Disabling dark mode with OS dark mode ON

Edit: any chance you could try row borders with the same grey as the column borders in your screenshot?
Not sure what exactly you mean. The coumn grid lines of same color as the lines in table header?
 
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Hello Martin and everyone, I just registered to give my 2 cents on the topic since I just updated to 6.30 (and the new beta build).

Because I work in dark environments mostly bright things aren't keen on the eyes, but getting a dark theme "right" (quotes because that's subjective) on an app that's not managed isn't trivial, to the point that not many I can think of feature a dark theme. Even on fully managed apps like paint.net, I keep the light theme on by default because of the contrast between areas where sometimes you get dark-ish colors all around but plain white on some things (I think I'll report it there too in case there's a way to tweak it).

Here, what I experienced in 6.30 was the usual when a Win32 app goes dark, the borders of the containers don't seem to be proportional in contrast to the background. In the system summary window for example, which is packed of boxes it's easy to see what I mean. This would be the default for the light theme:

Light Mode.png

You can see different kinds of controls in there, lets take a look at one of the main ones, the CPU at the top left corner. You see the tone of the line that surrounds that area is rather subtle compared to the background. Then there are several other controls that are "sharper" so to speak and the delimiting lines are dark grey.

Now let's take a look at the dark mode (in 6.31, I switch to that for now to keep using the light mode for a while longer at least):

Dark Mode.png

Does anyone think it's more crowded than the previous screenshot despite showing essentially the same data? It's because of the contrast, take a look at that CPU box again, the line now has a plain white component. It was a single pixel wide before too and now it's two which also plays a part, but what I think breaks the loop the most is the plain white over the dark background. Makes it very look off for some reason (in my mind).

Another Win32 application with a nice looking (in my opinion) dark theme (still experimental mind you, so only in nightly builds) is the open source Process Hacker task manager:


Process Hacker.png

The main interface seems to use paler, more pastel looking colors for some things, but while the system information tab shows more vivid colors, the lack of borders on some controls or the subtler grey (#DFDFDF) in that "Show one graph per CPU" checkbox makes it feel more at home. Lettering is still plain white from what I can see and in some places less vivid colors could make it look better, but overall it's a look I don't mind seeing:

Memory.png

That "More" button at the lower right is surrounded by a very subtle darkish-grey #414141 and the "Back" one at the lower left doesn't even have anything surrounding, it just shades blue (#273541, darker than the highlighted "Memory" section) when you're over it with the mouse.

There's still plenty of contrast with the white lettering and that orange for the section titles compared to the dark background, but it doesn't seem too jarring. Subtler would look better for my taste, but it's alright as it is.

I don't know if all of this helps, but the more examples the better and little by little things get refined. Just look at the changes in shading between 6.30 and 6.31, a step in the right direction and much appreciated :)
 
Just a new user trying to deep dive into this program. I want to thank you Martin for this sweet utility. Also thank you for improving the dark move in post #17. This looks much better. Maybe in the future if we are real lucky we will get an option to change the main color template of the UI. Looks like its 3 shades of grey in the hard coded dark mode. Could be a very basic but effective way to add themes. Many people would say this is a minor issue, but I feel that readability matters and its often to taste.

Have a great weekend!
 
Hello Martin and everyone, I just registered to give my 2 cents on the topic since I just updated to 6.30 (and the new beta build).

Because I work in dark environments mostly bright things aren't keen on the eyes, but getting a dark theme "right" (quotes because that's subjective) on an app that's not managed isn't trivial, to the point that not many I can think of feature a dark theme. Even on fully managed apps like paint.net, I keep the light theme on by default because of the contrast between areas where sometimes you get dark-ish colors all around but plain white on some things (I think I'll report it there too in case there's a way to tweak it).

Here, what I experienced in 6.30 was the usual when a Win32 app goes dark, the borders of the containers don't seem to be proportional in contrast to the background. In the system summary window for example, which is packed of boxes it's easy to see what I mean. This would be the default for the light theme:

View attachment 5102

You can see different kinds of controls in there, lets take a look at one of the main ones, the CPU at the top left corner. You see the tone of the line that surrounds that area is rather subtle compared to the background. Then there are several other controls that are "sharper" so to speak and the delimiting lines are dark grey.

Now let's take a look at the dark mode (in 6.31, I switch to that for now to keep using the light mode for a while longer at least):

View attachment 5103

Does anyone think it's more crowded than the previous screenshot despite showing essentially the same data? It's because of the contrast, take a look at that CPU box again, the line now has a plain white component. It was a single pixel wide before too and now it's two which also plays a part, but what I think breaks the loop the most is the plain white over the dark background. Makes it very look off for some reason (in my mind).

