Bringing a Windows Classic theme to Windows 11

How to make Windows 11 look like Windows 95

from Stardock Forums

Earlier this year, we released WindowBlinds 11 and with it, we included a modern theme that looks like the future of Windows but also a retro theme that brings back memories of Windows XP. And today, we are taking it back even further with a true classic Windows theme.

With the latest update to WindowBlinds 11, we have now included Windows Classic, a truly retro theme that takes you back to the era of Windows 95. We have spent a significant amount of time crafting this style to be a faithful replication of the previous version of Windows.

And like our other themes, when paired with Start11, you get the best experience where the Start menu, along with the frames and taskbar, are themed too. The Windows Classic theme is included as a default option, and while you can install many other styles from our user-created marketplace inside the application, there is no additional cost for this particular theme.

Along with the new theme, there are a couple of bug fixes in this release including better interoperability with Fences 4 along with an improved experience for selecting which themes to include during installation.

While we don’t want to spoil any upcoming themes, this is not the only release we have planned for WindowBlinds 11. Our expert skinners are already working on another update that we know you will love but you’ll have to wait until early next year for that release.

You can download the update with the new theme today by opening WindowBlinds and searching for an update, downloading the build from your Stardock dashboard, or if you need to purchase the application, you can do so here.

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Reply #1 from Stardock Forums Top

So far so good! :thumbsup:  

Thanks to Neil and his team. Did Dani do the W95 theme?

Reply #2 from WinCustomize Forums Top

DOSShell, Win386, Win 3 next? ;-P 

Siege of Centauri
Reply #4 from Stardock Forums Top

The theme itself was not the thing with a price on it. The post says Windows Classic shipped as a default style at no additional cost, so if you already had WindowBlinds it turned up in an update. What costs money is WindowBlinds.

Which is a fair thing to be annoyed about and I will not pretend otherwise. Microsoft dropped the Classic option after Windows 7, and the only route back is a third party skinning engine, so you end up paying to restore something you used to have for nothing. That is an irritating position to be put in regardless of who is doing the charging.

What I would say for it is that Classic is much harder to reproduce than people assume. It is not a grey colour scheme. The whole look lives in the bevels and the metrics, the exact border widths and the light and shadow edge on every button and frame, and being a pixel out on any of it reads as wrong even when you cannot point at what is wrong. I saw a lot of near misses over the years, back in the WB5 days and since. Getting it actually right is the work.

Reply #5 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Quoting SilverSage, reply 4146001

so you end up paying to restore something you used to have for nothing.

End of SilverSage's quote

And yet, you paid for that Win7 that could be 'classic' then took the free upgrades away from 7 and ended up with 11 [assuming you had the hardware] or at least 10.

So, people freely gave up what they had...

I didn't.  I'm typing this in Win 7 still.  OS has been alive now for 11 years, still the original install ...;)

Reply #6 from Stardock Forums Top
Quoting SilverSage, reply 4146001

Microsoft dropped the Classic option after Windows 7, and the only route back is a third party skinning engine, so you end up paying to restore something you used to have for nothing. That is an irritating position to be put in regardless of who is doing the charging.

End of SilverSage's quote

The premise that the Classic theme was free on W7 is false. Just because you didn't see the price tag does not mean it was free. In fact, the price for MS's OS is included in the price of your computer. You just weren't given an itemized bill.

Any further "upgrades" of OS such as W10 to W11 simply traded one OS for another at the same original price.

 

 

Reply #7 from Stardock Forums Top

Fair. The licence was in the price of the machine, and calling it free was sloppy of me. Point taken from both of you.

What I was reaching for is a different thing, and it is not really about money. Classic was never a theme. Under 95 through 2000 that look was just the system metrics: border widths, title bar height, the 3D colours, all of it sitting in Display Properties for anyone who fancied lilac window frames. XP put the visual style engine on top, and "Windows Classic" in XP was what you got with the engine switched off. It was the absence of a theme rather than a theme.

Which is why rebuilding it as a skin is awkward work. You are asking a theming engine to imitate the state of having no theming engine, and every bevel that used to fall out of the metrics now has to be drawn on purpose. That is a harder brief than it looks from outside, and it is the part I find interesting.

Jafo has the only real answer to the argument anyway. He still has it because he never handed it over. Eleven years on the original install is the one migration strategy nobody can argue with.

Reply #8 from Stardock Forums Top

I can certainly agree Classic was never a theme. It was, at best, oatmeal: Bland and blah. I applaud it as I applaud any and every skin. An artist or a group got together to improve what we get with Windows. 

I also agree that Jafo's obstinacy is admirable. For the life of me I can't abide thowing away a perfectly operational OS. If MS wants to "improve" or diversify, fine. I think we should be allowed choice and be provided mainainance...but that's just my opinion.

I do hope SD's UI artists continue to do what they can with MS's droppings. It's a frustrating but gallant effort.

Reply #9 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Quoting Jafo, reply 4146025
Quoting SilverSage, reply 4146001

so you end up paying to restore something you used to have for nothing.

End of SilverSage's quote

And yet, you paid for that Win7 that could be 'classic' then took the free upgrades away from 7 and ended up with 11 [assuming you had the hardware] or at least 10.

So, people freely gave up what they had...

I didn't.  I'm typing this in Win 7 still.  OS has been alive now for 11 years, still the original install ...;)

End of Jafo's quote

<3

Reply #10 from JoeUser Forums Top

My solution isn't for everyone.

Not getting security updates from MS means I'm paying for 0Patch instead [and doing that on the other systems on Win 10 as well...same reason].

I am forced to run a few proggies via Win10 on a VM on the main machine's Win 7 as they are no longer functioning on 7.  That in itself isn't something Joe Average is likely to want to do.

Upside is that with no MS updates I can go six months without a reboot .... ;)

Running the same OS for decades means you get pretty used to it... just like an old pair of undies ...;)

Reply #11 from Stardock Forums Top

Fair enough, and it cuts both ways. You are paying 0Patch to hold on to the thing you never gave up. I pay a subscription to get the look of it back. Neither of us got out of this for free, we just picked different bills.

The Win10 VM sitting on a Win7 host is the part I did not see coming. Every setup like this I have run into goes the other way, old OS in the box, current one underneath.

And the honest limit of my route is that a skin gives me the borders and the bevels back. It does not give me a system that stops moving underneath me. You have both. I decided a long time ago I would rather take the updates and repaint the result, but that is not the same trade and I am not going to dress it up as one.

Six months without a reboot is showing off, though.