Turn Aero On or Off

Learn how to turn Aero affects on or off in Windows Vista.

Introduction

If you’re not interested in all the new eye candy (Aero) introduced in Windows Vista, or you need a little performance boost, you can disable Aero affects.

Aero affects are:

The glass looking windows
Dynamic Windows: Windows seem to fade into the task bar when minimized.
Taskbar Thumbnails: When you point at a minimized window in the task bar a live thumbnail view of that window appears above it.
Windows Flip: A new version of Alt+Tab that shows you live thumbnails of each program running.
Windows Flip 3D: A very fancy version of Windows Flip.
Smooth Window Performance: Windows fade in or out when you open and close them.

Note: You won’t get a large performance boost if you disable Aero because the affects are mostly generated by your graphics card, not the CPU.

Turn Aero Off

Right-click an empty space on your desktop and select Personalize.
Click Window Color and Appearance in the Personalization window.
Click Open classic appearance properties for more color options.
Select Windows Vista Basic under Color Scheme.
Click OK to turn Aero off.
If you want to turn Aero back on, follow the steps above and select Windows Aero under Color Scheme.

Note: If you don’t have a Windows Aero option under Color Scheme your computer’s hardware doesn’t support Aero.