Attached Link: Give away of the Day - Aston Desktop 1.9.2 Free

From the Aston site :

*Aston is a shell replacement application, which gives you to get a completely new, powerful and easily configurable desktop, making your computing a more pleasant and productive experience.
Aston completely replaces your old desktop with a new one, providing numerous additional features and saving your computer's resources for more necessary tasks. By installing Aston you get a lot more than just a fancy look, you get a more efficient way of using your computer.

*for the next 24 hours, you can get Aston free at the link. no spyware, viruii. a real offer.  the catch is, no support for the product is given and there's no discount for buying the latest version.

but considering the benefits for Aston....

www.astonshell.com/aston/

Thanks for the heads up. I've looked at Aston a couple of times before deciding I didn't need to pay $20 for an alternate shell, and I've always come back to Explorer because the free alternatives (Litestep, etc) were too complex or unreliable. If it's light on system resources as it claims, it's good news for Poser users.

The site is slow; my guess is that this is the most popular offering they've had so far - some of the programs they feature aren't too inspiring.

As a general point, though, it's worth keeping up with one-day offers. My version of WinRAR came this way; it's two versions behind now and I can't upgrade it, but it does exactly what I need it to.

Very cool!  Thanks so much for the heads-up!  I too had seen this before, but didn't want to spend the money at the time.  I'm very glad I get to try it now, for free!  And if it really does use half the RAM of Windows desktop...well, that's terrific! 

no problems :)

I started with Aston about an year ago.. I love it. it's stable and fast.

one note tho : it's not recommended for XP 64. also if you don't like it and want to uninstall, swtich back to Explorer (using the Shell Wizard) before uninstalling (this is important! you'll reboot to a blank desktop otherwise. if this happens post in here and I'll try and help you).

this version is NOT vista compatible. for that you need the latest version 1.9.3.1

I have Windows XP, so no prob there.  And thanks for the tip about switching back to Explorer via the Shell Wizard before uninstalling!  That would have been a nasty surprise.  LOL!  :)

I haven't installed it yet...still reading up a bit and browsing through the free Themes and Plugins before I do.  But the official website keeps going down...I guess it's getting slammed right now because of the free offer.  :P

Neato!  Got it and thanks for the heads up!

OK, that was not very pleasant.  I like the look of the cool desktop additions but the clock is way to small to be of any use, the extra tool bar folders that I use all the time are no longer available, by default it loaded up ever friggin image file found on my desktop at start up.  I was like "wtf?"  Although I think the drive icons telling you how much disk space is available is hella cool and I love the Recycle Bin and My Computer icons.  NICE looking and very high tech.  Oh and the Start button.... didn't work.  That killed it the rest of the way for me!  Buggy thing.  When I opted to go back to my old WinXP desktop my wall paper was no more and the shortcut arrows were showing again (which I use TweakUI to turn those puppies off).

Is there a desktop solution that would give me something like what Aston offers without all this bugginess?? 

strange you got all that..

well lets see... the clock can be resized. you can reprogram the top, left and right toolbars to whatever you want, the images... hmm. all I can suggest there is it's something I've not see before. no comfort I know, but shrug as to the start button.. not seen that.

I used 1.9.2 for along time.. never found it that buggy at all...

It's interesting; maybe I'll keep it. Not sure.

My only true gripe with it is that it totally ignored all the folders that I created in the Start menu for organizing my apps so I'm missing too many shortcuts I'll have to configure for it. Small annoyance since it does provide me alternate ways to reach those apps with the sidebars as well though.

Thanks for the heads up on it btw!

Thankfully, I didn't have any problems with it at all.  In fact I'm really loving it and don't think I'll ever go back to my Windows desktop!

I browsed through all the free Themes on the official website and downloaded and installed about 8 or 10 really gorgeous ones.  I've been testing them all out, to find the UI I like the best.  I've also been on a wallpaper hunt so I can further customize the look of my new desktop!

I've had to "Add Elements" for most of what was originally on my desktop, but that's no biggie.  I never kept a lot on there to begin with (I hate a cluttered desktop) but now with these nifty drop down menus and hidden side bars I think I'm going to add a lot more for quick access!  I totally love that you can add your favourite URLs and it will automatically open up your browser and go to straight to a specific page!

If anyone knows of other websites that offer free Themes, please let me know!  :)

how do you get it to work past the 30 days trial? or is it only for 30 days?

the offer I posted is now over (only lasts 24 hours)
unless you ran the activate.exe in that time, it's now the demo (30 day) version.

SoulTaker, the free 1.9.2 version was a special 'one day only' offer which is now over:

Quote - This software was available as a giveaway on March 1, 2007, this giveaway is not available any more. You can download the trial version of this software at http://www.astonshell.com/asto....

Grrr missed out on the freebie...is it worth the money to buy it? Busy moving and just got my internet back yesterday evening.
Marque

to me, yes.
infact I bought mulitple copies lol

Attached Link: AstonShell Desktop One

I finally decided on a theme and wallpaper (click the link), and I've got everything I want added to the different categories.  Neato!  :D

I also got all the images, running XP pro. Anyone know how to get rid of them and just have one? Start button is ok but the other stuff not doing too well.

Not impressed. With the images it gives me a headache. Guess you have to buy it to get tech support.  8^(

can you give a screengrab?

Not sure I know how, don't have any special software for that.

Sigh now I have nothing, went into the theme wizard to change the theme hit preview and everything disappeared.

Got my old desktop back and uninstalling that one. Glad I didn't buy it.

Hi Khai,

Since my thread over at the DAZ forums seems to be forgotten already I would like to ask some questions:

Is there any way to set up an Element or something to get similar functionality as the Windows task bar will allow by creating a new Quick Launch menu??  I have two others that I access from there and I miss them quite a bit. 

I'm still getting errors about the AlfaClock and would love to know what's going on with that.  If you have any info on this error message then please elaborate as to what to do or if there is a way to not have it load at Start up I would be fine with that.  The current theme I'm using is using AClock which works just fine.

AlfaClock:
Hook Proc start error. Code = 7
Last-error code value = 2

Really miss my drag and select on the desktop and I'm also noticing there is no right click or it comes and goes.  I just tried it and it works but before I had selected some text and it didn't work.  So that's kinda strange. Might have been a one time "oops"

I tried joining the forums and still have NO confirmation email so I can't log on at the Aston forums! :sad:

Thanks for your help

Richard

not forgotten!

just not had time to reply due to Wife, 2 Hounds, Mum in law (she's in the early stages of Alzt, so we're still setting things up here to keep her at home as long as we can), 3 cats and a load of Snow. and Snow. did I mention Snow?

I'm working on it, so gimme a few hours...

Home from work just now.  Yea, I work late.  Curse of the hair dresser!!  :lol:

Hopefully when you get a moment, no hurry.  Much appreciated!

finally! I can get to do what I want to do!

ok I located 'alphaclock' and installed it. looks like you've found the first program I've seen that won't run on Aston!
far as I can tell, Aston's already taken the program hooks that Alpha uses then therefore blocks it from running. (I tried the beta version 'betaclock' as well and that has the same problems) my hat is off to you lol about the only thing I can think of atm with it is to uninstall alpha for the time being

working on the next one.. (start menu button glitch) for now I'd use the feature that lets you pull the startmenu up anywhere on the desktop.. not sure why the start button isn't working. what theme are you using?

oh, as to the startbar menu you mentioned - try using one of the top menu bars - you can configure them to whatever you want to run...