Another Win32 application with a nice looking (in my opinion) dark theme (still experimental mind you, so only in nightly builds) is the open source Process Hacker task manager:


View attachment 5104

The main interface seems to use paler, more pastel looking colors for some things, but while the system information tab shows more vivid colors, the lack of borders on some controls or the subtler grey (#DFDFDF) in that "Show one graph per CPU" checkbox makes it feel more at home. Lettering is still plain white from what I can see and in some places less vivid colors could make it look better, but overall it's a look I don't mind seeing:

View attachment 5105

That "More" button at the lower right is surrounded by a very subtle darkish-grey #414141 and the "Back" one at the lower left doesn't even have anything surrounding, it just shades blue (#273541, darker than the highlighted "Memory" section) when you're over it with the mouse.

There's still plenty of contrast with the white lettering and that orange for the section titles compared to the dark background, but it doesn't seem too jarring. Subtler would look better for my taste, but it's alright as it is.

I don't know if all of this helps, but the more examples the better and little by little things get refined. Just look at the changes in shading between 6.30 and 6.31, a step in the right direction and much appreciated :)

Thank you for your feedback and detailed analysis. I fully agree with your comments and observations. The problem here is that HWiNFO is a native application (also maintaining backwards compatibility) and it's using a lot of different controls. When I started working Dark Mode, I didn't even expect it to get as far as it did and so (relatively) quick :) This was possible using several tricks that worked more-less without the need to owner-draw most items (except a few ones), so with relatively less pain :) Windows GUI is a pain if one wants to customize controls - each one requires different handling, uses different messages, methods, etc. Moreover, a lot of the stuff in the GUI is sort of hard-coded in system and if one wants more, he's left out to completely draw everything on his own. This can cause other unpredictable issues with different themes, etc..
Anyway, I will have a look at the things you mentioned and see what I can do to improve that
 
How were you able to get row shading to start working? My row shading is enabled but the rows are all uniform in color?
Row Shading.png
 
Here a preview on next update to DarkMode to improve contrast. Pay attention to edit and group boxes - now the lines are thinner and darker.
I hope this change improves the appearance, it will available in the next build.

1598733097055.png 1598733426709.png
 
Here a preview on next update to DarkMode to improve contrast. Pay attention to edit and group boxes - now the lines are thinner and darker.
I hope this change improves the appearance, it will available in the next build.

It looks much better in my opinion!

The data, which is the important information, gets to be in the front page so to speak, with the surrounding boxes being subtler. I like how it looks :)
 
When is the newer version going to be availabe? I really dislike the current dark mode in v6.30.

Thank you for listening to the community Martin! and for all your hard work!
 
When is the newer version going to be availabe? I really dislike the current dark mode in v6.30.

Thank you for listening to the community Martin! and for all your hard work!

In a few days, there are a few things that need to be done.
 
Check the new v6.31-4245 Beta, it features several improvements to Dark Mode.
 
Here further preview of upcoming improvements in Dark Mode.
Checkboxes and radio buttons with a more clear dark look. The blue color is highlight on mouse hovering.

1599335817847.png
 
Signed up just to say thank you so much for this software and now dark mode :) Ive been using HWInfo64 for years and only tonight thought that dark mode would be great , a quick Google search later and bingo i have sensors in dark mode . So good when im playing on the single center screen with my 2 side monitors blacked out and instead of being blinded by HWI64 i now have the beautiful dark mode .
Thanks again .
 
Hi Martin,

Also, signed up to say Thank you for developing HWINFO.

However, I'm with many others here and am willing to put up a bounty to develop the option to go back to the original light theme - even if you have dark mode enabled. Love the program and have been using it for years, but it literally makes me ill to look at the program for extended periods of time with dark mode enabled. The original look and feel was perfect overall.

Thanks again for all the hard work.
 
Hi Martin,

Also, signed up to say Thank you for developing HWINFO.

However, I'm with many others here and am willing to put up a bounty to develop the option to go back to the original light theme - even if you have dark mode enabled. Love the program and have been using it for years, but it literally makes me ill to look at the program for extended periods of time with dark mode enabled. The original look and feel was perfect overall.

Thanks again for all the hard work.



Besides significantly improving Dark Mode in that build ^ it also features such option.
 
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Hello,

I am using a High contrast dark theme for windows.
It is called GreyEveTheme.theme and it's from https://github.com/nitschis/GreyEveTheme/releases/tag/v1

This theme works great to make everything else dark in windows, like those white title bars

However for some apps with a built-in dark mode, it messes up the dark mode and the fix is to disable the dark mode in that app only.

Where is the setting to disable hwinfo's own dark mode manually ?

Here is what this looks like

1683351851801.png
 
Hello,

I am using a High contrast dark theme for windows.
It is called GreyEveTheme.theme and it's from https://github.com/nitschis/GreyEveTheme/releases/tag/v1

This theme works great to make everything else dark in windows, like those white title bars

However for some apps with a built-in dark mode, it messes up the dark mode and the fix is to disable the dark mode in that app only.

Where is the setting to disable hwinfo's own dark mode manually ?

Here is what this looks like

View attachment 9215

That setting is in the main settings window of HWiNFO. You can reach is from the tray icon, sensor settings or at startup.
 
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