Decorate your Windows desktop for Christmas
If you like to decorate your house or apartment for Christmas by adding a Christmas Tree and another decorations around the house, you'd probably also like to do the same for your computer screen.
Decorations for Christmas range from changing the desktop background over installing a new Christmas theme to running all sorts of applications on your system that add Christmas and seasonal effects to it.
We have covered quite a few of those in the past, but never published a single article listing all of them.
This article covers Christmas decorations for the PC that we have reviewed earlier, and new programs and options that came out after we have published the reviews here on Ghacks.
Christmas Software for Windows
Designs and themes
You can check out this list of winter and Christmas themes for Windows 7 published by Microsoft as a starting point. They have been designed for Windows 7, but can also be installed in Windows 8 and newer versions because of it.
Most change the desktop background of the system and the default color scheme only.
Besides those that we have already mentioned in our last article, there are others that Microsoft has released in the meantime.
The Snowy Night theme for Windows features 13 snow and Christmas themed wallpapers that your computer will rotate between when you install it.
Windows 7 users can check out the Windows 7 Christmas theme over on Deviant art which packs 11 HD Christmas wallpapers, five new Christmas icons and a new cursor.
Christmas Theme Windows 8 on the other hand is a HD wallpaper pack for Microsoft's newest operating system Windows 8.
All themes can be installed without having to patch system files. If you are using a different version of Windows, you can still download the theme file and extract it using a program such as 7-Zip to gain access to the wallpapers it contains.
If you are looking for individual wallpaper images, check out the following resource sites that offer plenty of them:
- Christmas on Alphacoders
- Christmas on Desktop Nexus
- Christmas Wallpapers on HD Wallpapers
- Christmas Wallpapers on Deviant Art
- Snow on Desktop Nexus
- Snow wallpapers on Deviant Art
Christmas Software
The free program DesktopSnowOK adds snow to your PC screen. You can modify several parameters, like the number of flakes on the screen at the same time, the speed, or how the flakes look like. It is a lightweight unobtrusive program that works really well in the background.
An alternative is Desktop Snow HD, but it is limited in comparison as there is no option to change how the snowflakes look like.
The animated Christmas tree program on the other hand adds a blinking festive Christmas tree to the PC. While I think that this is too much of a distraction when you are working on your PC, it may work well if you do not but have the PC on.
Christmas in New York and Christmas in Prague on the other hand are animated desktop apps that display an animated cityscape of New York or Prague on your desktop. Animated means that you will notice snow falling down, a night and day shift, and that the days left until Christmas is displayed there as well.
From the same developer comes Animated Christmas Tree for Desktop, a free application to add an animated Christmas Tree to your desktop.
Closing Words
I'd like to know if you are changing the theme or wallpaper when Christmas comes around, or if you are a user who goes the extra mile and runs Christmas software as well on the PC.
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What mental age of reader are you targeting with the first sentence? 10?
Why not write an article on how to *avoid* upgrading from W10 to W11. Analogous to those like me who avoided upgrading from 7 to 10 for as long as possible.
If your paymaster Microsoft permits it, of course.
5. Rufus
6. Ventoy
PS. I hate reading these “SEO optimized” articles.
I used Rufus to create an installer for a 6th gen intel i5 that had MBR. It upgraded using Setup. No issues except for Win 11 always prompting me to replace my local account. Still using Win 10 Pro on all my other PCs to avoid the bullying.
bit pointless to upgrade for the sake of upgrading as you never know when you’ll get locked out because ms might suddenly not provide updates to unsupported systems.
ps…. time travelling?
written. Jan 15, 2023
Updated • Jan 13, 2023
This happens when you schedule a post in WordPress and update it before setting the publication date.
Anyone willing to downgrade to this awful OS must like inflicting themselves with harm.
I have become convinced now that anybody who has no qualms with using Windows 11/10 must fit into one of the following brackets:
1) Too young to remember a time before W10 and W11 (doesn’t know better)
2) Wants to play the latest games on their PC above anything else (or deeply needs some software which already dropped W7 support)
3) Doesn’t know too much about how computers work, worried that they’d be absolutely lost and in trouble without the “”latest security””
4) Microsoft apologist that tries to justify that the latest “features” and “changes” are actually a good thing, that improve Windows
5) Uses their computer to do a bare minimum of like 3 different things, browse web, check emails, etc, so really doesn’t fuss
Obviously that doesn’t cover everyone, there’s also the category that:
6) Actually liked W7 more than 10, and held out as long as possible before switching, begrudgingly uses 10 now
Have I missed any group off this list?
You have missed in this group just about any professional user that uses business software like CAD programs or ERP Programs which are 99% of all professional users from this list.
Linux doesn’t help anyone who is not a linux kid and apple is just a fancy facebook machine.
Microsoft has removed KB5029351 update
only from windows update though
KB5029351 is still available from the ms update catalog site
1. This update is labaled as PREVIEW if it causes issues to unintelligent people, then they shouldn’t have allowed Preview updates ot install.
2. I have installed it in a 11 years old computer, and no problems at all.
3. Making a big drama over a bluescreen for an updated labeled as preview is ridiculous.
This is probably another BS internet drama where people ran programs and scripts that modified the registry until they broke Windows, just for removing stuff that they weren’t even using just for the sake of it.
Maybe people should stop playing geeks and actually either use Windows 10 or Windows 11, but don’t try to modify things just for the sake of it.
Sometimes removing or stopping things (like defender is a perfect example) only need intelligence, not scripts or 3rd party programs that might mess with windows.
Windows 11 was a pointless release, it was just created because some of the Windows team wanted to boost sales with some sort of new and improved Windows 10. Instead, Microsoft cannot support one version well let alone two.
Windows 11 is the worst ugly shame by Microsoft ever. They should release with every new W11 version a complete free version of Starallback inside just to make this sh** OS functionally again.
motherboard maker MSI has recently released a statement regarding the “unsupported processor” blue screen error for their boards using Intel 600/700 series chipsets & to avoid the KB5029351 Win11 update:
https://www.msi.com/news/detail/MSI-On–UNSUPPORTED-PROCESSOR–Error-Message-of-Windows-11-Update-KB5029351-Preview-142215
check out the following recent articles:
Neowin – Microsoft puts little blame on its Windows update after UNSUPPORTED PROCESSOR BSOD bug:
https://www.neowin.net/news/microsoft-puts-little-blame-on-its-windows-update-after-unsupported-processor-bsod-bug/
BleepingComputer – Microsoft blames ‘unsupported processor’ blue screens on OEM vendors:
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/microsoft-blames-unsupported-processor-blue-screens-on-oem-vendors/
While there may be changes or updates to the Windows 10 Store for Business and Education in the future, it is premature to conclude that it will be discontinued based solely on rumors.
My advice, I left win 15 years ago. Now I’m a happy linux user (linuxmint) but there is Centos, Fedora, Ubuntu depending on your needs.
motherboard maker MSI has recently released new BIOS/firmware updates for their Intel 600 & 700 series motherboards to fix the “UNSUPPORTED_PROCESSOR” problem (Sept. 6):
https://www.msi.com/news/detail/Updated-BIOS-fixes-Error-Message–UNSUPPORTED-PROCESSOR–caused-BSOD-on-MSI-s-Intel-700-and-600-Series-Motherboards-142277
I try to disable the Diagnostics Tracking Service (Connected Devices Platform User Services) but it wont let me disable it, any help will be greatly appreciated.
Tank you for your help