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I've some questions regarding the following spells:
1)summoning of shadows: you get "summon shadow" and "shades" at lev. 5 and 6 that summons shadows, the two spells seems similar (with both you get stronger summons while caster level increase); also you get "conjure shadow" and "greater shadow conjuration" at lev. 5 and 6 too (at least for bards) that conjure (what is the practica difference with summon?) shadows of different strenght in but not improving with caster lev.
What is the use/difference of all theese spells that to me are very overlapping?
2) what is the difference between "summon djinni" and "summon efreeti", both 7 lev.? have the two summons different powers and so?
thanks for replying

answer to question 2

hello there!
i have answer to the second question:
the two spells each summons a diffrent creature...
diffrent creatures meane diffrent powers.
even the two are almost the same- they have diffrent alignements and diffrent powers (and they are both enemys of each other)
hope it helps- lonely wolf

Also you've got to figure that there is a slight varatioin in the creature being summoned. Ex. Djinn and Efretie are both close but one draws it power from the phere of fire and the other of air. You got figure also the elemental summoning spells are like this as well. it just for you to decide

Thanks for explaining the second question, I actually never summoned any of the two, but I should have though of that.

But regarding the "shadows" it seems to me that there is a lot of overlapping there.
Shadow and greater shadow summoning both grant you stronger summon as you raise in lev. so what is the difference? Shadow conjuration too get you stronger summons as you increase lev., but maybe are different the monster you get from the previous two (what is the practical difference between summon and conjure?)? Finaly shades is the highest lev. spell but it seems the weakest of the three (you summons have lower hp).
I am very confused here.

Anyway it would be very interesting to have a table with the stats and powers of all the different summons, something like the shapeshifting tables.

For question 1
According to PHB all these spells conjure shadow versions of real creatures. Now the difference goes like this:

Shadow Conjuration: The summoned creatures are 20% as strong as the real creatures
Greater Shadow Conjuration: The summoned creatures are 40% as strong as the real ones and
Shades: The summoned creatures are 60% as strong as the real ones.

In IWD2 the spells work pretty much like this. PHD does not have summon shadow spell so i guess it must be something similar to these ones.