Windows 8.1 - Deleting User Created Lock Screen Images
May 3, 2014
I've just bought a new laptop with Windows 8.1 and have been playing around with the settings etc. and have a question regarding the Lock screen.
I have personalised the lock screen with my own picture but have decided that I don't like it and would just prefer to use one of the default pictures, but there doesn't seem to be anyway of deleting the picture I have added.
I've tried searching for the picture on the laptop but have had no success finding it. How delete this picture?
I installed Windows 8 early to setup everything up so when it comes out in October I can just buy it and activate it. Then I got tired of not being able to customize anything so I found where Windows stores various images and here they are.
Note: After each one you may have to restart explorer.exe (cmd> tskill explorer)
Tools:Take Ownership registry edit- [URL] ....
User Account Picture:
-Go to C: Drive
-In the ribbon go to "View" Tab and choose "Options"> In the new windows go to "View"> choose to Show Hidden files
-Back in the explorer go to "ProgramData" since it is not hidden anymore
-Then Microsoft> then User Account Pictures
-The images you want to change are user.bmp, user.png, user-40.png, user-200.png (You may not see the .png or .bmp)
Now in Photoshop (or any other image editing software) make 4 images of the image you want using these settings:
This took me a while as it was harder then I thought, but here is a simplified version of what I did.
1. Download and install the takeown script to registry (This will save you a lot of time and trouble)
2. Go to "C:WindowsWebScreen" and replace img100.jpg with the image you want (make sure you have the same name)
3)Go to "C:ProgramDataMicrosoftWindows" and right click the "SystemData" folder and choose "Take Ownership" now you can enter the folder by pressing continue
4) Now go to S-1-5-18>ReadOnly>LockScreen_Z and replace the image with the same image you replaced in step 2, but remember to change your images file name to the one of the image your replacing. For example in step 2 it was called "img100" and this one the same image is now called "LockScreen___1920_1080" for me.
5) Now for the last one is in "C:WindowsWinSxS"
6) You will see tons of folders just use the search and search for 'img100" and when you find the correct image open the folder (right click>open file location) and replace img100 with your lockscreen image (once again make sure you keep the same file name so make sure your new lock screen says img100)
It seems like a lot to change the lock screen, but I had to change all of them to change that one setting
Start Screen: [URL] ......
Look at the bottom of this post under, "Programs to do these process for you", if you want a easier way.
3) Wait a second for it to popup and select your color
4) Alt+tab out or just press ctrl+shift+esc to bring up task manager
5) Kill msoobe.exe (it may be under Background Processes)
6) Restart explorer (cmd (or win+r)> tskill explorer)
Programs to do these process for you:I personally prefer to do manual edits, but I know some people do not or have a harder time so here are two programs I found that will change account picture and start screen. Then as a bonus it will also remove the activate water marks.
[URL]
Note: It did change the color (a simple registry edit), but it failed to change the start screen for me.
My laptop is a Sony Vaio - Model: SVE141R11L Product name: SVE14135CXB Pre-loaded with Windows 8 x64 Intel(R) Core i5-3230M CPU @ 2.60GHz 6GB RAM w/ 900GB HDD space Purchased in Navy Exchange last year (around July 2013)
I have dropped it once or twice from at most a 3ft fall inside a padded case. I mostly use my computer for school work, some gaming, extensive video/photo editing, internet browsing. I've installed some debatable programs but have been installed long ago. Most of my programs included Microsoft Office, Adobe suite, Steam, iTunes, uTorrent, McAfee VirusScan Enterprise, Winrar, VLC, etc. But are now gone due to the refresh I had just done last week for prior problems, but still experience problems.
I recently been having issues with my computer where it just won't respond at all. Like today, I had it working for a few hours, but then went out and left my laptop on the lock screen, and came back to it being completely stuck. Completely stuck as in, no keys or clicks would unlock the screen to the login prompt. However, my cursor was fully able to move around the screen, and my caps/num lock buttons work as they display the lights enabling/disabling them. The time when it was stuck was 8:03pm, but the clock was stuck on 7:55. But on the bottom of the front of the laptop, the HDD orange light is not lit up at all, which I believe suggest that the HDD is not reading/properly reading. Oddly enough, when I unplugged the power cord, the HDD light flickered a little then disappeared, still no response - could be related to the PSU I suppose?
