Get The Vista Sidebar In Windows XP
I am now running the Windows Vista sidebar in Windows XP. How to do it? Well, its not easy… Just follow the instructions here.
Basically, you download the Sidebar files, then download the patch. Copy the Parts folder to your created User\Parts folder, apply the patch, copy xmlrw.dll to your Sidebar folder, and run the Sidebar.
Now, as to the Gadgets that come with the Sidebar.
The first appears to just show random images from your hard drive. At the moment, it has no options to customize.
The second is an RSS headline display gadget. Currently, you can have one RSS feed, and a +/- sign determines whether you see one or four headlines.
The third is a clock. You can add a second hand, as I’ve done.
The fourth is a search box. It comes with MSN Search as the default, but you can change it easily by entering a search string.
You can specify the side of the monitor the Sidebar appears on, and which monitor it appears on (if you have multiples).
With all four default Gadgets running, you lose about 19 megabytes of RAM, pretty much on par with my Konfabulator experience. Objects can be removed from the Sidebar and be placed pretty much anywhere.
As you can see, its not exactly feature-rich at the moment. In fact, parts of it don’t even work. But, if you are like me and are having fun getting your XP system to look like Vista (as mine does, thanks to WindowBlinds), then this is a worthy addition. Also, proof positive Gadgets work in XP, since anybody can get them right now.
Or you could just use the GDS sidebar
-dg
Comment by Delicate Genius | October 14, 2005
Vista Sidebar for XP
Tech-Recipes.com has the… er… recipe. I’m not gonna do it, but Nathan has a full writeup.
Via Nathan Weinberg.
Trackback by MicrosoftBlog.com | October 14, 2005
Thats all very well but, where the heck are you supposed to get the file??
Comment by shokx | February 15, 2006
You need a Windows Vista DVD, either from a legitimate beta tester, or off bit torrent. I won’t point to illegal files, but if you have them, you might as well be able to use them in fun ways.
Comment by Nathan Weinberg | February 15, 2006
Don’t download this crap.
No bajen esta casaca
Comment by Tu madre | February 1, 2007
Kids Kids!!!!
At ease Please!
http://mstn.homedns.org/asp/news/news_detail.asp?id=3520
There you have it…
Comment by Xaban | March 19, 2007
Cani use vista gadgets in XP sidebar
Comment by Sathish | May 23, 2007
Or get Google desktop and turn on the sidebar - that looks very vistery (every body nicks every body else’s ideas - windows nicked Mac OSX, Google pinched Vista, open office nabbed .doc filetypes, Ms office initially nabbed .doc from mac)
Comment by RMW | June 1, 2007
thxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx alot
Comment by ahmed | June 30, 2007
Vista’s sidebar does have a couple things that are much better than the others. Thanks for the info.
Comment by Greg Pierquet | August 22, 2007
really????????????????????????????? how to dl the software you dum?
Comment by Ramon | October 22, 2007
hello - with such xp software can I then also download vista gadgets, like from http://www.gadgetsdownload.com
now I have asked on a few forum lets see what happens.
Comment by movie | March 9, 2008
how to download side bar
Comment by Aun | May 7, 2008