Introduction
Bz Xi Freshsnow is a WindowBlinds theme, which has been ported across to Windows by Bzeitler from the original Guikit by Pat. It is a simple, minimalist theme and comes in three different colour schemes, grey, blue and green. I have tried to show these three different variations in the header image. Interestingly, another feature offered by Bzeitler is the addition of a ‘Prefs’ WindowBlinds skin (see below image). This contains the preferences bar, found in OSX System Preferences below the main titlebar. This seems strange at first, but is useful for applying as a ‘per application’ skin in WindowBlinds, for use with Control Panel.

First Impressions
First impressions of the theme are that it is simple, easy to use, and quite colourful. It reminds me slightly of Aluminium Allow in the contrast between the simple white colours and the bright buttons and shellstyle. It is almost a colourful variation on Milk. Also, because WindowBlinds is being used, the buttons on the toolbar can be modified to sit towards the left of the window (emulating a Mac even more strictly).

The only negative first impression is the very slight contrast between the white font and light grey selection image on the taskbar. This makes it fairly difficult to read the window description text. Also, the Apple logo to open the start menu is a little too light, and may have worked better in the colour of the theme (i.e grey, blue or green).

Usability
As in most themes, the start menu remains fairly unaltered. The colours are fairly plain, and fit in very well with the rest of the theme. One very slight complaint here could be that as you navigate down the start menu structure, the font increases in size considerably. Although this makes the menu structure easier to read, it does not seem to fit quite so well with the rest of the start menu.

The earlier font complaint aside, the fonts throughout the rest of the theme work very well, and in most places the dark grey contrasts the light shades of the theme excellently. The expand icon for showing the hidden taskbar icons is very OSX like, with a plus icon changing to a minus icon when open.

Another aspect of this theme which works very well is the scrollbars. These are white bullet shapes, with two grey/silver semicircular areas in the end in darker grey (see image below). This looks very good, and is a welcome change from the standard blue scrollbars.

Although WindowBlinds does not use a ‘ShellStyle’ as such, it has a similar effect. The ShellStyle included with this theme works very well, and varies depending on the colour option chosen. The only complaint I have here is that the shellstyle is a green colour, even on the snow theme setting. It could be this is deliberately done to try to mimic the Mac theme as closely as possible.

Extras
The theme does not come with any extras. However the addition of the preferences skin and shellstyle should be noted.

Conclusion
Overall, this is a great theme. The simplicity of a theme such as Milk coupled with the colourful aspect combine to make a worthy addition to any WindowBlinds skin collection. I love this theme, and despite it’s few flaws find it to be a welcome change from most Aqua orientated themes. The preferences panel is a great idea, and can be found in many of Bzeitler’s WindowBlinds themes. Give it a go, and I’m sure you’ll be using it for months to come!

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Credits:
Pat - Original author of the guikit for OSX (http://www.xiap.net).
Bzeitler - Ported to WindowBlinds by bzeitler.