Design your way

For most people out there, cool desktop backgrounds are not the most important thing ever.

Yet, the hidden benefits of cool desktop backgrounds are more than one could imagine – if they are cheerful, they will lift the spirit up, and say plenty on who you are and what you stand for.

They won’t only make your desktop look more pleasant, but also keep it in order and help you locate your files easily. With clean desktop backgrounds, you will find it much easier to work as well.

This article aims to introduce the best cool wallpaper for all screen sizes, including beautiful and motivational backgrounds, and business-suitable images. Once you read it, you will get plenty of ideas on how you can improve your desktop.

Resolution comes first

You may have picked a cool desktop background with an incredible artistic value, but you won’t get to use it right unless it matches the resolution and aspect ratio of your screen. In the opposite case, it will end up looking stretched, distorted or grainy, so always examine the monitor specs before you begin searching.

Your screen resolution is commonly denoted in pixels, as for instance 1280 x 1024. These values reveal the number of pixels your monitor can display both horizontally and vertically, and indicate that the aspect ratio of the monitor is 4:3.

In order to be perfect, your wallpaper aims to respond to two requirements:

Resolution that is high enough
An aspect ratio that matches

Which is the native resolution and aspect ratio of your monitor? Which wallpaper would be perfect for it? Let’s check:

Windows wallpapers

Windows 7

Right-click on your desktop to open the menu, click on Screen resolution, and you will see the numbers displayed.

Windows XP

Right-click on the desktop again, and choose Properties and then Settings. A slider will appear under Screen Resolution in the lower left part.

Windows 8

Once again, open the right-click menu on the desktop and you will see which your screen’s resolution is. Check screen resolution from the right-click menu on desktop. You can reach the context menu under any blank area on the desktop, and you can even adjust your resolution by clicking on Appearance and Personalization, and then Adjust Screen Resolution.

Windows 10

Click on Start
Choose Settings
Choose Systems
Choose Advanced Display Settings
Choose Resolution, and you will get a detailed menu

Where to find cool desktop backgrounds

Cool desktop backgrounds are offered by more websites that one can count, and it is quite often that users discover the right background in less than no time. The web is overwhelmed by fresh themed compilations and resources that satisfy every taste or artistic ideas.

Shuffling between wallpapers

The real desktop aficionados will have a hard time short-listing their ideal wallpapers, but there is nothing to worry about! If you can’t make up your mind for a single piece, you can use and shuffle several cool desktop backgrounds instead of a single one.

Windows 7

With Windows 7 installed on your computer, you can personalize the desktop really easily – To do that, right-click on the desktop and select the option Personalize. You will see a small window in the bottom left corner, where you should choose Desktop Background, and then Picture Location.

Choose the folder that contains your file, or create a custom folder using the option Browse. There, you can add all images you’d like to use. To shuffle them, choose Picture position define to, and Shuffle in the end. Save the changes, and you will have all images diversely displayed with an uneven sequence between them. Time to enjoy your cool desktop background!

Windows 8

Group the wallpapers you’ve selected in a single folder, and save it on a safe location under a name you will remember. To enable a shuffling option for your backgrounds on Windows 8, follow these instructions:

Step 1: Right-click on the desktop to open the Menu, and choose Personalize

Step 2: Select Desktop Background

Step 3: Once the desktop background window opens, select Browse to reach the directory where you’ve saved your wallpapers. Use the Select All button to make sure they will all appear. You should be able to see the shuffle option displayed at the bottom of that window.

A problem with this method is that you’ll have to save all wallpapers in a single directory – Windows won’t index and display wallpapers located within those folders. The feature may also be a serious battery waster with no AC power on the run, so make sure you pause the slide show why relying exclusively on your battery.

Windows 10

In the case of Windows 10 wallpapers, you’ll need to create a special folder with the wallpapers you want to have shuffling on your screen. The easiest way to do that is to place them within a Slideshow Folder in the Pictures section, or even upload directly the images you’ve stored on OneDrive.

Note that these wallpapers will sync automatically on all Windows 10 devices, and it won’t matter whether they’re stored on the drive or not.

Next, let’s check how to set up a Slideshow for your multi-layered Windows 10 wallpaper.

Open the Notifications Center, and click on All Settings
Select Personalization
Select Background
Once the background menu drops, select Slideshow
Select Browse

Locate the specific Slideshow folder, and specify the directories you need

Set the desired time intervals

You can set the changing time for any period of time between a minute and a day. The operating system will auto-rotate the selected files in the appointed time lapse, be that 10 minutes or 24 hours. You choose!