Another problem I faced before was the Windows 8.1 update failure, resulting in reverted changes, etc. I also had problems in the first few months of owning this, but found it was the incompatibility of an old antivirus that I guess didn't work too well with Windows 8 causing me to have to do a full wipe before. That was long ago. Moreover, the problems I have been experiencing have been unresponsiveness, from what I believe, are the fast boot Win 8 provides (but I turned that off), issues with Windows 8 not being able to load drivers from sleep mode upon opening the laptop (turned off automatic sleep), and now with the lock screen being stuck. I know my problems aren't detailed, but maybe these problems are linked to a bigger similar problem that people have been facing? My last bet would be to do a full factory restore/ repair, although I don't have a Windows 8 boot CD.
Prior to last week my computer was running Windows 7, the computer also has a 3TB MyBook external drive on which I ripped over 100 movies from DVD/Blue-Rays that I own (and still have). The reason for doing that was 1) so I could watch the movies on my TV without the hassle of inserting the dvd into the blue-ray player, and (2) reduce the amount of storage space (I threw away the original containers and put them in a simple DVD file).
Last week I installed a new internal hard drive and did a clean install of Windows 8. Consequently my admin account's user name was changed to be the same as my Microsoft live.com account name. Now I can't access any of the folders on MyBook without taking ownership of them one-at-a-time. That is going to be very very time consuming to do that for over 100 folders. Any faster way to accomplish this?
I don't know why Microsoft won't allow computer Administrator to access any folder on his computer. This is just dumb.
The situation gets even worse -- after taking ownership of the folders I still can't access any of the files or sub-folders. I have to do that for every folder and file, somewhere around 500 of them! I feel like just reformatting the drive and starting all over again.
I've upgraded to Windows 8 RTM this weekend and I'm having this problem: Every time I boot the PC (shutdown or restart), the Num Lock key is off. Since my password uses numbers, and I'm pretty used to type it with Num Lock, I'd like to keep it always on. It was fine on Windows 7. Now, I've searched for it, and there is the "InitialKeyboardIndicators" key on regedit. I have changed values for all of them to "2", and it didn't work. My BIOS say to keep it always on.
On a MSI CR70 running on Windows 8.0, I wanted to change the location for "My Images" from "D:Pictures" to "C:UsersMain User*Pictures". Because the folder didn't already exist, the bar where you could fill in the new location** kept setting it to "C:UsersMain User". So now I have accidentally changed the location from My Images to "Main User". It's very weird this redirecting, as the "Main User"-folder looks disappeared in Win Explorer, but then "Contacts" is in "Main UserContacts" and at the same time in "Main UseImagesContacts". It's frustrating that Windows doens't let me change the location of "Pictures" back to where it came from or back in the normal folder, and I don't like it.
Updated to 8.1, created a couple of users accounts - but unable to sign into these accounts. Clicking to sign in, simply shows (a few seconds later) - 'Signing out'. No errors or similar reported and nothing obvious in the Event Log of the Admin user.
Have tried a variety of accounts - with passwords, without, child accounts, etc - same result.
Any accounts existing prior to 8.1 seem to work okay.
Safety Scanner and SFC check found no problems. A bit more testing found that if I create a new Administrator user, then this user can be logged onto and works fine. Whereas the Standard or Child accounts still won't logon. Accounts created using a pre-existing 2nd Administrator user (i.e. pre 8.1) show the same behaviour.
Logged on as Admin1 (my account). Created W-user2 (child user) - unable to logon Created test-user (std user) - unable to logon Created test-21-1 (std user - created 21/10/13 after sfc check) - unable to logon Created Admin3 (admin user) - Logon successful
Logged on as Admin2 (pre-existing 2nd Admin account) Created standard2 (std user) - unable to logon Created child2 (child user) - unable to logon Created Admin4 (admin user) - Logon successful
So, it looks like only new Admin users can logon. A pre-existing Standard user account can still logon (as before).
