Aerofoil 1.5.1 Released (64 and 32 bit builds available)

The award winning Aerofoil has now been updated to 1.5.1!

Aerofoil extends Vista and Windows 7 notebook battery life by:

• Allowing you to manually disable Aero Glass.
• Optionally managing Aero Glass user interface.
• Optionally managing sound muting.
• Optionally managing your chosen power plans.
• Optionally managing Windows Sidebar.
• Optionally showing a quick hibernate button.
• Changing icon colour to show whether on battery or AC.

Benefits over earlier versions and similar software:

• Much more efficient - Aerofoil is 100% unmanaged C++ (no .Net Framework!).
• Available in both 64 bit (x64) and regular 32 bit (x86) builds.
• Much smaller memory use (about 25%-30% of the size of similar software).
• Unlike other apps, Aerofoil doesn't poll battery level continuously allowing the CPU save power by being idle more often.
• No configuration file - everything is customised with the installer.
• Open source and free - no expiry date, adware, spyware or malware, download and compile it for yourself if you prefer*!

What reviewers of Aerofoil have had to say:

"Aerofoil Extends Your Battery Life Approximately 25%", "you really should download"
(netbooknews.com) Disclaimer: Aerofoil's author's (my) personal best has been (only) 10-15%, or ~10 minutes, on a 2 hour battery 17 inch HP notebook (DV9233EU) with power saver mode using the lowest screen brightness.

"Why couldn't Microsoft just make power switching part of the "Designed for Windows 8" spec or buy Aerofoil?"
(Woody Leonhard, Infoworld)

"This is definitely a worth-while little app for road warriors"
(Metro Area Personal Computer Club, Iowa, USA)

"great for gaming and notebook applications alike"
(Official Windows Magazine - 47th of top 100, 37th of top 40 Hot Apps / TechRadar)

"Aerofoil, though, is far, far smaller and more efficient"
(Dave Johnson, Bnet)

The great advantage of AeroFoil is little resource consumption..... works perfectly with Windows 7"
(Kavya, Techno360)

"a must for every Vista laptop user."
(Wim Van Acoleyen, ZDNet)

"Great utility for gamers and laptop users."
(The Glitch)

"simple yet amazingly effective software that the corporate bigwigs couldn't figure out"
(Umar, Techtites)

Changes in 1.5.1:

• Available as a 64 bit (x64) executable.
• Source code updated for the wxWidgets 2.9.0 framework.
• Project updated for Visual Studio 2010.
• Multibyte strings have been removed in favour of Unicode.
• UPX compression has been removed due to lack of a 64 bit Windows packer (memory usage remains the same).

Downloads (please read the important note below too):

Download from Softpedia (external site) (note Softpedia don't host the source code).
Download Aerofoil 1.5.1 (64 bit) Installer
Download Aerofoil 1.5.1 (32 bit) Installer

Download Aerofoil 1.5.1 (64 bit) Source Code (C++)*
Download Aerofoil 1.5.1 (32 bit) Source Code (C++)*

IMPORTANT: If you receive an error message regarding the msvcp100.dll being missing you may also need a Windows update - the Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Redistributable. You can get this from Microsoft - links below - please choose the correct version:

Redistributable for 64 bit (x64)
Redistributable for 32 bit (x86)

* The source code has dependencies on the wxWidgets framework (2.9.0) and the project is for Visual Studio 2010. For 64 bit compilation wxWidgets will also need building with the WIN64 flag (instead of WIN32) and the project build platform targets set to x64. Additionally an environment variable $(WindowsSdkDirx64) needs to point to the relevant Windows 7.1 SDK.

Aerofoil 1.5.0_03 Out

Again this is another installer fix - perhaps I shouldn't be making code changes after 2.30am and I might make less errors... Thanks to reader Timothy for pointing out another flaw!

There are no other changes to the Aerofoil itself (it still has version 1.5.0 in its About box).

