I’ve just spotted that I’ve got 37 windows open on my PC, including 18 Internet Explorer and 10 MS Office. While at the high end, this isn’t unusual for me at home, but at work I normally have far fewer open, because I run NT at work and this registry hack is not available.
How many do you normally have open?
Usually, just one. I used a tabbed browser that usually contains 5-20 tabs. Does that count?
I open up the SDMB sections that I’m interested in all at once and then go through them and open all the interesting-sounding threads in new tabs. Then I spend the next hour or so going through each tab and answering the threads.
As for other applications, I try to minimize the amount of windows whenever possible… I use Trillian so I don’t have to have a bunch of IM apps, and I use ePrompter so I don’t have to have a bunch of separate email windows/webpages open.
Lately not more than 5. Though it used to be a little higher, as I like to have multiple browser windows open at once (rarely more than four though). Firefox has cut that down to two at most, and that’s only if I forget about tabs. Currently I have windows media player, a folder of media files and a torrent window open, which is typical. I’ll also have a MSN window or two (or ten) open often, but rarely this early in the day.
Two. Never more than two.
I’ve been known in the past to have anywhere between 30 - 50, and I got tired of how slow my computer used to go. It wouldn’t effect this computer at all, but I trained myself out of it years ago, so it doesn’t matter. Anything more than two irks me to no end.
three on this pc, and four on my laptop. currently printing a document on a third pc in the basement. home networks are fun!
Only when reading the sdmb threads. 
usually a dozen.
Right now I have 4 open.
But at work, I will sometimes have over 25 windows open, and they generally ain’t low-RAM applicatons either. Good thing my work PC has a gig of RAM, although sometimes that’s not even enough.
Usually at least one instance of MS Word, WSAD, Lotus Notes, a database utility or two, a few random Notepads, sometimes a Visual Basic and/or Delphi editor…
there’s a reason my taskbar on my work PC is 3 levels high…
Right now two IM windows (buddy list and a conversation) and a tabbed browser with five tabs. This is low…usually I have 7-10 tabs in the browser, three or four IM windows, and then one or two MS Word windows to work on what I’m actually supposed to be doing.
Four browser windows, four tabs in the SDMB window. Two other windows, email and (shudder) work. I’ve got three other computers on the KVM switch, only one of which is running at the moment but that one has got half a dozen windows of it’s own open.
At my peak, when it isn’t a beer swilling Saturday night, I can keep four computers reasonably occupied.
Four, right now. Here, my buddy list, a conversation, and one for school.
Right now I have two, email and the Dope. I’m at home. At home I rarely get more than 4 windows going at a time.
At work on the other hand I usually have 7 or 8 open in remote desktop where my email, documentation, and call tracking DB run. Then on my desktop I usually have at least two PCA or remote desktop connections going to different properties(I connect to properties to fix their software) with 2 or 3 open windows at each property, three or four instances of notepad, a couple IE windows and two copies of our software running. It gets a little hectic sometimes.
Slee
One, and almost always one alone.
Two is my max. But that’s only when I need to google something when reading a thread.
At work, usually 30-40. Sometimes more. That’s spread over eight virtual desktops, mapped to the function keys. So on any given desktop, I have 4-5 windows open.
At home, somewhere between one and six, depending on what I’m doing.
I have only five windows open now, but 7 tabs within my browser are open as well.
46 at the moment. I usually have 12-18 putty windows open for work, connecting to various databases and app servers around here. Another 10-ish windows of IM, and then a hodgepodge of browsers, Itunes, mail, notepad, and random spreadsheet and word docs.
26 at the moment. I will run between 10 and 60 depending on what I’m working on, most of them being mail messages and putty sessions, with browsers thrown in for flavor. My record, not tried for, was 168, mostly SecureCRT.
11 currently, but I’m getting ready to leave for the day, one of them is FireFox that I have 4 tabs open in. usually around 20-25 windows and maybe 10-15 tabs.
15-30 at work. 1-3 at home.
When I visit my parents, they completley panic when more than 1 is open on their PC. They have half a gig of RAM, but lose their minds if I open Word and a browser. God forbid I have two browsers open.
Three tabs in firefox, email, IM, and a VNC connection to a unix workstation that has several dozen xwindows open, spread across 4 virutal desktops.
One Netscape browser with six tabs for the SDMB fora (does that count as 1 or 6?), Adobe Audition, MSN Messenger, and a folder on my D: drive. I have scarcely, if ever, had more than 8 windows open at the same time, here or at work.