There still are some PC users out there with XP (and I’m partially one of them!) For those unfortunate, I will give a small walkthrough that will enable you to change your boring old XP theme to the more vibrant Vista theme!

To be able to load 3rd party themes in XP, you’ll need t patch, make sure that you’ve patched your uxtheme.dll. This file, you can find in C:\WINDOWS\system32:

Copy the file to another location to backup it. Now download a patcher like UXPatcher and run it. Don’t be alarmed if the theme switches back the Win98 theme. The original theme will revert after a restart. Once you’ve done this, you’re ready to download and install the new XP Theme!

If you browse the internet, you’ll find a lot of cool looking Vista themes. For example, The Vista 13 Theme is a nice start.

Unzip the files in this package to the themes folder: C:\WINDOWS\Resources\Themes. Now, double-click the .msstyle file included in the zip file.

You will see that the theme changes to the new Vista theme!