Windowblinds 5.01 Issue

from WinCustomize Forums
Iv been looking and iv yet to find a solution that was posted that has helped. WB5.01 refuses to load skins. It changes the skin to the classic windows but doesnt apply the actual skin to windows XP HE. Iv tried some of the things here, all other version of WB worked ok for me and I was hopeing to buy this version soon, if only I could get the trial to work.

I have a ATI Radeon 7000 Series card, and here's what it says with the sys info on WB.

WindowBlinds 5.0 System Information Report:

STATUS : WB+ SRV+ HLP+ UI+ TRAY+

WindowBlinds is installed correctly on this PC.

Your machine does not support per pixel borders on WindowBlinds skins.

This is because :

Your computer graphics hardware does not support acceleration of per pixel alpha. WindowBlinds requires this for per pixel alphablended borders as without it performance would be poor. Please see if you can obtain new drivers for your graphics hardware. Recent ATI & NVIDIA boards should support this feature. Onboard graphics tend not to.

You have one monitor in total.

(Plug and Play Monitor) 1 is attached to RADEON 7000 SERIES

Wblind.dll 2006/03/21 13:35:00
Wbsrv.dll 2006/03/19 12:37:20
Wbconfig.exe 2006/03/19 14:32:58
Wbload.exe 2005/12/21 00:04:40
Wbhelp.dll 2004/09/18 15:37:00

The only other graphic oriented program I have running is IconPackager trial. Im wanting to test this stuff out before I decide whether or not I want to buy it.
windowblinds
2,592 views 6 replies
Reply #1 from WinCustomize Forums Top
This behavior has been reported when prior versions of WB were not uninstalled before installing WB5 (you can't install WB5 "on top of" WB4).

I'd suggest uninstalling completely, uninstalling any previous WB versions if applicable, rebooting to a clean XP desktop, then reinstalling the WB5 trial version, then rebooting again. If you happen to have any skins installed already that you want to preserve, copy the folders to another location before the uninstall(s).
Reply #2 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Your computer graphics hardware does not support acceleration of per pixel alpha. WindowBlinds requires this for per pixel alphablended borders as without it performance would be poor. Please see if you can obtain new drivers for your graphics hardware. Recent ATI & NVIDIA boards should support this feature. Onboard graphics tend not to.


I think your answer is right there. At the very least you'll need updated drivers. At most a new video card. You should have no problems running the 4.6 version though.
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Reply #3 from WinCustomize Forums Top
WB5 does not require hardware acceleration of perpixel alpha, just takes advantage of it when present. It runs fine on my rig, which accelerates only constant alpha, I just don't get the transparency on borders (but I still get taskbar & Please Wait transparency).
Reply #4 from WinCustomize Forums Top
My drivers are fully updated, I never had a prior version installed on this computer, and the error report shouldnt be there since I got 5.01 to work on this same computer at one point before my harddrive crashed.
Reply #5 from Stardock Forums Top
What other software do you have running on your PC?

Do you ever see the Please Wait screen, or does not stop before that?
Reply #6 from WinCustomize Forums Top
all other version of WB worked ok for me


What were you referring to here? A different computer?