Windows 7: more Windows 7 basic themes other than the standard light blue????

hello everybody,

Is there a fairly non-technical method to change the color of the windows 7 basic theme (so not the aero themes!!). The windows areo themes do seem to have an excellent basic color selection from grey to orange, but the basic theme only comes in 'baby blue'.

I dont really appreciate the aero themes in my case because I use changing wallpaper backrounds that are visible through the areo themes it just doesn t look good unless you stick to a plain wallpaper solid colour backround........



I tried google this solution for hours the only way is to use thrd party themes which are a nightmare, I just want to stick to simple colours as in the attachment shown (but then with a solid pattern not glass)

any suggestions/help mostly appreciated!

Welcome to the Seven Forums
You are right a 3rd party theme with the basic part done to are hard to find but that's what you would need the basic theme is controlled by the areo theme's .msstyle they share some images and some images are for aero and some for basic.

Have you tried to unchecking Enable Transparency with the aero theme?
Jerry

thanks I figured that out exactly, but there is still some pattern in these colours unfortunately. do you know a way to get one colour so no shine effect??

Hello bras4real about this time last year I recreated some basic themes that can be used on Windows 7 based on the old Windows XP themes. These are not 3rd party themes they were created using the lone windows 7 basic theme the same way you have attempted but I used XP Mode as a guide to get the theme as close to the original as possible

Unzip the zip file and click to install the theme in the Personalization panel or save the theme in C/WINDOWS/Resources/Themes.

More Windows Classic Themes for Windows 7

I use Ave's Windows7 Style Builder and Gimp to edit the .msstyles

Aero no shine


Aero with top frame color change


Basic with frame color change


Jerry

No third-party tools are needed, actually.

You may simply select the Windows 7 Basic theme (with the blue colors you don't like) and then click at the bottom on Windows Color. This time, you won't just get a color selection, but can actually edit each attribute of the UI such as frame thicknesses, font styles and - you guessed it - colors.

After you're happy with your settings, simply save the theme as a new custom theme.

No third-party tools are needed, actually.

You may simply select the Windows 7 Basic theme (with the blue colors you don't like) and then click at the bottom on Windows Color. This time, you won't just get a color selection, but can actually edit each attribute of the UI such as frame thicknesses, font styles and - you guessed it - colors.

I noticed this also, but how do you change the taskbar color???I managed to change the colours of the active windows, and window frames but how to get the taskbar the colour you want..............??? i could nt figure it out...

You all are getting Basic and Classic theme mixed up


Window Color and Appearance can be used on all 3 types of themes (Aero, Bacis, Classic) but will only change to frame color of Classic theme, on Aero and Basic it can only change some text font and color, with Aero and Basic themes you need to edit the aero.msstyles (and it should be a copy of the aero.msstyles renamed) which makes it a 3rd party custom theme and for it to work you will need to do 1 of these 2 ways of Enabling custom themes.
Enabling Custom Themes - Windows 7
Or
Theme - How to Apply Custom Themes

To change the taskbar color with the Classic theme use 3D Objects in Window Color and Appearance

Jerry

I'm running windows 7 home premium x64 sp1 but nothing changes with these themes.

Try putting them in C:\Windows\Resources\Ease of Access Themes folder. The theme packs are just a zip folder download 7-zip and you can extract the contents and put him in the above location and they should show up at the bottom of personalization.

Jerry