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Nexus Dock v15.7 Released!
July 27, 2015
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The Winstep Nexus dock is a FREE dock for Windows. Every feature you’d expect from a dock, including widgets, mouse-over effects, skins, drag-and-drop, and many others not available in most other docks, such as live icon reflections, in-dock system tray, blur-behind effects, and much more. Completely customizable, with thousands of different backgrounds freely available online, Nexus is fully compatible with skins for all 3rd party docks.
Nexus runs on the 32 and 64 bit versions of Windows 2000, XP, 2003, Vista, 7, 8.x and Windows 10.
Full compatibility with Windows 10 is here!
v15.7 makes Nexus 100% compatible with Microsoft's Windows 10.
Fixing a couple of nagging issues, such as Nexus hanging for a couple of minutes when running for the first time and
the Windows Start Menu button being disabled when showing the Windows taskbar, v15.7 also adds support for Windows Apps and the new Windows 10 Virtual Desktop Manager.
Important note to currently registered Nexus Ultimate users:
To make up for the fact that there were no new releases for a while, this upgrade - making Nexus Ultimate fully compatible with a brand new Windows version - is FREE to you provided your license key is valid for updates released until November 22 2012 or later.
If you are updating via the Winstep Update Manager, the Updater itself will let you know if your license key is NOT valid for v15.7, in which case you will have to either renew your upgrade subscription or stay with the version you already have.
You can find more details about your license key at the bottom of the About tab of Nexus Ultimate Preferences. You can also renew your upgrade subscription from that tab if necessary. For more information about Nexus Ultimate's Upgrade Policy please click here.
What's New? Highlighted Features:
- Full Windows 10 support.
- Improved the experience of running Nexus for the first time.
- New 'Task View' internal command to invoke the Windows Virtual Desktop Manager (Windows 10 only)
- Improved the way Nexus behaves when the user presses 'Show Desktop'.
- An Always on Bottom dock is no longer allowed to come forward on mouseover even if 'pop up dock on mouseover' is enabled.
- Live preview thumbnails of running applications can now range from 64 to 512 pixels.
- The Theme Browser now displays the name of the theme author, where available.
- Fixed problem in the Update Manager that could cause downloads to fail randomly with a 'File may be corrupt' error.
- Various other misc. improvements and bug fixes...
Nexus v15.7 complete change log:
- Added Romanian language file.
- On Windows 8/10 Glass Blur settings are now enabled to allow for 3rd party glass blur applications but the blur feature itself is disabled by default.
- Added new internal command 'Task View' to invoke the Virtual Desktop Manager (Windows 10 only).
- Windows 10 Metro Apps in the list of running applications now display a customized icon instead of the default system icon.
- The size of mouseover window preview thumbnails can now range between 64 to 512 pixels.
- Improved the way the dock behaves when the user presses 'Show Desktop'.
- The Tip of the Day is no longer displayed when being run for the first time.
- The default dock now has a 'Show Tip of the Day' icon.
- The Check for Updates dialog no longer pops up when being run for the first time, and a check for updates is performed immediately in the background.
- Added new 'Restore Wallpaper' internal command to restore any Windows wallpaper changed when switching to a Winstep theme.
- Added a 'Restore Wallpaper' internal command icon to the default dock.
- The balloon tooltip of dock items with thumbnails now also displays the thumbnail.
- Added new 'Busy' animation to replace the hourglass animation.
- An Always on Bottom dock is no longer allowed to come forward on mouseover even if 'pop up dock on mouseover' is enabled.
- The Update Manager Window showing new versions available now appears in the taskbar and can be minimized.
- The Theme Browser now displays the name of the theme author, where available.
- Enabling both the Rain Drop effect and the 'Hide Dock at Startup' setting would cause several glitches until the dock was activated for the first time, such as the rain drop audio immediately playing, animated icon reflections being visible and dock activation animation not playing properly for the first time.
- The application would crash if the user answered No to any of the confirmation dialogs in the Troubleshooting Options dialog.
- Updated the URL used for displaying 'Detailed Weather conditions' for Weather.com, which was no longer correct.
- A hidden dock would pop up (but inactive) immediately after exiting a full screen application when using the fade hide animation.
- On Windows 10 the Winstep service would silently crash when trying to install new fonts and would become unavailable until the next reboot. This caused, among other things, the application to hang for a couple of minutes when running for the first time as it tried to install the default theme fonts.
- Under Windows 10 the tasklist no longer displays multiple windows for each Metro app or for Metro apps that are no longer visible.
