I'm using Emerge Desktop and once you get used to it it's actually not bad. Took me 5 minutes to figure out where the hell everything went... lol
I completely "hides" everything. And you access your usual Start menu by right clicking on the desktop.
http://emergedesktop.org/
http://emergedesktop.org/FAQ.html
Once you reboot or another tutorial said you can just log off and on there will be a box at the top left. Ctrl+click/drag will show the "task" bar and the open app box. You can customize the look of it to fit your desktop.
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