How to Customize your Start Button
- both bitmap and text -
Are you tired of seeing the word "Start" on the start button? If not skip this page. If so, you can replace it with any word and you can replace the tiny image as well.
Method 1 - Replace Text and Image
First, Download Resource Hacker
Change the word "Start" to anything you Wish
Change the tiny Bitmap Image on the left side of the Start Button
Method2 - (text only)
First, download XVI32, which is the best free Hex editor available IMO.
This method works for Windows 95, 98, ME, 2000 and XP. There is really no need for this method, since Resource Hacker does it so easily - but this shows you how the text is stored in binary, and is at least educational.
1. The file that needs to be changed is Windows Explorer, and it is essential to make a backup before you modify anything. "Explorer.exe" can be found in the Windows directory, usually C:\WINDOWS for Windows 95, 98, Me & XP and C:\WINNT for Windows NT/2000. Make a copy of "Explorer.exe" and place it into another directory, C:\BACKUP might be a good choice.
2. Make another copy of the original "Explorer.exe" and name it "Explorer1.exe", then open "Explorer1.exe" in your hex editor.
3.
You now need to
change the word "Start" (with Hex “0x00”, or simply Hex “00” between
each letter) BUT only the occurrence of Start (there are several occurrences of
Start in Explorer.exe) that has the string following it: "There was an
internal error and one of the windows you were using has been closed.".
Since this string will also have the hex “00” between each character, and since
hex “00” has no ASCII character that you can type, use the hex string to search
for the words.
You can either search for the the hex string for the word Start, "53 00
74 00 61 00 72 00 74" in hex values - or even better, search for the
hex string for the first couple of words from the string that must follow that
instance of Start, which is "There was an internal error and one of the
windows you were using has been closed.". In otherwords, search
“There was” which is Hex:
54 00 68 00 65 00 72 00 65 00 20 00 77 00 61 00 73
4. Below is a list of addresses listed by Microsoft, with offsets to point to the "Start" text (BUT my own tests reveal that Explorer.exe does have the string “Start” at these locations – so just use the Hex editor's Search feature instead)
o
Windows 98
Offset: 0x00028D6E - 0x00028D76
o
Windows NT4
Offset: 0x00028BEE - 0x00028BF6
o
Windows ME
Offset: 0x00033DDE - 0x00033DE6
o
Windows 2000
Offset: 0x0003860E - 0x00038616
o
Windows XP
(Enhanced Start Menu)
Offset: 0x000412B6 - 0x000412BE
o
Windows XP
(Classic Start Menu)
Offset: 0x0004158A - 0x00041592
o
Windows XP
SP1 (Enhanced Start Menu)
Offset: 0x0004208E - 0x00042096
o
Windows XP
SP1 (Classic Start Menu)
Offset: 0x0004259A - 0x000425A2
The result may look similar to the image below, depending on the display from your hex editor. Many displays will show the “nul” character that you see below just before the word “Start” – the difference being these displays will show it between every letter of the word “Start” as it correctly should be shown. The following display removes them for easier reading:
5. Once you have located the string, you can then replace the letters in "Start" with five other characters. You must use exactly five characters, if the word you want to use is less, replace the remaining characters with the space key. In this example we have replaced "Start" with "Guide", alternatively a three-letter word would look like "A B C" (note the spaces). Once you have changed the letters the result should look similar to the image below.
6. Now save the modified "Explorer1.exe" in the Windows directory, and confirm that you now have the two Explorer files in the Windows directory, they both should be the same file size but have different modified dates.
7. The next step is different depending on your operating system. Only do the step required for your version.
o
Windows 95,
98 & ME
Exit to DOS (or use a boot disk for Windows ME) and at the command prompt
change to the Windows directory and rename "explorer.exe" to
"explorer.old". Then copy the newly modified Explorer
"explorer1.exe" to "explorer.exe". Do a directory listing
and confirm that "explorer.exe" has the most recent modified date and
time. Restart the computer and Windows should reload along with the new Start
button text.
o
Windows NT
First close any open applications and open a new Command Prompt window, then
switch back to the GUI and open the Task Manager.
Find the "explorer.exe" process and end it, you should now be left
with only the command prompt and task manager. Switch back to the command
prompt and change to the Windows directory, rename "explorer.exe" to
"explorer.old", and copy the newly modified Explorer
"explorer1.exe" to "explorer.exe". Do a directory listing
and confirm that "explorer.exe" has the most recent modified date and
time. Switch back to Task Manager and launch a "New Task" called
"explorer.exe" this should reload the shell along with your modified
"Start" button.
o
Windows 2000
and XP
Open your registry
editor and find the key [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon]. Find the value named "Shell" and change
it to equal the filename of the new explorer "explorer1.exe". Exit
your registry editor and restart Windows for the change to take effect. The
reverse the change, modify the value of "Shell" and set it back to
"explorer.exe".
8. If everything has gone successfully you will now have a new Start button, and also hopefully learnt something about the Explorer file structure. If you do have problems replace the faulty Explorer with the backup made during the first step.