- Windows 10 apps would always display a black thumbnail in the list of running applications, so we now display an icon instead.
- Under a clean Windows 10 installation the dock now tries to add a default shortcut to Internet Explorer instead if the default browser is a Windows App.
- Removed 'Start Flip3D' internal command from Windows 8.x onward since it is no longer available.
- Under Windows 8 and Windows 10 the Windows Start Button did nothing when clicked on after restoring the visibility of the Windows taskbar.
- Image thumbnails no longer pop on and off when browsing a network folder on a menu.
- Fixed the 'Peek Desktop' internal command which wasn't working properly (Windows 7).
- Thumbnails in Delete File Confirmation dialog are now displayed with the correct aspect ratio.
- When pinning an application to the dock in which the executable does not have a Version Info block, the executable filename is used instead.
- Auto-Complete was not working properly on several configuration dialogs.
- Icons of URL shortcuts were not being resolved properly.
- Tooltips of pictures or running application preview thumbnails appearing at the very top of the screen would not be visible.
- A tooltip would not display for the first picture preview thumbnail on a menu.
- If a picture or running application thumbnail could not change position when switching then the previous thumbnail was not being erased and the thumbnail appeared instantly instead of fading in.
- The application would sometimes crash when executing certain shell functions (such as 'Set as Desktop Background' for an image item) from a context menu.
- Fixed issue with the Winstep Update Manager which could cause it to mis-report the size of the file download so far and even terminate with a 'Download may be corrupt' error.
Nexus Ultimate v15.7 complete change log:
- On Windows 8/10 Glass Blur settings are now enabled to allow for 3rd party glass blur applications but the blur feature itself is disabled by default.
- Added new internal command 'Task View' to invoke the Virtual Desktop Manager (Windows 10 only).
- Windows 10 Metro Apps in the list of running applications now display a customized icon instead of the default system icon.
- The size of mouseover window preview thumbnails can now range between 64 to 512 pixels.
- The Quick Launch tab in the Shelf now includes items pinned to the taskbar (Windows 7 and above) and is also monitored for changes.
- Improved the way Nexus Ultimate behaves when the user presses 'Show Desktop'.
- The Tip of the Day is no longer displayed when being run for the first time.
- The default Main Shelf tab now has a 'Show Tip of the Day' icon.
- The Check for Updates dialog no longer pops up when being run for the first time, and a check for updates is performed immediately in the background.
- Added new 'Restore Wallpaper' internal command to restore any Windows wallpaper changed when switching to a Winstep theme.
- Added a 'Restore Wallpaper' internal command icon to the default dock.
- The balloon tooltip of dock items with thumbnails now also displays the thumbnail.
- Added a 'Icon Labels' sub-menu to the Shelf context menu to quickly set the number of lines used by icon labels in the Shelf.
- Added new 'Busy' animation to replace the hourglass animation.
- Always on Bottom docks are no longer allowed to come forward on mouseover even if 'pop up dock on mouseover' is enabled.
- The Update Manager Window showing new versions available now appears in the taskbar and can be minimized.
- The Theme Browser now displays the name of the theme author, where available.
- Enabling both the Rain Drop effect and the 'Hide Dock at Startup' setting would cause several glitches until the dock was activated for the first time, such as the rain drop audio immediately playing, animated icon reflections being visible and dock activation animation not playing properly for the first time.
- The application would crash if the user answered No to any of the confirmation dialogs in the Troubleshooting Options dialog.
- Updated the URL used for displaying 'Detailed Weather conditions' for Weather.com, which was no longer correct.
- A hidden dock would pop up (but inactive) immediately after exiting a full screen application when using the fade hide animation.
- On Windows 10 the Winstep service would silently crash when trying to install new fonts and would become unavailable until the next reboot. This caused, among other things, the application to hang for a couple of minutes when running for the first time as it tried to install the default theme fonts.
- Under Windows 10 the tasklist no longer displays multiple windows for each Metro app or for Metro apps that are no longer visible.
- Windows 10 apps would always display a black thumbnail in the list of running applications, so we now display an icon instead.
- Under a clean Windows 10 installation the dock now tries to add a default shortcut to Internet Explorer instead if the default browser is a Windows App.
- Removed 'Start Flip3D' internal command from Windows 8.x onward since it is no longer available.
- Under Windows 8 and Windows 10 the Windows Start Button did nothing when clicked on after restoring the visibility of the Windows taskbar.
- Sub-docks with an opening animation set to None would not appear until the time required to play an (invisible) animation had elapsed.
