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For windows 7, I'm looking for a good Virtual desktop manager so that on just single monitor I can divide my work into multiple screens like on linux. What are the good options that people have used and works well?

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Is this off-topic? – Soner Gönül Oct 5 '11 at 8:18
consider buying second monitor :) – noisy Oct 5 '11 at 11:43
There are several duplicate questions about Windows virtual desktop software with answers over on Superuser, which is probably a better fit for this more software than productivity related question. – Adam Wuerl♦ Mar 19 '12 at 0:08

closed as off topic by Adam Wuerl♦ Mar 19 '12 at 0:07

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3 Answers

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I've been using Dexpot for over 8 years now, and I really miss it when working on another Windows machine. Supports up to 20 monitors, highly configurable, and works fine with Windows 7 (even on 64 bits). Only discomfort it's caused me is that sometimes, when using Remote Desktop, it causes my desktop icons to disappear.

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Virtual Desktop Manager Powertoy

Virtual Desktop Manager Powertoy converts your single Windows Desktop into four virtual, independent desktops that provide you with a lot more space to organize and distribute windows, applications and documents. What's more, you can assign a hotkey to each one to switch between them more quickly, or just use the four buttons on your taskbar, although you'll probably need to activate this manually by right clicking on the taskbar.

The program includes a Preview function that enables you to get a sneak peek of what's going on in all four desktops. In any case, we highly recommend using different wallpapers on each one of them to avoid the initial confusion.

Pros

* Much more space for apps and windows
* Support for hotkeys

Cons

* Needs to be manually activated
* Can be confusing at the beginning

enter image description here

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I like Virtual Dimension and AltDesk the best. Both have good GUIs. Virtual Dimension is free, while AltDesk has a trial then $15. AltDesk is just slightly better looking--it is skinnable.

It depends a lot on how you will use the software. I used to try to only use the keyboard, VirtuaWin is a good solution if you want no GUI. But I never did stick with that.

I started trying GUI-based solutions like Virtual Dimension and I've had better success with it. I like to be able to just drag a bunch of icons off my current desk and onto other random desks when things are getting cluttered on my main desk.

GUI-based programs help to at least see what is on the desktops I'm dragging to and if those desktops are cluttered to. I used to try to group my desktops, but that is too much of a hassle when you have a lot of windows. Now I just try to keep my left-most desktops as most work relevant, and right most as less work relevant or things like Outlook that aren't needed for programming.

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