WM 6.1 or 6.5 ROM?

[noober22]

Hello all,

I've bought what I suppose is the last WM-based modern phone in the universe. That's a perfect device and I'm very glad to own it. Unfortunately, the OS is WM 6.5.x which I've never used before... I mean not just held in hands for several minutes, but customized as well. That's were my troubles began.

I've been using Wisbar Advance since 2007, as it lets explicitly minimize/close windows, show 2 rows in the clock area, make my own buttons for custom actions, which work for any app etc.

Unfortunately, Wisbar Advance doesn't work well with 6.5.x. After minimizing, an app is often not being invalidated/redrawn, two rows don't make the title bar higher, skinning apps feature glitches and as I've found out, WA doesn't support its own Start button at the left-top corner, even as a duplicate of the existing one in the bottom. The worst of all, Lakeridge, WA developer, abandoned WM development at all, so no updates for me anymore. Also, WM 6.5.x looks and feels similar to WinPhone Metro style, which if I liked, I'd bought Lumia instead.

So after reading forums and articles on how to make WM 6.5.x look like 6.1, I concluded that I need a custom ROM, built on top of 6.1 or maybe 6.5 (not 6.5.x), since 6.5 UI is (possibly) not corrupted enough to make WA broken.

I saw ROMs descriptions here with Manila (HTC-like shell, right?) and with no Verizon apps. Is there a ROM without both Manila and the apps, based on 6.1/6.5? At least, can I build one on my own? Or maybe I can just replace some Windows files or fix the issues another way?

Thank you for any help and answers.

Regards,