- Image thumbnails no longer pop on and off when browsing a network folder on a menu.
- Fixed the 'Peek Desktop' internal command which wasn't working properly (Windows 7).
- Thumbnails in Delete File Confirmation dialog are now displayed with the correct aspect ratio.
- When pinning an application to the dock in which the executable does not have a Version Info block, the executable filename is used instead.
- Auto-Complete was not working properly on several configuration dialogs.
- Icons of URL shortcuts were not being resolved properly.
- Tooltips of pictures or running application preview thumbnails appearing at the very top of the screen would not be visible.
- A tooltip would not display for the first picture preview thumbnail on a menu.
- If a picture or running application preview thumbnail could not change position when switching then the previous thumbnail was not being erased and the thumbnail appeared instantly instead of fading in.
- The application would sometimes crash when executing certain shell functions (such as 'Set as Desktop Background' for an image item) from a context menu.
- Fixed issue with the Winstep Update Manager which could cause it to mis-report the size of the file download so far and even terminate with a 'Download may be corrupt' error.
Archived News
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Winstep Xtreme v23.11 Released!
December 8, 2023
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v23.11 adds per monitor taskbars and tasklists and mitigates Windows 11 22H2 changes and bugs, plus many new features and stability improvements!
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Nexus Dock v23.11 Released!
December 8, 2023
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v23.11 adds per monitor tasklists for docks and mitigates Windows 11 22H2 changes and bugs, plus many new features and stability improvements!
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Cyber Monday!
November 27, 2023
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Cyber Monday 2023 is here and Winstep Xtreme is 50% off for the next 24 hours. So, will you take the final chance to bag a deal?
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Happy Holidays!
December 20, 2022
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Wishing everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
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Winstep Xtreme v22.7 Released!
July 27, 2022
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v22.7 brings FULL compatibility with Windows 11 plus many new features and stability improvements!
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Nexus Dock v22.7 Released!
July 27, 2022
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v22.7 brings FULL compatibility with Windows 11 plus many new features and stability improvements!
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Happy Holidays 2021!
December 22, 2021
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Once again and still in difficult times, wishing everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Stay safe!
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Happy Holidays!
December 20, 2020
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In this difficult times, wishing everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Stay safe!
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Winstep Xtreme v20.10 Released!
October 28, 2020
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v20.10 brings many new features and stability improvements, increased compatibility with Windows 10 and much more!
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Nexus Dock v20.10 Released!
October 28, 2020
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v20.10 brings many new features and stability improvements, increased compatibility with Windows 10 and much more!
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Happy Holidays!
December 18, 2019
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Wishing everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Read more
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Winstep 20th Annniversary!
February 28, 2019
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Winstep is celebrating 20 years in business with a fantastic, time-limited, price reduction all across the board! Enjoy it while it lasts!
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Winstep Xtreme v19.2 Released!
February 28, 2019
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v19.2 is mainly a maintenance release with a few goodies thrown in such as a matching Windows 10 Light Mode and much more!
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Nexus Dock v19.2 Released!
February 28, 2019
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v19.2 is mostly a maintenance release with a few goodies thrown in such as a matching Windows 10 Light Mode and much more!
Read more
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Happy Holidays!
December 17, 2018
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Wishing everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v18.12 Released!
December 17, 2018
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Just in time for Christmas, v18.12 is a massive release featuring the new Grid Stacks, Search Filters, multi monitor profiles and much more!
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Nexus Dock v18.12 Released!
December 17, 2018
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Just in time for Christmas, v18.12 is a massive release featuring the new Grid Stacks and Search Filters (Nexus Ultimate), multi monitor profiles and much more!
Read more
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Cyber Monday!
November 26, 2018
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Cyber Monday 2018 is here and Winstep Xtreme is 50% off for the next 24 hours. So, will you take the final chance to bag a deal?
Read more
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Black Friday!
November 23, 2018
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Black Friday 2018 is upon us and Nexus Ultimate is 40% off.
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v18.10 Released!
October 9, 2018
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Icon colorization, center icons in Shelves, Drawer resizing, improved handling of hybrid Win32/UWP apps, menu scaling and much more!
Read more
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Nexus Dock v18.10 Released!
October 9, 2018
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Icon colorization, improved handling of hybrid Win32/UWP apps, context menu scaling and much more!
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Price Increase Announcement
October 7, 2018
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After nearly 20 years providing the best products at competitive prices, Winstep is increasing the prices of all its applications for the first time - just to make up (barely) for inflation.
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v18.8 Released!
