My Windows XP theme is broken, help!

Hello everyone.

I tried to use the Luna Element 5 theme, and it asked me to patch the UXtheme.dll file under system32 in Windows XP.

But its now broken my interface... most the backgrounds have gone black in colour, inlcuding the theme windows, the start menu and right click menus... I don't know what to do to fix it... is there anyway to reset it without System Restore? As I don't have that active...

Help!

Ok update. Managed to get it back to Classic Windows Theme.

Now I need to figured out how to fix my .dll file and get things looking good again ^^

It nevermind, fixed it myself. Loaded a copy of the windows theme select and click randomally to fix it, got LE5 theme loaded now...

Thank goodness.

For future reference, you can get a safe multipatcher from NeoWin.

http://www.neowin.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=308905

I'll post this here if anyone else sees this thread.

WHENEVER you attempt to use custom WindowsXP themes/shells, make SUR you first create a backup copy of UXtheme.dll file BEFORE modifying anything!

This will pretty much ensure that anytime you experience serious theme/shell problems, you can simply overwrite the modified file with the backup.

Just some advice to others looking to mess with custom shells/themes.
Btw, RTSFireBat, im glad yours auto fixed, it can cause a lot of grief when the winXP interface is permanently screwed up (speaking from own experience, LOL!).

cheers

Yeah that is the one I used in the end, there are many patchers on the Internet, but I found this is the only one which works 100% of the time.

Yes mate, I did back it up. But since the Interface was broken I couldn't get to the file to restore it lol

My only advise for people who see this is if you using a custom theme ALWAYS check what the windows theme preview window is showing beforing clicking apply or OK. If it looks odd, don't click it by mistake like I did.

This time I go lucky with random clicking to get the classic theme back up.

On the note I'm suprised there isn't any guides or patch exes on the Microsoft site to load the default themes in an event such as this.

Oh, so you couldn't even SEE stuff enough on ur desktop to do the simple fix eh? Man that prolly was despairing! Lol, thank God for random chance eh? That random clicking success saved you buttloads of pain.

Anywhoo, in the end another set of great advice, looking at the preview before applying. LoL, i often don't look, eek! well congrats on the fix...

cheers!

I got an easier question: currently, all of my text are in italics: browser text etc.

I haven't changed a thing I suppose, I just loaded windows and there it was. Odd.

Style XP ftw...

you have to "pay" for that though...

Seriously though, I had a lot of performance issues when I was running stylexp. If you don't care about the startup screen/logon/etc, I see no need to waste resources on it. Then again, I'm already wasting resources using a visual style in the first place.

--EDIT--

Also, RTSFirebat, you could have replaced the file by booting into DOS, and then copy the file back. Also, MicroSoft doesn't have such a fix because this is actually an illegal patch of the OS. MS only supports official styles purchased through them. I remember reading somewhere that Pro already has style support, and Home is the only version that requires such a patch, but it's been so long since I did a pro installation that I can't really confirm it.