tips & Tricks : Customize Aero Glass

one of the most talked about features in Microsoft Windows Vista is the new Aero Glass interface. Aero Glass requires at least a DirectX 9 enabled video card with WDDM drivers, and either AGP 8x or PCI-E. Not all graphics cards have the capability to run Aero Glass, but for those that do, the effects are fantastic. In addition to the transparent Window borders, running Aero Glass also enables the flip 3D function (WinKey+tab) and some very nice animation effects.

Aero Glass also comes with a new panel for adjusting the visual appearance. To customize your Aero Glass appearance, click on a blank area of your desktop and from the pop-up, select ‘Personalize’. You may also access this through the Control Panel> Appearance and Personalization> Personalization.



This will open up the ‘Personalize appearance and sound effects’ panel from which you can customize many aspects of Windows Vista appearance. Next, click on the ‘Visual Appearance’ link to open the ‘Change your color scheme’ panel. From this panel there are a number of predefined color schemes which you can choose to apply. There is also a checkbox to Enable/Disable transparent glass. There is also an option to open the color mixer which will allow the user to highly customize the displayed color of their Windows. With the color mixer, you can adjust the Color, Saturation, and Brightness of your window borders. At the very bottom of this panel, there is also a link to open the classic appearance properties.
href="http://parcom.pro-networks.org/images/TTAero3a.JPG">

>*Note: in the latest builds of Windows Vista, some users who have Aero enabled have not been able to enable the transparent glass – it is sometimes possible to get transparency in these cases by lowering the screen resolution


Vista Aero Glass ushers in a new and updated look for Microsoft Windows as well as some very nice visual effects. It should be noted that the Aero Glass interface may still undergo some changes in the next releases of Vista.