August 30, 2018
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Major release featuring the new Drawers, support for multiple and vertical Shelves and much more!
Read more
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Nexus Dock v18.8 Released!
August 30, 2018
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Major release featuring new colorization options, new Drawers and support for multiple and vertical Shelves (Nexus Ultimate) and much more!
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v18.5 Released!
June 1, 2018
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Major release featuring the ability to access docks directly from NextSTART, new Delete Effect with 22 different animations, alarm overlays and much more!
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Nexus Dock v18.5 Released!
June 1, 2018
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Major release featuring new Delete Effect with many different animations, enhanced Media Player functionality and playlist handling, alarm overlays and much more!
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Winstep and the EU GDPR
May 25, 2018
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The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is a legal framework that sets guidelines for the collection and processing of personal information of individuals within the European Union (EU).
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v18.3 Released!
March 31, 2018
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Major release with new alarm options, power saving modes and media player internal command, plus many other performance and stability improvements!
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Nexus Dock v18.3 Released!
March 31, 2018
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New alarm options, full dock keyboard support, power saving modes and media player internal command, plus many other performance and stability improvements!
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v18.1 Released!
January 20, 2018
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New optional Dark Mode for the User Interface, new Windows 10 icons, many other performance and stability improvements!
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Nexus Dock v18.1 Released!
January 20, 2018
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New optional Dark Mode for the User Interface, new Windows 10 icons, many other performance and stability improvements!
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Winstep Xtreme v17.12 Released!
December 28, 2017
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A bit late for Christmas but still not too late, v17.2 is here. Many Windows 10 related additions and fixes and much more!
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Nexus Dock v17.12 Released!
December 28, 2017
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A bit late for Christmas but still not too late, v17.2 is here. Many Windows 10 related additions and fixes and much more!
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Happy Holidays!
December 22, 2017
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Wishing everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Read more
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Cyber Monday!
November 27, 2017
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Cyber Monday 2017 is upon us and Winstep Xtreme is 50% off.
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v17.1 Released!
January 27, 2017
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New moon module, new sub-dock options, smooth Shelf scrolling and much more!
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Nexus Dock v17.1 Released!
January 27, 2017
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Wallpaper hot-track smooth colorization transitions, new moon module and pop-up calendar (Nexus Ultimate), and much more!
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Happy Holidays!
December 23, 2016
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Wishing everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
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Winstep Xtreme v16.12 Released!
December 8, 2016
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New calendar module, high-quality voice packs in multiple languages, and much more!
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Nexus Dock v16.12 Released!
December 8, 2016
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High-quality voice packs in multiple languages, Email Checker module now displays number of unread messages on the icon itself, and much more!
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Winstep Xtreme v16.9 Released!
September 30, 2016
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v16.9 is is mostly a maintenance release, fixing some issues in the previous version and restoring the NOOA/METAR Weather feed.
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Nexus Dock v16.9 Released!
September 30, 2016
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v16.9 is is mostly a maintenance release, fixing some issues in the previous version and restoring the NOOA/METAR Weather feed..
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Winstep Xtreme v16.6 Released!
June 27, 2016
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New Fast Boot option, running Universal Windows Apps in Windows 10 now display the proper icon and can be pinned to docks and the taskbar, and much more!
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Nexus Dock v16.6 Released!
June 27, 2016
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New Fast Boot option, running Universal Windows Apps in Windows 10 now display the proper icon and can be pinned to the dock, and much more!
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Winstep Xtreme v16.5 Released!
May 28, 2016
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NextSTART taskbar high-DPI support, new colorization options and much more in this new release!
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Nexus Dock v16.5 Released!
May 28, 2016
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New colorization options, fixed 3D dock backgrounds distortion at certain icon sizes, and much more!
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Winstep Xtreme v16.3 Released!
March 10, 2016
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Maintenance release fixing all the issues we know of in v16.2.
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Nexus Dock v16.3 Released!
March 10, 2016
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Maintenance release fixing all the issues we know of in v16.2.
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v16.2 Released!
February 11, 2016
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New battery module, clock alarms, 10 amazing new mouse-over, launch and attention effects and much more in this new release!
Read more
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Nexus Dock v16.2 Released!
February 11, 2016
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Minimize windows to the dock, new internal commands, performance improvements and much more in this release!
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Winstep Xtreme v15.9 Released!
September 29, 2015
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High DPI compatibility, Language Bar, Weather module Geo location, better Windows 10 integration and much more in this new release!
Read more
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Nexus Dock v15.9 Released!
