Windows 7: Windows Explorer Folder Preview Thumbnails - XP style?

I keep hearing (MS?) people saying that if you move to Windows 7 your only option to deal with any gripes you might have with it s way of doing things, is to just cope with them.

Well now, aint that some way to spoil your customers!

Heres what.

I ve got folders with images and I do a lot of sorting and moving around and when I used XP I could see little fancy tumbnail previews of the images inside the folder, ON the folder icon.

Windows 7 does this too but in an inept, I-need-to-be-different-for-differents-sake kinda way.

Now, why the heck would MS want to go changin stuff around that aint needin no changin around I wonder.



Then I wonder if theres somewhere I can change this around to a practical setting but soon realize theres no such setting anywhere.

... hence I ve arrived here.

Is there a hack/tool/whatever around someplace that will let me fix Windows Explorer tomake it useful to me once again?

What's wrong with the way Windows 7 folders display their pictures?

I've actually found that it works pretty well when I have my thumbnails set somewhere between "Large Icons" and "Extra Large Icons":

The answer to that is in your own picture.

I need unobscured folder preview thumnails and the flat, 2D quad thumb folder preview.

The Windows 7 way of doing this is just looks over functionality and will most likely have me move back to XP rather than going 3rd party software for something that was already in the OS before.

I cant beleive M$ scrapped such a useful feature just like that. The XP implmentation really ought to have been a legacy function, costing M$ only the slightest of efforts.

For picture management, I don't really see much difference between Windows XP and Windows 7 methods of displaying folder thumbnails, with the exception that on Windows XP, the images displayed are more cramped and harder to see than on Windows 7.

In either case, really, would it not simply be easier to just go into the relevant folder and not have to squint your eyes at thumbnails that are less than 48x48 pixels? Just set your Thumbnail Size to "Extra Large Icons" or somewhere inbetween.

But if I might make a suggestion, you might want to consider using Microsoft Windows Live Essentials 2011 or ACDSee Photo Manager 12 for picture managements. I myself used ACDSee on Windows XP, but since I've been using Vista and later Windows 7, I adopted Windows Live Photo Gallery, which is easier to use.

When used together, Windows Explorer Search and Windows Live Photo Gallery make the best picture management tools I have seen. And my Pictures folder currently contains 173,814 Files across 2,764 Folders...

I would ve settled for a 'No, theres no way to change it...', yknow?

Dude, stop downplaying it. The Windows 7 folder tumbnail preview is botched, it s right there for everyone to see. If it suits your needs, fine but stop telling me the sky is green ok.

Furthermore, I specifically said I m not interested in any additional software to get around it.

Also, in that same screen space you d get 6 folders with quad thumbs showing in XP as compared to only two in Windows 7. That is if you bother to disable the side panel in XP of course.

Blowing up the Windows 7 folders in size like that just to get no additional benefit is just lol. Despite how cheap screen realestate has become today, I ll pretend I never read that suggestion.

Tell me why did you bother with Win 7 if you want to turn it into a glorified edition of an almost obsolete OS

If you are so concerned then return to your beloved XP, and let us carry on looking to the future,

No need to get your wand in a twist. I was only trying to help. Perhaps my advice would be of service to others who are reading this thread.

But you did ask for a solution:

You asked for a TOOL or WHATEVER to make it useful again - hence I suggested Windows Live Photo Gallery to be used together with Windows Explorer.

You also wrote, in a later post:
Windows Live Essentials is NOT 3rd Party software. It's a Microsoft program suite that was originally bundled together as part of Vista, but became a standalone optional download for Windows 7 in order to allow for more frequent updates.

Also, if you have multiple images in a folder and you want just 1 image as the folder preview you can copy and paste an image (will appear as (2) or .copy) and rename it folder.jpg




OS

that last way is how i like to do it.
but if you have a landscape framed pic instead of the vertical portrait pic. then a quarter of the pic is obstructed by the folder flap.
what i hate about it is that the angled view is visually unpleasing to how i want to look at a photo... even in thumbnail form.
the flat, 2d view on the folder was the better way. its irritating that going to that way is not even an option in 7.

I think it was more of an anti-trust issue. I haven't seen any evidence of frequent updates.