WindowFX 5 - Beta 2 Released
Add Animated effects and advanced window controls to your Windows desktop
Thursday, March 15, 2012 by Island Dog | Discussion: WinCustomize News
We have released Beta 2 for the upcoming WindowFX 5 today. WindowFX 5 lets Windows users add animated effects and advanced window controls to your Windows desktop!
New in this update:
- Added new UI for animations to handle presets
- Added new blend options to darken inactive windows feature for colors, desktop, and custom image
- Added modifier for holding Ctrl when dragging to screen edge to stop using edge window resizing
- Updated wobbly windows to complete animation rather than stopping instantly
- Updated performance for multiple monitor setups
- Updated high DPI support
- Updated UI on Windows XP to hide animations tab
- Possibly fix for configurations with multiple discrete graphics cards
- Fix for darken inactive windows displaying a bad animation
- Fix for third party animation script crashing
Current Object Desktop subscribers can download WindowFX 5 beta 2 now from download.stardock.com.
For more information visit the WindowFX website.
Reply #4 Thursday, March 15, 2012 2:59 PM
SDC shows WindowFX 5 beta 4.96 as available for me. And shows the first beta as installed.
Reply #5 Thursday, March 15, 2012 3:07 PM
I downloaded directly from site. I can say the new UI is much more intuitive. Great job SD! ![]()
Reply #7 Thursday, March 15, 2012 3:28 PM
It should show now in Stardock Central. Backend issue when updating the links earlier.
Kris
Reply #10 Thursday, March 15, 2012 5:29 PM
Thank you! Now my wobbly windows are finally transparent while moving. This update is amazing ![]()
Reply #11 Thursday, March 15, 2012 8:18 PM
YAY! This works PERFECTLY on my Geforce 295 (two discrete but identical GPUs) machine now! ![]()
The only odd behavior of note is that it seems to require one explorer.exe crash before it is stable. So when I run the beta and wobble a transparent window a few times, explorer.exe crashes. But after explorer.exe restarts, it doesn't seem to crash again...no matter what I do to it.
This behavior also happens if I log off and then log on, and it is consistent and repeatable.
I have not tried rebooting yet to see if that makes any difference.
This is a 64bit Windows 7 install, if that helps you track things down for the future.
But for now, it works and works smoothly across all three monitors, on top of Windowblinds, Fences, and three different Deskscapes animations. ![]()
Edit: Rebooting shows that no matter what I do, after a few minutes, explorer.exe will restart, forcing Deskscapes to reinitialize all animations, and then everything works just fine after that. Note that either explorer.exe or "program manager" may hang up a log off or restart now. Canceling the operation and then using CTRL-ALT-DEL allows one to safely log off and then restart from there. I hope this helps and THANKS again for looking into this bug.
Reply #12 Friday, March 16, 2012 2:04 PM
This beta seems to be having some z-order issues with windows not getting/grabbing focus when they should (on launch from another window in particular) and windows losing focus for no apparent reason at times.
Win7Pro 64bit, Intel HD3000 graphics. Running WB, WFX5, CFXPro, FencesPro, Dreams.
Reply #13 Friday, March 16, 2012 2:17 PM
Win7Pro 64bit, Intel HD3000 graphics. Running WB, WFX5, CFXPro, FencesPro, Dreams.
We would need more information.
Reply #14 Friday, March 16, 2012 2:41 PM
Glad to give you more info, Neil, but would appreciate guidance about specifics & level of detail.
Reply #15 Friday, March 16, 2012 2:45 PM
Is there a particular time when you can reproduce the problem every time for example?
Reply #16 Friday, March 16, 2012 3:01 PM
Bonsoir
Beta 2 fonctionne trés bien pour moi, à part explorer exe juste aprés l'installation de la béta 2 , j'ai redémaré internet explorer , et tout est rentré dans l'ordre
![]()
Reply #17 Friday, March 16, 2012 3:10 PM
Yes.
I access a remote app by way of Citrix Receiver. Initial login is via a web page (using PaleMoon, FWIW). Enter credentials & another web page opens (in same tab) requiring one additional set of credentials and then (again in the same tab) the remote app 'home page' opens. Clicking on a link on that page launches a Citrix Receiver window (remote desktop) which previously popped to the front (seized focus) but now opens in the background with the browser window retaining focus. When I log off the Citrix Receiver window & it closes, no window has focus - all open windows remain darkened/transparent.
Windows losing focus for no apparent reason is more random/spontaneous & I can't 'reproduce' that, though on occasion it may be another window grabbing focus but not coming to the front in z-order.
If I see other repeating patterns, I'll post again.
Reply #18 Friday, March 16, 2012 3:39 PM
Just now -
Had PaleMoon, Word 2010 and two remote desktop (Citrix) windows open. Closed Word and no window had/took focus.
Edit: If you'd like this discussion moved over to the beta feedback thread, no problem. Should've posted there, anyway. Thx.
Reply #19 Friday, March 16, 2012 7:23 PM
I'm having issues with menus in Dopus v10. I can see the menu shadow but the menu itself is completely transparent, text included. Disabling WFX5 fixes the problem,
W7 x64
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Reply #1 Thursday, March 15, 2012 1:31 PM
Interesting. SDC does not list Beta 2 as available. Does not even show WFX5 as installed, though it most definitely is. I'll need to post in the SDC thread, too, I suppose.