Its basically a preference option, I skin them all, 99% of the time because I feel obligated to and I believe it does look better, Also a way to distinguish oneself via creativity, having said that, doesn't bother me at all if someone else doesn't.

One thing tho Mike \ SD.. I have noticed on some of your skins that the large 'spacial' shell images in XP are not showing. This is because you apparently are skinning XP last and the explorer background image in Vista.. is being used in XP. When this happens, your XP shell images are not showing to the XP user. This is a shame as you did take the time to make them. I'm sure you probably weren't aware so I thought I'd point it out.

The explorer Bg's can be removed in the XP version to remedy the issue.

Btw, anyone with SKS can do this easily for themselves if they would prefer to see the special folder shell images as opposed to pinstripes.

The skin itself is very clean, very usable, as usual. I'll be holding onto this one. and to WC for getting the ball rolling on teh sub. skins.

Great skin, Mike....posted a ss yesterday in W7 Desktops. Works very well with 7.

Thanks!!!

I love black / dark blue skins.  This is a nice addition.  Thanks to all.

vStyler, I was aware of that. I skin the large shell icons in case the user has explorer backgrounds disabled. I personally prefer the explorer background to the shell pics on XP.

z71, I dual boot XP solely so I can skin it. I asked if the small shell icons were a usability issue because, otherwise, I'm not sure why you'd ask me to skin them for you from now on.

Fair enough

Mike, I use XP 90% of the time. I'm still an XPer. I use what I like. I still like XP. I just dual boot Vista and now Win 7 solely to skin them, also.

I'm confused though. You did make icons for it, you just left the control panel one blank. Sometimes you do, sometimes you don't. I just don't like to download or purchase a skin, that still has those awful default icons showing. They stick out like a sore thumb. If I pay for something, it better be 100% skinned. The freebies, I'll let slide.

Kevison, this was made with Vista in mind. It fully supports XP though.

z71, I must apologize. I misunderstood which small shell icons you were referring to. I was talking about the small pics inside the shell pane, but you were talking about the small icons on the shell bar. You are correct, I did intend to use a single icon for all of them, but I apparently overlooked the control panel one. Sorry about that.

Mike, that's OK. Like you, I too leave the small pics blank, most of the time. Yes, I was referring to the small icons, not the small pics.

No harm done. This is now my default skin.

Wow,very nice indeed. I like dark skins and have loads of walls that will go well with this. Thanks a bunch!!

Thank you for this.  Should be fun to apply texture to it.