I have Windows 8 home with IE 10. I want to DISABLE selective browser history deletion (open history, right-click-delete certain websites). I don't have gpedit.msc but I believe it falls under the "Prevent User from deleting websites visited" or something along those lines. I found a registry key edit "CleanHistory" and I have changed the value back and forth from 0 and 1 but it still hasn't stopped me from being able to selectively delete. I found the registry key on multiple websites so I imagine it's supposed to work but it just isn't. User error, perhaps?
When I turn on or restart my computer after the teal windows logo with the spinning wheel the screen will flash off quickly then come back on black and then 10 seconds later show the lock screen.
I upgraded from Windows 7 to Windows 8 Pro. Everytime or almost everytime I click on an app or go to the desktop and try to get on IE 10 (desktop version), my screen flashes and goes black for a few seconds then returns me to the screen with the space needle, then I click on it and it signs me back in. When I try to use Google Chrome, the websites freeze up on me. I don't want to have to reinstall/reformat as I paid $40 for this for one, and secondly, I don't want to have to repurchase Office 2010 as my licenses ran out. I ran every update that comes up and restart, but this doesn't change this issue. . why it does this and any way to fix it without reformatting?
Just upgraded to 8.1 this weekend. Whenever I install a new app from the Store, it says it's installed, and I can search for it and play it, but it does NOT create a tile for the new app on my Start screen??
I can search for it, then right-click on it, and click on "Pin to Start" and it creates a tile on my Start screen, but I want it to create a new tile by default when I install an app, and it has stopped doing that!!!!
So, I wanted to download a game from the windows store and had to create a Live/microsoft account. After doning so win 8 made that account the account that I use to sigh-in to windows. Didn't wanted that so I went to user managment and deleted the account from thare. The problem is that I also accidenly deleted my windows user account as well.
After I restarted, I got to the password screen and my windows user was gone, just "other user". I tryed to enter the windows user name and password but nothing. the screen also showed the microsoft acount name but here also the password dident work (probably because a deleted them both from the system...)
Every time I Restart my Laptop, the Lock Screen does not show the Welcome Screen and skips directly to the User Account login screen. Actually, it shows a darkish blue screen for a couple of seconds and then jumps to the user account login.
When I use the logout function or the shutdown (and I power it back on) everything works normally.
I have ran SFC / Scannow in windows (8.1 by the way).
I have a problem in my dual boot machine. I decided to remove Linux mint 17 from my dual boot with windows 8. I used easeus partition manager to delete the partitions associated (root, home and swap). Then I got unallocated space just before my windows partition. So I moved my windows partition to the extreme left possible. Then I merged this unallocated space with my second storage partition.
These steps required reboot (specifically the moving of windows partition). When I rebooted my PC I got an error that grub was not found. I realized that I had forgot to fix MBR and load windows boot loader. So I used windows 7 recovery disk (yes windows 7 as I don't have windows8 recovery or installation disk). I got a windows 7 style boot loader instead of windows 8's graphical one which has advanced recovery options built in. But I proceeded. Then eases did its job with the partitions. After a reboot now I am stuck at a black screen after entering my password with a movable mose cursor. I can only press Ctrl+alt+del. Selecting task manager from it does nothing.
Since I don't have windows 8 disks and windows 8 boot loader I am not able to refresh or reset my PC. Neither can I shift restart my PC to get advanced boot options. One more thing to note, that while entering password, I noticed that the lock screen and account pictures have changed to defaults of a freshly installed windows.
I recently installed Office 2007 onto my Vaio. It said it was successful and needed a reboot, so I rebooted. Upon reboot, it simply won't let me get to the lock screen (where I enter my pass/PIN). I have control of the keyboard (I think) because I can still adjust the brightness. The track-pad won't register my click to get into the lock-screen.
I tried to get into safe mode, which I've read is done by holding Shift and pressing F8 repeatedly at bootup. No go on safe mode.
Is there some alternative way to get into safe mode or somehow get into the lock screen?
How do I lock my windows 8 desktop? I leave my computer unattended at times so I usually lock the screen so that no one can access it while I'm gone, So how to do it in Windows 8?
Why Microsoft Have made it so difficult to use this OS.
I recently installed windows 8.1 pro x64 on my laptop which is acer 5755g.but i've a very strange problem with that. When I want to go afk before leaving laptop i press windows + l key and go to lock screen everything is ok now but when I'm coming back in few hours laptop is freezes and must shut it down from power button.
