Some UI suggestions

The different tree styles under Preferences / Folder Tree / Appearance have different widths, although I don't know if any of them are as narrow as the one you have in mind. The Vista-style auotmatic horizontal scrolling option under Preferences / Folder Tree / Options can make the width of tree branches less important, too.[/quote]
Those don't affect the width of the branches. In XYplorer, narrow folder tree width actually makes the + and - branch controls appear closer to the edge so the expanded branches aren't pushed out to the right as far. It really does save a lot of empty space.

You can have as many icons on the status bar as you want, and you can fully customize the information displayed there.

See Preferences / Display / Status Bar and the Status Bar Codes thread, as well as the Sampels drop-down in Preferences, which included a sample that only uses icons for the file/folder counts, just as you wish.[/quote]
For the status bar I mean only 3 kinds of icons (could use ones for items and bytes/space too), not the amount of icons. The column headers allow no icons, of course.

So does Opus, if you change the grid line style, under Preferences / File Display Modes / Details, to the solid block.[/quote]
Ah, great, thanks.