What Is Aero?

You've probably heard the hype about something called Aero. But what is it? In a nutshell, Aero is the ultimate visual experience for Windows Vista. It's a new user interface with a transparent glass design with animations and cool new colors, and it's a feature you can use only if your computer meets some specific requirements.

Aero comes with Windows Vista Business, Windows Vista Enterprise, Windows Vista Home Premium, and Windows Vista Ultimate, but you'll also need to meet some hardware requirements. For starters, this includes a 1-gigahertz (GHz) processor, 1 gigabyte (GB) of random access memory (RAM), and a 128-megabyte (MB) graphics card. Aero also requires a DirectX 9class graphics processor that supports a Windows Display Driver Model, Pixel Shader 2.0 in hardware, and 32 bits per pixel. You'll need your display settings for color at 32-bit too.

TURN ON AERO

Come on, you know you want to...turn on Aero, and give it a whirl:

Right-click an empty area of the desktop, and click Personalize.

Select Windows Color And Appearance.

If you see what's shown in the following illustration, you can use the Aero interface. If you see something else, specifically an Appearance Settings dialog box, you don't meet the minimum requirements to run Aero. (This may be because of the edition of Windows Vista you're running or because your computer doesn't meet the minimum requirements.)

Select Enable Transparency.

Select a color.

Click OK.

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