Change the Windows 7 Taskbar to Work Like Vista
While many think the new taskbar feature in Windows 7 is a great improvement, others may not want to use it. Today we take a look at how to get the Vista style taskbar back on Windows 7.
The new Windows 7 taskbar does take some getting used to for sure. However, if you need to get things done on your new OS quickly, you don’t have time to learn how it works.
To get the Vista style taskbar back Right-click an open area on the Taskbar and select Properties.
The Taskbar and Start Menu Properties windows opens up where you will want to click the box next to “Use small icons” and select “Combine when taskbar is full” from the drop down next to Taskbar buttons.
Now the Taskbar look similar to how it did in Vista. It doesn’t look exactly the same but has similar functionality.
Another tweak is to unpin all programs from the Windows 7 Taskbar.
Then follow The Geek’s tutorial on adding the Quick Launch Bar in Windows 7 to get a look and feel that is exactly like Vista with the Quick Launch Bar enabled.
This should help you out when you are too busy to sit and learn the new Windows 7 Taskbar or simply are not a fan of it.
Daily Email Updates
You can get our how-to articles in your inbox each day for free. Just enter your name and email below:
Right, but Win+# doesn’t run the quick launch item. Small downside.
Ah thats better, I never have got on with the Win 7 task bar. So great tip!
Thank you, thank you! Pinning items to the task bar was never an equivalent to the Quick Launch bar, for instance if you want to create a shortcut to open Explorer to a specific folder in a maximized window. And the automatic stacking of separate instances of the same program is just insane, just an attempt to mimic a bad OS X feature that I loathe.
personally i think its the DUMBEST idea to customize taskbar this way in windows 7. imo windows 7 has awesome taskbar, way more usable than old windows way
“And the automatic stacking of separate instances of the same program is just insane, just an attempt to mimic a bad OS X feature that I loathe”
in fact, os x mostly never launch “separate instance” of the same software. mac applications have to be document (or whatever) centric.
I don’t get why you would change the taskbar back, I love the new taskbar.
I think people should spend some time to get used to how things are in 7… If you switch back to the old interface now, you’ll possibly never get around learning to how much better the task bar in 7 is. I wasn’t sure if I liked it at first either, but now I sing it’s praises as the single best thing about 7…
tnx
Got in a little muddle here……….
I have set up quick launch of left side by start, have three icons (mail, internet explorer and windows explorer) in there. If for example I wish to open another internet explorer page the e icon has changed to the web page I already have open eg Google. I then have to go to desktop and double click internet explorer, my home page then opens and shows another par in my Quick Launch area. In windows vista/xp it would show in the taskbar on the right of the quick launch section. The area of the quick launch would always be accessible easily as the e (internet explorer icon) would always remain there.
IF I open another application, like ccleaner, word,mail or spybot they work correct and go to task bar on right of quicklaunch. So basically its an Internet explorer problem. Hope taht makes sense
I have obviously done something wrong or I have misunderstood the instructions
Can anyone assist please
er the window goes to the task bar and is locked in there
Thx, so much. I wanted to kill this annoying, unusable new taskbar. Thanks again, thanks, thanks, thanks….
Bueno el tutorial man
OMG Thankyou!
When you are doing quick editing in lots of things at the same time this new taskbar is an absolute nightmare. It’s like three clicks to change windows back rathar than one.
WHY they would ever want a taskbar so inefficient as this one is beyond me. It’s like in the old system when you would have too many windows open, so it would stack them all together, HATE that.
I need to be able to see QUICKLY exactly what window is blinking at me.