M$ Windows buttons & icons
 

I've never liked the flat button style introduced with Office 97 & then adopted by M$ ever since. I really dislike having the delay involved with recognition & response time when it it come to locating the button hotspot.

Anyone know if it's possible for force Win 98 & WinXP to use Win95 style raised buttons?


Similarly, I loathe the 'cartoon/modern art' style of WinXP. Many are too similar to readily distinguish from each other, or the detail becomes a blurry smudge at high resolutions

Anyway for force it to use Win95/98 style icons?

Would this extend to programs too? Or can I substitute an Office 95 .DLL into Office 97?

Perhaps by replacing a .DLL with one from an earlier OS, or changing a registry reference to another .DLL?

It is possible to revert to the classic Windows style, and get rid of the horrid rounded XP one, if that's what you're after.

Just right-click on the desktop and choose:

Properties > Appearance

In the box Windows and buttons you can choose Windows classic style.

The Advanced button here lets you change the appearance of menus and buttons too.

That's not what I meant, but thanks anyway Voidhawk

Those things were done with nano-seconds of the first log in. Unfortunately you can't change the look of the buttons, nor can you change the default icons & buttons back to Win9.x.

WinXP classic style still uses XP icons though. Compare the clarity of those to Win3.1 or Win9.x.

It's most of the icons that I wish to revert to the Win9.x ones, and the button look that I want to force into the pre-Office 97 style of widget. They're much, much clearer.

Since Office 97, M$ have moved all their products into using a 'flat' type of button ie there isn't a visible button boundary that defines its locus - you have to move the mouse to the button then must wait while the system responds & you recognise the response before taking action. The old Win95/Office 95 look had buttons that looked like raised buttons. You didn't have to move the cursor over them to identify the button's hotspot. It was just there.