I decided today that I wanted a quake style powershell console (with the classic win+` to activate or hide), and here is the end result:

I used http://www.instructables.com/id/“Drop-Down”,-Quake-style-command-prompt-for-Window/ as a template to get it all working, but wanted to use Console2 instead of v1.5 like this article uses.

What you need?

Download AutoHotKey
Download Console2

Instructions

1. Extract the Console2 folder somewhere (I extract to %userprofile%\Console2).
2. Add the directory to your %path% (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310519) or create a shortcut to Console.exe and place it in your windows directory.
3. In windows 7/Vista you can use the command ‘setx PATH “%PATH%;%userprofile%\Console2\” /M’
4. Download console.xml and QuakeMode.ahk and overwrite the original console.xml. Then edit console.xml and set the startup directory.
5. Right click on QuakeMode.ahk and run the script.

Now you can press win + to open the console, esc or win+ to close again. Also right click on the console to access the settings to modify things like colour, window size etc etc.