I'm personally fond of DisplayFusion for that task.

Here's my Windows 8 desktop as of yesterday:



As you can see, I have my Skydrive app snapped to the left of my desktop so that I have quick and easy access to my cloud storage. Of course, I can expand the desktop to full size if I need more space.

I don't pay much attention to my desktop shortcuts at all: I just let them pile on. The ones I do use are the ones in my Start menu, which I will also post here (these are the far left and far right views):

I installed MS-DOS 6.2 and Windows 3.11 just for fun on my old laptop. I took a screenshot by booting the image of my other laptop's hard drive with QEMU.

Ooh, fun! Nothing like an old OS to head down Memory Lane. Out of curiosity, does you computer show "It's now safe to turn off your computer" when you shut it down?

No, actually it's safe to shut down DOS by just pressing the power button when it's at the C:\> prompt.

Oh, yeah, I forgot that Windows 3.x was simply an extension of DOS, and you exited to DOS when you were done with Windows. I was thinking of 95/98.

Updated from my old background (although now one of the album tile is outdated)

I made my desktop a new background last night. I also wanted to consider a massive Battlestar Galactica, but I can't find a high-resolution image or render of the ship.

Whoaa... what a display! What is the resolutions for the displays?

I like to call the whole thing 4440x2100, because the 22" monitors are 1680x1050, and the 27" monitor is 1920x1080.

How big is your power bill because of those

Also, just noticed, why two keyboards?

It's a nice very setup but the wallpaper looks like pretty boring/generic sci-fi

Ashbad, how can you not appreciate the Firefly wallpaper? It's hardly "generic sci-fi."

Clearly he hasn't been exposed to the concentrated awesome that is Firefly.

Each 22" consumes 45 Watts, and the 27", being much newer, consumes 40 Watts. That's 220 Watts all together, or slightly more than two 100 Watt incandescent light bulbs. So really not all that much at all.

Two hands. Nah, I spilled coffee on the back keyboard, and I haven't gotten a chance to buy a new keyboard yet.

The front one is twice as nice as my nicest keyboard. And nice monitor setup!
Also, Windows 3.1 is so great; glad to see it has a presence here. Perhaps I can post a pic of my Windows 1.1 desktop here sometime.

I don't really look at my desktop. I use hot keys to open search and open apps/documents from there. Though I will open up Finder from time to time and do a more in-depth search. I use the stock apps with OS X because I'm not really a "power user." My dock consists of only the apps I have open and they disappear when closed. But CMND+Tab (Or Alt+Tab for you Windows Folk) is basically the same thing. The only think I use my dock for is quickly accessing recent downloads and a quick list of my documents, which are the two things next to the trash bin.


Click for Fullsize

From left to right: Widgets, Desktop 1, Desktop 2, Desktop 3, Web (Safari), IRC (Linkinus), Messages (iMessage), Music (iTunes), Mail and my Calendar.

I have three "desktops" because when I do work on my desktop rather than in a full screen app similar to the six on the right, it's to keep similar windows together. For instance Finder is tied to one desktop, Lightroom to another (with an "actual*" second monitor, my iPad, wirelessly sitting in front of me) and various others to a third.

*I only have a TV and will sometimes utilize my iPad as a second, mirrored, monitor as I watch Netflix, play a game. When I'm in Lightroom I do use my iPad as a second monitor since the application recognizes other connected displays and utilizes them.

Desktop awesome by elfprince13, on Flickr

Things to note:

• Path Finder is awesome, and I'm never going back to normal Finder. The extra blue dot in the dock is annoying though
  
• 9001 papers to read.
  
• Skype convo with Kerm and Courtney.
  
• Delicious Library is awesome
  
• I don't use Adium or Colloquy anymore. I just screen -r into an irssi session on my work desktop. I keep them in my Dock for nostalgia.
  
• Same wallpaper and desktop arrangement since the thread began
  

I use lots of desktop environments, having lots of computers with more on the way.

On my IBM ThinkPad R40e, I use Windows XP modified to look like a very dark version of Windows 7. Very clean desktop because I use it only for internet, calculator emulation, and TIConnect. And creepy music.

My Gateway 400VTX has the standard Windows Vista Classic environment, being used for exactly the same thing as my IBM except in places where there aren't any LAN ports. It also has Microsoft Office. Soon, the Ubuntu it also boots from will dominate, becase three months after I installed Windows from a genuine disk with the Windows logo and everything, the disk drive broke and in the corner of the desktop, it says, "Not a genuine copy of Windows." So the Ubuntu will be Unity2D with different colors.

My Toshiba Satellite C55 has Windows 8.1 with everything changed to jet black. It has the original Windows wallpaper for everything since XP, but done in dark colors.

My Dell Optiplex 755 has Windows Vista OEM with a manga angel for wallpaper.

But my other three computers are best of all: they have BIOS.

Can you believe how many junky computers I have? And I get another tomorrow, which I can keep if I fix. I can't believe the guy who owns it calls it old because it is from 2007! I have another laptop with Windows 95 and no way to connect to the Internet except through the built-in phone line![/img]

And I still can't find an OS that runs smoothly on a laptop with 512mb ram or 256 on my other one. To top it all off, my disk drives are broke so I have to install it from Windows. I don't suppose any of you have any ideas?

Cool...

There are still alot of people running DOS. There are things that can be done with a command line that Windoze can't touch...

Windows XP runs smoothly on 512 MB, just use an older version of Firefox for web browsing. For 256 MB, use Windows 2000 or Windows 98.