dock apps for windows

Alright, so I've been in the habit of theming windows (be it XP, vista, or windows 7) pretty heavy for a while, and I typically like to use a dock of some sort. I've been using rocketdock because its lightweight and I can customize it exactly how I'd like. Well I just made the jump to windows 7 64 bit, and while the new taskbar is very intriguing I prefer to eliminate it like I normally do. The problem seems to be rocketdock, though it does work just fine under 64 bit, it has one bug that makes it not suitable for this task. Every program I have running (skype, itunes, chrome, CS4, etc.) will minimize to the dock, with the exception of an explorer windows. I checked this with two other windows 7 (32 bit) machines, they didn't have the bug, so I guess I'm s.o.l. there. Objectdock makes me want to vomit all over myself (alright not entirely true, it's usable, but not as lightweight, difficult to customize to my liking, and is lacking - relatively - in visual effects). RKdock hasn't had an update since 2005 so I'm not going to waste my time there. Anyone have any other suggestions?

 

I am very sorry to tell you, those considered BEST dock applications already been tested by you. LOL.
I didn't use RocketDock to maximize or minimize Windows, so, I don't care much about it.
ObjectDock, I agreed. It sucks. LOL. Yet, many people recommend it.
RKLauncher, very beautiful and light weighted but not practical.

Circle Dock? Have you tried?
I know there are something like DELL Dock and HP Dock out there.
But these DELL and HP Docks came with DELL or HP machines. I don't know if they can be installed by other machines.

 

i think Y'z 's page has a dock he's working on (I THINK ?) and theres Xwindows Dock (XWD) which is beautiful like the Mac dock, but awfully heavy. but you could try it tho. and you can try the Cairo shell, its got a good menu bar.

 

Ahh all very good answers, thank you! Tried circle dock, meh not what I was looking for, but a fun piece of software. I think I'll take a look at what you said melthd, thanks.

 

As I recall Dell modified RocketDock to release with some laptops like the Studio 15. Perhaps you could DL it and see whether they improved it?

 

the new win7 taskbar/superbar is starting to get some third-party enhancements. While I too am a fan of Rocketdock don't completely write off the superbar just yet. As I recall Gizmodo (of all places) had a very good write up of the superbar a while back

 

That's certainly and idea, I mean they would have had to fix the 64 bit bugs if they where going to release it on machines that run a 64 bit OS? Or maybe I'm just being too logical I'll check it out when I get home from work.

Yeah the superbar is cool and all...it's mainly that there are very few themes for windows 7 that do anything but change the tint of aero and the desktop background. I preffer more of a change, and I like to swap out browseui.dll while I'm at it.

 

No, Dell's dock is based on ObjectDock.

 

Have you tried running the 32bit version of Explorer, which is included with your OS as well? I bet this one will behave the way you want it to. This one also has the advantage of having the context menu of 32-bit programs integrated. Of course, the downside is that it won't have context menu entries for 64-bit programs.

 

i used to use object dock , i liked the options in object dock but it just stop responding randomly and some time lags , so i changed to rocket dock , i lost alot of options to gain stability

 

ObjectDock Plus will be better than Rocket Dock.
However, ObjectDock Without Plus will not be better than Rocket Dock.

ObjectDock = Resources Hog
RocketDock = Light Resources

 

ObjectDock runs at about 10MB for me, so hardly a hog, especially as most people have 2-4GB to play with these days. 10MB is just an extra tab open in FF after all.

 

Not really. It depends on how you style it. The more effects and icons you put, the heavier the ObjectDock is. It is proven RocketDock is lighter than ObjectDock. RocketDock should beat ObjectDock or equally powerful. However, ObjectDock Plus will beat RocketDock.

 

I have 37 custom icons on my objectdock and have added over 100+ themes and I'm sitting at 3mb of ram usage.

 

The Dell dock is pretty fantastic, but I never got it to work on my non-Dell desktop. Perhaps you're clever enough; I just never tried very hard.

 

regardless of 'features', everything from StarDock including ObjectDock has a yearly cost associated with it. The free version of objectdock is less capable than rocketdock.

 

Definitely, but someone can't get what was I trying to mention(paid and non-paid).
It doesn't matter. OP don't like the ObjectDock anyway.

 

I had not thought of that, I'll be sure to try this.

 

I'm using Objectdock (free version), and I'm currently using 22mb ram. Though I have so much crap on it. I wish I could get the system tray icons in objectdock though....

 

And I see that StarDock has released a simple utility called 'frames' which appears to be a warmed over rehash of the long-standing utility 'sideslide' from www.northglide.com

Problem with everything from stardock is their pricing and product cycle decisions. More than once they've brought out 'free' utilities, improved them to a certain point, then froze development (leaving just 2 or 3 serious bugs in place) and shoved users toward the paid-for objectdock. Kind of like your neighborhood dope dealers.

 

Objectdock uses 2mb on my system lol..

 

That's the first I've heard of that. I am downloading it now to see if I like it.

 

I am really liking this. I'm going to try this, thanks.