The old alt+tab switch provides the most efficient way of finding quickly and activating an open window. It also didn’t include in its row the desktop! Windows 7 proposes to us to sacrifice some of our time in order to enjoy an Alt+Tab that is more annoying but less boring!

A fair bargain, I must admit, which we can deny if we want – by disabling the successive activation of each and every window that happens in the current alt+tab, even by returning completely to the XP alt+tab.

You can do the first by going to Computer – Properties – Advanced – Performance – Settings, and unchecking the option “Enable Aero Peek” (you will lose also the Win+Spacebar peek).

You can resurrect the XP alt+tab switch by creating a DWORD Value called “AltTabSettings” in HKCU/Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Explorer, and setting it to “1″. (You need to logon in order to revert this change – deleting this registry key is not enough, although creating it does the job immediately).

Note also that you can just temporarily use the XP alt+tab, whenever you press an alt button, then (holding this pressed) press and immediately release the other alt button, and then press the tab button as usually to switch between open applications. We can describe this as alt+[alt]+tab, with the brackets meaning that the second alt is pressed and immediately released.

Consider also using the VistaSwitcher freeware, a handy tool that works much better than the original Vista/7 AltTab switch. It will give you even the option to browse only windows that belong to the same application, instead of browsing all of your open windows. After using VistaSwitcher for some time, I must admit that it seems just impossible for me to return to the messy Windows 7 alt tab.

Select Windows Freeware  

• Replace the Alt Tab dialogue with VistaSwitcher
• Snap your programs to grid (and more), with Gridy
• Optimizing your Windows system for audio

at Fine Shareware -- or at Google!