Is this software legal?

I was hunting around for some software that makes XP prettier. I came across something called "Vista Customization Pack 3.6".

The description seems great, but... If i understand it correctly, it replaces Windows XP componets with ones from Vista. Something about that seems illegal and generally unsafe.

Does anyone know about this software?

It always seems like the perfect way for someone to slip me a virus

 

Softpedia says it is Virus/spyware free.

http://www.softpedia.com/get/Desktop-Enhancements/Shell-Replacements/Vista-Customization-Pack.shtml

You can take a look at the reviews. One said it doesn't work with SP3. Another said it changed their language to Arabic.

 

Why not the Vista Transformation Pack? It's more current and seems to have better support.

http://www.windowsxlive.net/vista-transformation-pack

 

Those things bog down system performance and can never be "fully" removed

 

Why not just run the real thing?

 

Thanks for the responses guys. I will guess at this point that it isn't illegal, but I won't rule out it being a generally bad idea (performace and security wise).

I'm glad to know it isn't one big virus. When I saw how many Windows system files it replaced all I could imagine is that it is the worst virus on earth.

I'll give that a try, thank you. This look like the same thing, but newer and better!

I am a little nervious about that. In the past I have kept my computer very clean and without software in order to get better performance. But I recently gained a tremendous amount of power by eliminating elements I don't use with Nlite. Since I don't do more then web browsing and typing, I'm looking for a fun way to use the extra power .

I am going to install it on a separate partition though. Just in case it is going to make my old Pentium M angry.

My old Toshiba L25 doesn't make the Vista cut I think

 

If you must use one of these tools, then go with Vista Transformation Pack
Its much better
But be warned, it will probably make your system slower

 

heh, I just made a thread about this yesterday I think.
XP functionality+Vista looks = awesome

 

I'm amazed how little the Vista Transformation Pack affected performance. It is running very smooth. Of course, I didn't install all the 3rd party software because I want to use ObjectDock and ObjectBar to get the elements I like from MAC. So the software for altering the taskbar and startmenu was uneeded.

I did encounter a few errors. I'm not sure if it is caused by SP3 or because I emilinated a lot of stuff from my install CD with nLite. Nothing too bad though.

 

Check it out! My computer is having an identity crisis .

2 part MAC + 1 part VISTA +2 part XP = awesome.

I used Vista Transformation Pack, Object Dock and Object Bar.

 

lol, wow it can be done after all. Well done!

 

Now run crysis on that partition

 

The one game I play lists this as its requirements, so I think I'm all set

Surprisingly though all this junk isn't slowing down my computer much at all.

According to my task manager my CPU is averaging 5% use and physical RAM use is about 360MB while web browsing.

I have 2GB of RAM I might as well be using it!

 

It's a resource hog. Funny how XP users don't like Vista but yet like it's 'pretty' personality. I've tried this program on an XP and though it's nice looking it's not worth it.

 

I had XP looking like vista well before it came out. It didnt hog any resources.

It was for the most part a simple theme change that looked like areo, I liked it much better than xp and its not illegal because its not vista or stealing any vista function its just a theme change really.

 

The reason I was concerned with the "Vista Customization Pack" was because when I was setting it up it appeared that it was replacing Windows XP EXE's with ones from vista. For example the calc.exe (the calculator, I believe that is what it is called). I wasn't sure if it was replacing it with recreations of Vista's components or the actual EXE's from Vista. If that had been the case, I think Microsoft would consider it pirating of some sort. However, I wound up not using that particular program anyway.

My computer isn't powerful enough to run Vista well. So this is my best alternative. Although these programs really aren't so bad resource-wise. They use up a modest amount of RAM, but no significant amount of processing power. With all these programs running to make it look like Vista & MAC I am running as smoothly as ever! Very happy with it.