In Windows Vista and Windows 7, the old Luna interface has been replaced with a new default theme / interface called Aero. Aero uses a number of features such as translatable windows and title bars, live thumbnails, and other eye-catching features to make the user experience more comfortable.
The problem with Aero (and other compositing window managers) is that it is resource intensive. This means that users of computers with low power graphics cards or those who want to squeeze every frame of performance out of their system (which is important, for example, when playing games), may want to disable Aero, temporarily, if not permanently.
Fortunately, getting rid of many of the resource-consuming features is not that difficult. Below you will find two ways to get rid of Aero, one disables it completely, and the other for individual applications.
Turn Aero off completely
To use Windows 7 in your daily life without Aero, first open the Personalization Control Panel. To do this, right-click somewhere on the desktop, then select the Personalize option at the bottom of the context menu.
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After the Personalization Control Panel loads, click the Blue Window Color option at the bottom of the window.
Now just make sure the “Enable transparency” checkbox is unchecked.
When you do, click the Save Changes button to make sure your changes are not lost.
You should now have opaque windows as well as preview windows and an opaque taskbar as shown below. Compare with the first screenshot to see the changes.
Of course, you don’t have to disable these features all the time. Sometimes you just need to turn them off when you need extra power for something else like gaming. In this case, we’ll show you how to temporarily disable CPU-intensive Aero effects.
Pause Aero
This is actually a little faster as we only configure the apps we want to run without Aero. If you do not make the following changes, your computer will work normally. However, when you launch an application modified through this process, Aero will be disabled until the program is closed.
The first step is to find a launcher for your program. Then right-click it and select Properties from the bottom of the menu.
When the Properties window loads, click the Compatibility tab.
Now check the Disable Desktop Composition checkbox. This will disable Aero, but again, only when that particular application is launched.
Finally, click the Apply button to save your changes to the launcher.
When you do, nothing will change, but the next time you launch this app, Aero will be temporarily disabled as you wanted it to.
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