There are a number of applications available which will patch your Windows XP automatically, the leader in this field appears to be the UXtheme Multipatcher. You can download this application from softpedia here. As you can see from the page over at Softpedia it’s all very straightforward and easy for even beginners to manage.

We don’t really feel the need to offer a step-by-step for this application or others like it, but we thought it well worth bringing to your attention.

First things first, lets get this out of the way… If you decide to change your system files, bad things could happen. If you follow this (or any guide) on Vista Themes Finder and something goes terribly wrong, you do so at your own risk, we do not accept any liability if things don’t work as expected.

Secondly, this guide for applying windows themes applies for Windows XP Home and Pro.

There are two common solutions available to update XP with vista themes. The key file is the UXtheme.dll file, which is locked in your out of the box installation, and needs patching. If you don’t patch this file you can only use official Windows Themes, which is pretty dull. You can find various programs online for patching this file automatically, but they’re hard to find and apparently can be buggy and hard to reverse. As such we’ve steered clear, and suggest you may want to do the same.

To manually patch your UXtheme.dll file, the following steps should do it for you:

1. Find out which version of Windows you have installed. Right click on your My Computer icond and chose properties. In the box which pops up on screen underneath the tab labelled General you will see your operating system information, including the Service Pack details, either 1 or 2. Make a note of this, from now on we’ll call that SP1 or SP2, the vast majority of people will have SP2 installed.
2. There are two different unlocked uxtheme.dll files you will need to install unsigned themes, such as vista themes on your xp install. For SP1 you should download the file from here, otherwise for SP2 grab it from here. We’ll go on the assumption that you’ll do what most do, and unzip the file onto your desktop.
3. Now you’ll need to get Replacer, which does exactly what it says on the tin, replaces system files on your computer, automatically backing up your files in case of trouble. Download from here, and unzip replacer.cmd.
4. Next you need to use Replacer.cmd, double click on replacer.cmd and you’ll get a new window open, olde fashioned command line style. Do as the screen says, and drag the original uxtheme.dll theme onto the window. Lets assume your copy of windows is on the C drive. Right click the start button and select Explore. Go to C:\windows\system32, that’s where the file lives. Find the file (oragnize alphabetically and press ‘u’ to get yourself in the right area to speed things up).
5. Now you’ll be asked to drag the replacement file into the window, drag the file you downloaded into the window, and confirm that you do indeed want Replacer to do it’s thing (patch/replace) the original uxtheme.dll. A backup will be created.
6. Restart Windows, cross fingers

Now you’ve gone through this process your system should be ready to take any cool themes, vista themes, or any other type of themes you want to throw at it. We’ll be providing information and links to themes, focusing on vista themes, in the near future, so stay tuned to Vista Themes Finder.