Changes in 1.5.0_03

- Fixed installer to set auto mute option correctly which was always switched on in Aerofoil 1.5.0_02.


Downloads

Download Aerofoil 1.5.0_03 Installer

Download Aerofoil 1.5.0_03 Source Code (C++)

Aerofoil 1.5.0_02 Out

Sorry all - I rejigged the installer for 1.5.0_01 to change shortcut names and add a reconfiguration option to the Windows start menu and accidentally deleted the line to copy the readme.txt, this fixes that bug :(

Changes in 1.5.0_02

No code changes in this release just an installer bug fix to ensure the readme.txt is copied by the installer (which had caused a broken Windows shortcut icon).

Downloads

Download Aerofoil 1.5.0_02 Installer

Download Aerofoil 1.5.0_02 Source Code (C++)

Aerofoil 1.5.0_01 Out

UPDATE: Please get the latest (1.5.0_03) version of Aerofoil from here

No changes to Aerofoil, just to its installer (About box in Aerofoil still shows "1.5.0").

Changes for 1.5.0_01:

• Added installer options to add a "Configuration" shortcut to the start menu (configuration shortcut starts a copy of the installer for Aerofoil's reconfiguration).
• Added automatic shutdown of Aerofoil on installer run.

These changes should hopefully deal with the concerns raised about the ease of reconfiguring Aerofoil. :)

If you are upgrading from Aerofoil 1.5.0 it is recommended you uninstall Aerofoil 1.5.0 first.

Download Aerofoil 1.5.0_01 Installer

Download Aerofoil 1.5.0_01 Source Code (C++)

Aerofoil 1.5.0 Released

UPDATE: Aerofoil is now at version 1.5.1.

Original post follows.

The award winning Aerofoil has now been updated to 1.5.0(_03)!
Aerofoil extends Vista and Windows 7 notebook battery life by:

• Allowing you to manually disable Aero Glass.
• Optionally managing Aero Glass user interface.
• Optionally managing sound muting.
• Optionally managing your chosen power plans.
• Optionally managing Windows Sidebar.
• Optionally showing a quick hibernate button.
• Changing icon colour to show your power type.

Benefits over earlier versions and similar software:

• Much more efficient - Aerofoil is 100% unmanaged C++ (no .Net Framework!).
• Much smaller memory use (about 25%-30% of the size of similar software).
• Unlike other apps, Aerofoil doesn't poll battery level continuously allowing the CPU save power by being idle more often.
• UPX compressed meaning Aerofoil.exe is as small as it can be.
• No configuration file - everything is customised with the installer.
• Tried and tested on Windows 7 (thanks to D. Schiferli!)
• Open source and free - no expiry date, adware, spyware or malware, download and compile it for yourself if you prefer*!

What reviewers of Aerofoil have had to say:

"Aerofoil Extends Your Battery Life Approximately 25%", "you really should download"
(netbooknews.com) Disclaimer: Aerofoil's author's (my) personal best has been (only) 10-15%, or ~10 minutes, on a 2 hour battery 17 inch HP notebook (DV9233EU) with power saver mode using the lowest screen brightness.

"This is definitely a worth-while little app for road warriors"
(Metro Area Personal Computer Club, Iowa, USA)

"great for gaming and notebook applications alike"
(Official Windows Magazine - 47th of top 100, 37th of top 40 Hot Apps / TechRadar)

"Aerofoil, though, is far, far smaller and more efficient"
(Dave Johnson, Bnet)

The great advantage of AeroFoil is little resource consumption..... works perfectly with Windows 7"
(Kavya, Techno360)

"a must for every Vista laptop user."
(Wim Van Acoleyen, ZDNet)

"Great utility for gamers and laptop users."
(The Glitch)

"simple yet amazingly effective software that the corporate bigwigs couldn't figure out"
(Umar, Techtites)

Downloads

Download Aerofoil 1.5.0_03 Installer

Download Aerofoil 1.5.0_03 Source Code (C++)

If you use Windows Vista and receive the message "Side-by-side configuration is incorrect" you may also need a Vista update - the Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributable

* Note Aerofoil.exe is compressed using UPX so you will find your compiled executable is larger. You can find UPX here. The source code has dependencies on the WxWidgets framework (2.8.8) and the project is for Visual Studio 2008.