I tried: installed windows again updated all of drivers using coolpad
If I change the lockscreen to a different picture as the default ones, one of these default pictures goes away in the PC Settings Panel. Is there a way to restore them back so that only the default ones are there?
This morning I woke up to find that I could not log in to my windows 8 computer. The first 'lockscreen' would appear, but the when I clicked to go to the next screen to log in, all I see is text in the bottom right hand corner telling me about windows updates that will automatically update in two days (I have already installed most of the newest WUs).... Having issues with the latest WU?
Pc was running fine last night, woke up this morning and powered on pc. Windows 8 boot to the start/lock screen and does nothing more.
Some info keyboard and mouse don't work, keyboard num lock lights up but you can't turn off. Only change to pc was done 4 days ago when i brought 2 samsung 830 ssd drives and I installed a fresh copy of windows 8.
When pressing the power button pc boots down as it should (i dont have to hold the power button for a forced shutdown)
My PC is on 24/7 previously on every version of Windows when I walk away, the screen turns off after 30mins of inactivity, the PC stays on and when I return, I simply moved the mouse and within 2 - 3 seconds the monitor was back on, and I was where I left it.
On Windows 8.1 that sometimes happens, but 90% of the time what is happening, when I return to my PC, I move the mouse and nothing happens, anything I press on keyboard etc, monitor stays off on black screen, if I turn the monitor off by the button and back on, it just stays black, the only way I can get back to my Desktop is to restart the PC!!
I changed several power settings around, disabled password on idle setting, googled many things and tried and its still doing it. The PC is still on fans etc, but doesn't respond.
Weird thing is, it did it today when I was watching a movie on my PC connected media server downstairs (app is PS3 Media Server used with a WDTV Live Hub) I came to use the PC and it was black screen, I went back downstairs and could still access all my files on the media server, so the PC is still up and fully running when it does this, but I just can't get the monitor to display anything other than black screen, again on a reboot everything is fine again.
To summarise, I have power setting to turn off display after 30mins, usually a nudge of the mouse brings the monitor to life, this is not happening, I can only get back to desktop via hard PC reboot.
I have recently installed 8.1 on my desktop with 3 local user accounts (no Microsoft accounts) and no user passwords, and Guest account Off. I have bypassed the lock screen but whenever the computer is switched on or a user signs out, the OS loads the last user instead of going to the user select screen. Something that all Windows OSs have done from go to Win 7. I can back arrow which does display the user select screen.
Or more importantly, any way to make it act like all previous Windows systems. I would not be fussed if this was a single user computer.
i installed windows 8.1 RTM BUT when i start download anything using IDM few seconds windows show my lock screen although i adjust my power options to never (Turn off display or put computer to sleep). What is the cause of this problem?
Any way of deleting all the alleged 'Frequent' buttons from the foot of the screen when I go into IE. Obviously I've tried deleting them individually but they insist on returning. Ideally I'd like to get rid of 'Frequent' itself so more of my genuine 'Favourites' would show.
I have The Weather app permissions set to allow it to display the weather on the lock screen. This has been working fine for some time -- up until now.
bought a new pc with windows 8 this week. set it up yesterday all worked fine, was on it again today - i uninstalled the crappy free trial anti-virus software that came with the computer and turned on windows defender. i was prompted to update software which i did. i turned the computer off and came back to it later.
when i turn the computer on now, it gets stuck at the lock screen. the mouse and keyboard do not work. the light is initially on the keyboard for a split second when first turn the computer on, then it goes away. the mouse is lit up but does not move. i have tried adding a second keyboard, or replacing the keyboard completely. also tried using a different mouse, it still gets stuck at the lock screen.
i have also tried pressing F8 when computer is booting up but it does not register it. i have tried to put in the windows 8 recovery CD - but this does not load.
i have obviously tried to reboot the computer several times etc.
I can't seem to find any way to lock my start screen once I get my apps organized and just the way I want them. Is there no way to lock your apps so that they can't be rearranged by someone? If not then that seems like a glaring omission. I spend a great deal of time arranging it and then my three year old comes along and messes it all up. I would like to prevent this. I know I can create a user password and just not let any use on it.
