I love top-down bottom-up roman shades that I just got for my bedroom and master bath. I just moved to a condo complex with neighboring buildings so privacy is important especially in bedroom. But natural light is too. The TDBU option gives you best of both worlds. I keep TD until dressed in morning and sometimes even put the TD at night so I wake up to some daylight. However, its not a budget option! At least the hunter douglas ones that I got. Most of the shades mount on the "ceiling" of the window opening, so there is usually a little more mounting opportunity than the side jambs. The specs of each shade will give you the exact clearance you need. Graywings' picture of the outside mount is very helpful. It also reminds me that it measuring to the nth degree on an outside mount is not so critical as an inside mount. You have more fudge factor on height and on width which is important in DIY mode. Outside mount profile may be more of a concern based on the view in the particular room. Looking head on at the window won't matter much. At my last place I had wood blinds outside mounted and you entered the room from the side of that window. I wasn't crazy about the profile gap, but I didn't stress over it. I'll see if I can find a picture. [update: Actually on further reflection, what bothered me was the gap created from the curtain rod and drapes that had to extend past the blinds valance. but only an issue from the side view. something to think about.] Here I reluctantly spent the big bucks for the TDBU Roman Shades for Hunter Douglas for the bedroom/bath, but I have other rooms and will probably buy online for those, so I am interested in what responses you get on that part. This post was edited by wendyb on Fri, Jan 3, 14 at 12:30

I have verticals and they are extremely practical. The only downside is when closed, they present usually a bland wall of color. What I love about them is when they are open they take up so little wall space. Mine are mostly open when I am awake and closed during the night when I can't see them anyway. What makes them most dated I think is the mounting hardware--the track and what covers it. Lots of ways to update that. Verticals are so easy to deal with and update with new blinds if some get damaged or you want a new color. That said, I'm thinking about covering my dining room sliders with roll up bamboo blinds. They also get out of the way easily, they roll UP instead of next to the doors so take up space in a different location. The only reason I'm ditching my verticals in the dining room is we eat in there in the winter and entertain and at night we like the slider windows covered over. The windows are a big black hole on one whole wall otherwise. With the verticals closed they are a big wall of blah blue which is the color of my current blinds. So am looking for something that looks nice when closed. Really updated patterns for verticals nowdays are hard to come by. I looked. My dining room is small so the sliders take up almost one whole side of the room.

You are welcome. I'd use WoW if they were here (same area) for my own house LOL. Anyway, the sliding door is under-serviced no doubt. And it's been replaced a few times as well in the last 20 years. Basically, there is something going on where a lot of debris and water get into the track. I think the exposure directly to the outside and a lot of yard debris (leaves, dirt from the ditch that blows up in windy weather, etc). And that starts the downward decline. Perhaps the last install was bad. But we really want to do away with a slider completely this time and simply avoid having to keep cleaning the track and servicing it. Even with a new sliding door, the shoulder surgeries have left their arms weak and I think it's best to avoid that type of door going forward

Please post pictures of the area so we can see it to help advise you.