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Windows XP Preinstalled Environment skins

This page was last updated on September 21, 2006
Written by R.Collewijn

: : Introduction
: : zSkins plugin
: : Resource Hacker
: : Windows XP Professional available bitmaps
: : XPE plugin available bitmaps
: : Conclusion
: : History

Introduction

In this short manual I try to explain how to change the layout/skins of some parts of your own Windows XPE. To realize this we need Resource Hacker, this is a little tool that’s free to download at this link.

True this short manual I try to explain the steps I use. This doesn’t mean it’s the best way to do it and if you have any suggestions or recommendation, please let me known.

zSkins plugin

After you have downloaded the zSkins plugin you extract this in a new plugin directory zSkins. It’s imported that the directory begins with a Z, because this directory must almost be the last moment implement into your Windows XPE ISO.

Put also the following files from your installation cd in the zSkins\files directory;

explorer.exe
ntoskrnl.exe
shell32.dll
msgina.dll

After you have changed the bitmaps of the ntoskrnl.exe file, you must make a copy of ntoskrnl.exe and rename this copy into ntkrnlmp.exe or one of the following file names.

ntoskrnl.exe - Windows Single Processor Kernel
ntkrnlmp.exe - Windows Multi Processor Kernel
ntkrnlpa.exe - Windows Single Processor Kernel with more then 3 GB of RAM
ntkrpamp.exe - Windows Multi Processor Kernel with more then 3 GB of RAM

Check if this new file exist within zSkins.inf file.

zSkins.inf

; zSkins.inf
; PE Builder v3 plug-in INF file for Windows XPE Skins
; Created by xpe.collewij.info[Version]


Signature= "$Windows NT$"

[PEBuilder]
Name="zSkins - Windows XPE Skins"
Enable=1
Help="zSkins.htm"

[SourceDisksFiles]
files\ntoskrnl.exe=2
files\ntkrnlmp.exe=2
files\explorer.exe=1
files\shell32.dll=2
files\msgina.dll=2

Resource Hacker

To change the skins we need to edit all the zSkins\files\*.* files with Resource Hacker. In this first example we editing bitmap 131 from the Shell32.dll file. After we have start the Resource Hacker program we browse to the bitmap 131 picture.

And replace this picture with the one you want by using the following steps;

To get the following result.

And save this file.

Windows XP Professional available bitmaps

I have found out that in the following file’s you can change the following bitmaps numbers. This bitmaps numbers are for Windows XP and for other Windows versions you must figure out which bitmaps are available.

explorer.exe

Bitmap 167 (21x233x4)

ntoskrnl.exe

Bitmap 1 (640x480x4)

You must save this picture as with RLE comprossion which you can do with PaintShop Pro.

Use Paint Shop Pro -> Save As -> Windows Bitmap (BMP) -> OPTIONS -> RLE