[JASJAR, XDA Exec, MDA Pro General] Knight__Mayor:
TODAY plug ins - mine and why, not mine and why....

Hi Simon,

A lot to cover here as I have tried almost all the apps you mention with varying success.

I'll try to cover these in the order you listed them:

I was a long standing fan of the spb Suite of apps - on my M1000 (xda2) that was pretty much all I used, but I have found a few problems running on the M5000 (xdaExec). It really slowed the machine down - even after removing the SD Card meter from the today screen (recommended!). It was bearable for a while, but then one day I hard reset had forgotten how fast this wee beastie can run!

10 out of 10 for functionality of the spb software - I almost reinstalled it purely for the multi-PIE pages, the safe mode & close button are also two very missed utils - but the performance hit is just too much to take for me nowadays.

SBSH's Pocket Breeze never really appealed to me in the past. Partly due to my affinity with the spb crowd, and partly because when I tried using it on my M1000 I found it ghastly, ugly and really slow.

I returned to Pocket Breeze, etc when I was turned off Pocket Plus etc on the M5000. I installed Pocket Breeze, Contact Breeze and Pocket Weather. All ran pretty well and on the VGA screen - didn't seem to look as bad as I remembered. It's my today item of choice today. There are LOADS of options so you can customise to your heart's delight, and some pretty tasty skins online.

I also installed SBSH iLauncher which is a nice replacement for the shortcut launchpad found on the Pocket Plus today addin. You can use fantastic hi-res icons for your shortcuts making your today screen gorgeous.

SBSH is an all round winner for me!

I am currently running the beta release (for WM5.0) of Wizbar Advance on the M5000. I used it breifly on the M1000, but the slowdown has horrendous and promptly removed it. On the Universal - it does seem to run not too bad. Don't get me wrong - you really do notice a performance hit when it's running, but it's sooooooo beautiful :)

There are lots & lots of options to customise the display, and plenty of beautiful ready made themes available online. I also use the Wisbar Advance Desktop Add-In which gives your today screen a whole new dimension!

(BIG help for me: Uncheck Don't cache background images under Start Menu settings - uses more mem, but far more responsive)

I should say - I don't have wisbar advance running all the time. Usually I have a rather bare skin for speed's sake, but I occasionally flick it on when I am feeling lush (or someone asks to see my pda & I wanna show it at it's best! :oops: )

Can't recommend JournalBar for the Universal at all. I really liked it on the M1000, the RSS feeds were excellent I was really looking forward to having them on my Uni, but not long after installing it I experienced a lockup that needed a HARD RESET to recover from. Thinking I had just overloaded it with apps I started again - JournalBar on 1st. :evil: Same thing.

I have noted a few other threads where people have reported the same.

I do use 1-Calc though. It's a little slow at times - but I still really, really like it.

I have always used, and still am using - Resco Explorer as my main file browser. I can't rate it high enough - It's fantastic, and have never had a problem with it.

Can't say the same for Radio though. Tried installing it a couple of times but it kept crashing and closing itself on me. Also seemed really slow & sluggish.

To get my radio I use the free GSPlayer and find my streams on www.shoutcast.com. Works perfectly for me! Really light too.

All the other ones you mentioned that I didn't - I have never used them so I can't comment.

Hope these comments help (or at least start the ball rolling).

Here's a couple of screengrabs.

Used: WisBar Advance 2, WisBar Advance Desktop, Pocket Breeze, Contact Breeze, iLauncher.