Adjust the fit

You don’t really have to adjust the fit unless you want to. The Fit option is also located in the Settings menu, and you can use it to stretch or tile a smaller file to fit your screen. A great bonus you’ll get this way is multi-monitor set up, so that each of your devices has a different image from the batch displayed at a time.

Personalized animations wallpapers

When it comes to cool desktop backgrounds, less is more. Yet, creative people may appreciate an animated desktop wallpaper to make their work more cheerful. Using Windows 7, for instance, you can use screensavers as animated wallpapers, or even personal videos converted into .scr files.

With Windows 8.1, you can use literally any image as your desktop background. The size or the origin of the image won’t matter, and the system will allow you to compile a running show for all your monitors. There’s nothing particularly magical about the Windows 8.1 desktop background.

Here are some personalization tips you could find useful

Right-click anywhere on the screen. Select Personalize, and a dialog box will appear. Windows will suggest built-in compilations with desktop backgrounds, sound schemes, and window colors to choose from. The synced themes from your other Windows 8 and 8.1 PCs will be displayed in the upper area of the dialog box from your menu.

Another feature you should know about is the Get More Themes Online one, clicking on which would direct you to a specialized Microsoft website where you can get a dedicated theme for Windows 7, 8, 8.1, or 10. Some of the best themes offered are pre-adjusted to two-monitor Windows 8.1 setups, so that one half of them appears on one of the screens, and a half on the other.

We suggest Nightfall & Starlight Panoramic themes, due to their gorgeous looks. The Get More Themes Online link takes you to a Microsoft website that has a huge variety of themes, which will work on Windows 7, 8, 8.1, and 10.

There are some truly astounding themes for two-monitor Windows 8.1 setups, with half of the background showing in one screen and half in the other. The Nightfall & Starlight Panoramic theme is one of those gorgeous two-monitor themes.

Move towards the bottom, and choose Desktop Background. Keep in mind that changing the background won’t change the tiles on the Metro Start Screen. The next thing to appear is the Desktop Background dialog box.

Choose Picture Location, and select all wallpapers that can ship with Windows. For more pictures, click on Browse.

Once you hover over the picture with your mouse, Windows will display a detailed description, and a small check box in the upper-left corner. Clicking on this box, you will add the picture to the slide show. There are no limitations to as how many pictures you can add to the slideshow. Windows will also allow you to set specific changing times in the bottom of the screen.

As attractive as animated slideshows may sound, you should remember that the shifting causes serious delays in other operations conducted on the same device. This may not be an issue with PCs, but netbook and notebook owners should not let these slideshows cause battery drain.

You can also change the basic color of your desktop by enabling the Solid colors category. This way, you’ll be choosing a layout shade that will fill the background in case the image doesn’t match the exact screen size. Another option is to ‘ask’ Windows’ to shoehorn the picture so that it fits the exact dimension.

Windows also makes it possible to position an image differently, and the option is available in the dropdown Picture Position menu you can find in the Desktop Background dialog box.

Once you’ve adjusted the settings the way you want them to be, remember to save the changes and to close the dialog box for personalization. The slideshow will start right away.

TIPS

The best desktop pictures are JPEG (.jpeg/.jpg) and bitmap (.bmp/.dib) files.
Open the Picture Location drop-down menu, and select Solid Colors. This option will enable you to choose custom colors.
You can use any image you want as your desktop background. To choose it, simply right-click on it, and select Set as Desktop Background.
You can also use any web image as your Windows wallpaper, by right-clicking on it on Internet Explorer, and selecting the option Set as Background. All downloaded images are saved in the Picture Location menu, and you can replace them any time you want.
You can also save the picture first in a separate folder, and use it permanently as your desktop background.
The Use Drop Shadows for Icon Labels’ option in the ‘Managing Visual Effects and Performance Menu’ can help you change the labels on your desktop icons, and make them easier to read against your wallpaper.

Ending thoughts on cool desktop backgrounds

Your environment has a strong impact on how productive you are, in particular the colors and images that can motivate you.

With most of today’s work taking place in the digital realm, desktop environments matter to productivity as well, even though your computer experience is not really dependent on them.

Instead of working on a messy and confusing surface, you can use cool HD desktop backgrounds to design a beautiful and pre-organized working space, and remain productive without investing too much time into it.

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