What is on your Windows Sidebar (Update)

By Richard Hay, on April 19th, 2009

When Windows Vista came out one of the many features that was touted included the sidebar. This window sits on your desktop with a multitude of applications – better known as gadgets available to run in it. There are currently over 3,200 gadgets listed at the Windows Live Gallery for your sidebar as of this post.

They are broken down into several categories including:

When I was running only one monitor on my home computer I messed around with the sidebar but it never stayed on the desktop for long – it just took up way too much real estate on a single monitor. For the last 5 months or so I have had a two monitor setup and the sidebar has found a permanent home on my setup (far right of my second monitor in fact).

What I would like to do is share what gadgets have earned a piece of the sidebar – there are 6 permanent ones that I keep on there all the time.

From the top to the bottom:

Control System
Weather (default one that comes with Windows Vista)
Count Down (currently counting down days to release of the new Star Trek film on 08 May 2009 – 19 days!)
Woot
All CPU Meter
Wired Network Meter

So what do you have on your sidebar? Feel free to post links to a picture in the comments.

Richard Hay (3358 Posts)

Richard is the Owner of WindowsObserver.com and has been involved in tech for over 25 years. His first website – AnotherWin95.com – came online in 1995. Back then he used GeoCities Web Hosting for it and what you see here today is the result of the work he has continued on the site since 1995. In January 2010 his community contributions were recognized by Microsoft when he was awarded the Most Valuable Professional (MVP) Award for Windows Desktop Experience. In January 2011 he was renewed as a Microsoft MVP but in a new category called Windows Expert - Consumer and in January 2012 he received the award for the third time.

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