Windows 7 Feature - Aero

 AERO

The Aero desktop experience, available in the Home Premium, Professional, Ultimate, and Enterprise editions of Windows 7, mixes cool graphics with useful new ways to manage your desktop.

Aero visual hallmarks include subtle animations and translucent glass windows, which you can personalize. Pick from the included color palette, or create your own custom tints with the color mixer. 

There's more to Aero than style. Point to a taskbar button, and you’ll see a thumbnail-sized preview—even for live video. Then point to the thumbnail, and it morphs into a full-screen preview. Shake and Peek cut through desktop clutter by quickly minimizing open windows or turning them invisible. 

What is the Aero desktop experience?

The Aero desktop experience features a translucent glass design with subtle window animations and new window colors.

The Aero desktop experience features glass-like windows for an open look

 

It includes distinctive visual styles that combine the appearance of lightweight, translucent windows with powerful graphic advances. You can enjoy visually appealing effects and appearance and also benefit from better access to your programs.

Glass effects

Translucent glass windows create depth on the desktop

 

One of the more visually obvious features is glass window borders, which let you focus on the contents of your open windows. Window behavior has also been redesigned, with subtle animations accompanying the minimizing, maximizing, and repositioning of windows to appear more smooth and effortless.

Tint your windows using the provided colors, or mix your own custom color

 

You can even fine-tune the color and appearance of windows, the Start menu, and the taskbar by tinting your translucent windows. Select one of the provided colors, or create your own custom color using the color mixer.

Switching between programs

Pointing to a window's taskbar button displays a preview of the window

 

The Aero desktop experience also includes taskbar previews for your open windows. When you point to a taskbar button, you'll see a thumbnail-sized preview of the window, whether the content of the window is a document, a photo, or even a running video.

Switching windows with Alt+Tab

 

When you press Alt+Tab to switch between windows, you can see live previews of the windows for each open program.

How do I get the Aero desktop experience?

The following editions of Windows 7 include Aero:

• Windows 7 Enterprise
• Windows 7 Home Premium
• Windows 7 Professional
• Windows 7 Ultimate

Aero is not included in Windows 7 Home Basic or Windows 7 Starter. You can find out which edition of Windows 7 you have on your computer by opening System in Control Panel.

Open System by clicking the Start button , right-clicking Computer, and then clicking Properties.

The edition of Windows 7 you're running is displayed under Windows edition near the top of the window.

You also need to use a Windows theme to display Aero graphics. If you are using an Ease of Access theme, some elements such as transparency and thumbnail previews will not appear. To view which theme you are using, open Personalization in Control Panel.

Open Theme Settings by clicking the Start button , clicking Control Panel, clicking Appearance and Personalization, clicking Personalization, and then clicking Theme.