September 29, 2015
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High DPI compatibility, combined dock shortcuts with running applications, Weather module Geo location, better Windows 10 integration and much more in this release!
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Winstep Xtreme v15.7 Released!
July 27, 2015
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Winstep Xtreme is now 100% compatible with Windows 10 and much more in this new release!
Read more
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Nexus Dock v15.7 Released!
July 27, 2015
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Nexus is now 100% compatible with Windows 10 and much more in this new release!
Read more
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Windows 10 and Winstep applications
June 27, 2015
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With Windows 10 just around the corner, many users have been wondering if Winstep applications (Nexus, Nexus Ultimate and Winstep Xtreme) will work correctly with it.
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v14.11 Released!
November 7, 2014
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Restored weather feed for weather forecast and more in this maintenance release!
Read more
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Nexus Dock v14.11 Released!
November 7, 2014
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Restored weather feed for weather forecast and more in this maintenance release!
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Take back what is yours!
March 23, 2012
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In an effort to force you into using Metro, Microsoft stripped the familiar Start Menu out of Windows 8. In the process it also stripped your ability to chose for yourself what is best for you.
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v12.2 Released!
March 22, 2012
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This is a monster release, click the Read More link below for a guided tour on what's new!
Read more
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Nexus Dock v12.2 Released!
March 22, 2012
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This is a monster release, click the Read More link below for a guided tour on what's new!
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v11.10 Released!
November 18, 2011
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Weather module working again, new Launch and Attention effects, new Tray tab in Preferences, and more...
Read more
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Nexus Dock v11.10 Released!
November 18, 2011
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Weather module working again, new Launch and Attention effects, and more...
Read more
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Weather feed down!
November 6, 2011
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Weather module not working? Find out why and what is being done about it.
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v11.6 Released!
July 6, 2011
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Maintenance release of Winstep Xtreme.
Read more
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Nexus Dock v11.6 Released!
July 6, 2011
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Maintenance release of Nexus and Nexus Ultimate.
Read more
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New Winstep Theme: DarkTech
June 24, 2011
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Brought to you by the Winstep design team - more in-house themes currently in the pipeline.
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v11.5 Released!
June 23, 2011
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System tray icon customization, ability to mix mouseover effects, support for animated icons, and much more!
Read more
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Nexus Dock v11.5 Released!
June 20, 2011
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Dock mouseover effects can now be combined with magnify effect, support for animated icons, and much more!
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v11.2 Released!
March 14, 2011
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New release featuring increased support for Microsoft's High DPI virtualization technology, and much more!
Read more
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Nexus Dock v11.2 Released!
March 14, 2011
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New release featuring increased support for backgrounds of 3rd party docks, preserving aspect ratio of image thumbnails, and much more!
Read more
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Start Menu Organizer v1.5 Released!
March 14, 2011
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New release adding more languages and increasing compatibility with 64 bit versions of Windows!
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v10.9 Released!
October 14, 2010
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Major release featuring nine new incredible dock mouseover effects, five new menu opening animations, Windows 7 "Superbar" ability with window previews and aeropeek capability on docks, horizontal sub-docks, and much more!
Read more
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Nexus Dock v10.9 Released!
October 8, 2010
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Major release featuring nine new incredible dock mouseover effects, Windows 7 "Superbar" ability with window previews and aeropeek capability, and much more!
Read more
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Nexus featured at Download.com!
October 8, 2010
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Nexus featured on the front page of Cnet's Download.com!
Read more
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Start Menu Organizer v1.4 Released!
August 9, 2010
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Version 1.4 fixes an issue in which the Pro version of the program could stop when expanding the Administrative Tools group and adds support for 23 languages.
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme featured at Download.com!
July 18, 2010
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Winstep Xtreme has been featured on the front page of Cnet's Download.com, not once, but twice!
Read more
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Winstep Xtreme v10.6 Final Released!
July 13, 2010
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Roughly 1 year in the making, the official upgrade to Winstep Xtreme v9.5 is finally here!
Read more
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Nexus Dock v10.6 Released!
July 13, 2010
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Maintenance release of our free popular Winstep Nexus dock.
Read more
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Winstep announces strategic alliance with Proxma AG!
July 13, 2010
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Proxma AG will market Winstep products in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
Read more
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Start Menu Organizer v1.3 Released!
July 2, 2010
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New version of the Winstep Start Menu Organizer featuring support for even more languages.
Read more
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Welcome to our new web site!
June 15, 2010
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The Winstep web site gets a brand new face to match the quality of our products.
Read more