Aerofoil 47th in Hot 100 Windows Vista Magazine Utilities

IMPORTANT:
This page is just for archive purposes - Aerofoil is now at version 1.5.0 please click this link to get it.


Aerofoil has been rated at 47th out of 100 best software for Windows Vista!
(That's just one behind BBC IPlayer, and ahead of iTunes at 50)

Aerofoil extends your Vista and Windows 7 notebook battery life by

- Allowing you to manually disable Aero Glass.
- Optionally managing Aero Glass user interface.
- Optionally managing the best two power plans.
- Optionally managing Windows Vista Sidebar.
- Optionally showing a quick hibernate button - hibernate and power management were greatly improved in Vista.




Benefits over earlier versions and similar software:

- Much more efficient - Aerofoil is 100% unmanaged C++.
- Much smaller than older versions and other similar software.
- UPX compressed meaning Aerofoil.exe is as small as it can be.
- No configuration file - everything is done with the installer.

Windows 7

Aerofoil has been tested in a Windows 7 virtual environment and no obvious bugs were found. "Windows Gadgets" - "Windows Sidebar" on Vista - seems to be managed correctly - at least started when on AC, as I can't simulate battery power I can't tell if its shut down when on battery. Please also note that if your Windows 7 graphics card driver doesn't support power management then the Aerofoil "Hibernate" menu shortcut won't work.
For most people Aerofoil should work just as well as in Vista, having said that... if you notice any problems with Windows 7 and Aerofoil please report them here since I don't have real hardware to do the testing on!

Downloads

Download Aerofoil 1.4.5 Installer (read the note below!)

If you receive the message "Side-by-side configuration is incorrect" you may also need a Vista update - the Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributable

If you find your settings are not being saved please read this post (they are saved, this is not a bug)

Download Aerofoil 1.4.5 Source Code (C++)

Aerofoil 1.3 - Aero Disabler / Laptop Battery Saver (Final Version)

In response to the positive feedback I received I've put together a final version of Aerofoil - I won't be adding any more new features simply because the majority of people wanted me to keep it a simple one purpose utility. To briefly recap what this program does - it disables Vista Aero Glass when your Microsoft Vista laptop is running on battery. Ordinarily Vista would do this for you but only when using the "Power Saver" scheme but not in any other power schemes. You can also enable/disable Glass manually from the notify icon.

UPDATE: Smaller faster 1.4.5 version available here


This version

• Has a bumped version number - 1.3 better reflects code maturity over 0.1.3


• Uses a fixed tool window (so it no longer shows in shows in Alt-tab)


• Simplifies the code (just a tiny bit more code reuse - I don't think it can get any better!)


• Includes fully commented source code

Remember you need Vista Premium or better to use this (Vista Basic for obvious reasons won't work).

Download Aerofoil 1.3 here
GPL source code here

Free laptop utility to disable Aero's Glass when on battery

"Hot" on the powersave/cooling subject of my last post yesterday evening I threw together a small tray icon application Aerofoil to disable Aero's Glass interface when on battery power. Hopefully this should cut heat and increase battery length a bit!

I'm hoping Microsoft add this functionality into the standard power manangement features of Vista at some point and this isn't needed anymore, but if they don't and the utility proves popular, I may add some other powersave functionality not currently available - although I don't know what yet, maybe options to disable sound, slow down gpu clockspeeds via atitool profile or similar!

GPL'd source code will be available shortly - I've not got time at the moment to bung in the relevant licence comments, readme and package up nicely. This should be in the next day or two.

Updated version

Get Aerofoil here!
Source code


If you find this useful and want the new features please post a comment or suggestions!