Possible to change "All Programs"?

[Jaseva]

Anyone know if it's possible to change the "All Programs" section of the start menu to look like XP? I don't like how it all opens in the same little area.

I have searched around, but can't figure out how to change it.

[Joshua Gourgues]

Show me what your speaking of.... Make it look like what you're trying to explain and then hit your PRINT SCRN buttin up top on your keyboard by the Scroll Lock button. Then open PAINT and just paste that into PAINT. Then save it and upload it somewhere like Picturetrail.com or Photobucket.com. Then insert it in a post. Not really sure what you're trying to do from what you've explained so far.

[Jaseva]

I can't take a screenshot of what I can't do. I'll explain below and if you still don't understand, I can photoshop something up real quick.

Here's the deal:

In XP you hover over "All programs" and the menu of programs pops out to the right. Then you hover over a folder in that list and another menu pops out to the right, etc, etc.

In Vista, you click "All programs" and the list opens directly above it in the far left panel of the icon menu. Then you have to click a folder in that list and a menu appears below that, etc etc.

I want to use XP style on Vista..

[Jaseva]

Okay, I'm home now so I grabbed a screenshot from my desktop with XP.

The first one shows how I want the "All Programs" menu to look (XP). The second one shows how the "All Programs" menu is now in Vista (it opens inside the first pane of the start menu - clicking a folder in there will open that in the same place as well).

[Joshua Gourgues]

You can change the behavior and look of your Start menu so that it works best for your specific needs. To change Vista's Start menu, right-click on the Start button and select Properties. When the Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box appears, click the Start Menu tab ....The primary options on the Start menu dialog box let you select between the Start menu option and the Classic Start menu option. Unless you or someone else has changed it, the Start menu option will be selected. This allows Vista to display its Start menu to operate in the Vista style of a one-column set of programs, as explained earlier in this chapter. The Classic Start menu changes your Vista menu to perform more like the Windows XP Start menu that cascaded out to the right as you selected from submenus.

[Jaseva]

Thank you, but I am familiar with the start menu customization options. The classic start menu option is more like Windows 9x, and that's not what I am looking for.

[Joshua Gourgues]

Well have you tried right clicking on the desktop and selecting PERSONALIZE....then click WINDOWS APPEARANCE...I think that's what it is lol....and then just change that to CLASSIC. See if that helps!

.joshua.

[Jaseva]

Thank you, but I did already try that.

Please note that I have already taken all of the obvious steps to solve my issue.

1. I searched through all the customization included in windows, including the start menu properties.
2. I searched through Google trying to find someone else who may have had the same question and maybe found an answer.
3. I came to ask here.

No one seems to know or care how to do it or if it's even possible.

PS. Joshua Gourgues, thanks for the attempts to help me :)

[goldeagle2005]

Unfortunately, there IS no way of reverting to the XP style of the start menu. It's either the Vista style or Windows Classic style.

[Jaseva]

Thanks. Guess I'll just have to get used to it. I did do a lot of googling on the subject and it seems everyone (but me) thinks the new menu style is a good thing :confused:

Ah well. It's kinda starting to grow on me :)

[Dani]

My main qualm with the new start menu is the little window area is so small that as soon as I start expanding one or two folders, I have to start scrolling way too much to see what I'm doing. So I went and expanded the start menu to show more items at a time (essentially 3X as many). This way even though the start menu items still appear in the one little pane, the pane is much taller which lets me see all of my programs at once.

[Jaseva]

Good idea. I set mine as high as my screen would let it go.

[Dani]

Yeah I did the same but I didn't want to tell you how many I expanded it to at the risk of hiding the fact that I have 2560x1600 resolution :)

[Jaseva]

Wow! How big is your monitor?

[lasher511]

Yet another example of microsoft saying "you pretty much have to" when really it should not be the user that conforms to the OS but rather the OS that conforms to the user and does what the user wants and if it was not for irritating little things like DirectX 10 and later versions of office not being compadible with the pevious. i would say stick with XP if thats what works for you but sadly these things add up and make it impossible not too and therefore means that once again we have to learn a new OS.

[claborde]

I was searching online because I had the same problem I did not like the new Vista all Program menu :-/ Because It's kinda slow for my taste and I end up here.
But I could not find the answer I was searching for here, but I did find a solution on my own. :)
[IMG]http://img253.imageshack.us/img253/6810/programtoolbarez8.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://img253.imageshack.us/img253/programtoolbarez8.jpg/1/w640.png[/IMG]

As you can see I have the same All Program menu almost as XP! In my toolbar and i kept my Vista start menu!
What I did was I created a toolbar.
So here are step by step instructions of how to do it.
1) Create a Toolbar
Right click on the toolbar and select Toolbars and then select new Toolbar......
[IMG]http://img511.imageshack.us/img511/4953/createtoolbarod5.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://img511.imageshack.us/img511/createtoolbarod5.jpg/1/w640.png[/IMG]L]

2)Then it will ask you for a folder Paste this there
C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs
Then select Folder and you are done :)
[IMG]http://img296.imageshack.us/img296/2928/programtoolbar2ix2.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://img296.imageshack.us/img296/programtoolbar2ix2.jpg/1/w640.png[/IMG]

[jbennet]

dont use imageshack use the upload attachment feature here
then the links are guaranteed to stay working

[Jaseva]

Thanks claborde. That is a great idea!