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Changing the Pre-Login Screen Background Picture

Answered Changing the Pre-Login Screen Background Picture

  • Tuesday, August 21, 2012 4:07 PM
     
     
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    How can I change the initial screen before the domain login page? Right now it's set with a Seattle picture that scrolls up to reveal the login screen. I've tried changing the Lock screen but that doesn't change it.

    Orange County District Attorney

     

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  • Tuesday, August 21, 2012 7:31 PM
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    How can I change the initial screen before the domain login page? Right now it's set with a Seattle picture that scrolls up to reveal the login screen. I've tried changing the Lock screen but that doesn't change it.

    Orange County District Attorney

    Hi Sandy

    Press WinKey+I.

    Select Change PC Settings.

    At the top/right of the window, click the Lock Screen item.

    Select any of the Thumbnail images to change to that image.

    Click the Browse button and navigate to any custom image that you wish to use.

    Best


     
  • Tuesday, August 21, 2012 7:42 PM
     
     
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    Hello Ronnie,

    Thanks for the information. I have changed the Lock picture using WinKey+I - If I Press WinKey+L the system locks and the picture I've changed it to appears. However, when I restart in the morning, right before the domain login, the old Seattle, Space Needle picture still shows there. Guess I've got to live with it. Maybe it's because I'm running Windows 8 Enterprise?

    Orange County District Attorney

     
  • Tuesday, August 21, 2012 8:19 PM
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    Hi Sandy

    I have not had a chance to test the Enterprise version yet, but you may be correct.

    There are many differences with this new version of Enterprise.

    Best

     
  • Tuesday, August 21, 2012 9:43 PM
     
     
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    Thanks Ronnie. I can live with it for now.

    Orange County District Attorney

     
  • Tuesday, August 21, 2012 9:47 PM
     
     
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    Looks like you are using domain accounts, right?

    In that case, I guess that they are showing the default lockscreen since many users can connect to the machine, it wouldn't make sense to use a specified user lockscreen instead of the default one.

    /my 2 cts.

     
  • Tuesday, August 21, 2012 9:50 PM
     
     
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    Yes, we are. It does make perfect sense what you're saying. I'll keep digging to see if I can find out where the setting might be. Maybe a GPO.

    Orange County District Attorney

     
  • Wednesday, August 22, 2012 1:33 AM
     
     
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    In a multi-user environment on a non-domain machine, a logged in user who locks the screen gets their background, but when no user logs in, it gets the default. I guess they automatically apply this to a domain machine.
     
  • Wednesday, August 22, 2012 2:54 PM
     
     
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    On my domain-joined machine, I can lock the screen and get my custom background. It's just the initial screen before the login prompt that I can't change.

    Orange County District Attorney

     
  • Wednesday, August 22, 2012 3:24 PM
     
     
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    I know what you mean, i have the same setup.  It might be in group policy where you can change it.  I'm going to look for it.  It'd be nice if we can change it to maybe a company picture.
     
  • Thursday, August 23, 2012 8:13 AM
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    Open Group Policy Edit, locate to Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\System\Logon. Enable the policy “Always use custom login background” and see the result.

    Please remember to click “Mark as Answer” on the post that helps you, and to click “Unmark as Answer” if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread. ”

     
  • Thursday, August 23, 2012 2:35 PM
     
     
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    I set the policy that was mentioned and added a sample .jpg to the folder mentioned in this article ( http://www.grouppolicy.biz/2010/08/group-policy-setting-of-the-week-39-always-use-custom-logon-background/ ). It didn't change anything. I also changed the value of OEMBackgroud to 1 in the registry HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Authentication\LogonUI\Background. Still no change.

    Orange County District Attorney

     
  • Tuesday, September 18, 2012 5:32 PM
     
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    Try this:

    Open: C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\SystemData\S-1-5-18\ReadOnly\LockScreen_Z\

    Replace the picture in there with your custom background picture. IT MUST MATCH THE NAME OF THE CURRENT BACKGROUND PICTURE (for me, it's LockScreen___1680_1050.jpg). Logoff (or restart) to see the result.

    *NOTE* You may have to take ownership (or grant yourself permission) to view the contents of the SystemData folder and it's subfolders.


    *EDIT* It seems Microsoft may have released an update which the above solution no longer applies. It's still a picture in the SystemData folder, but it now has _notdimmed appended to the end of the name of the picture.
    • Proposed As Answer by AnthonyDa Tuesday, September 18, 2012 8:05 PM
    • Edited by Brian Michael Reed Sunday, October 14, 2012 1:30 PM additional information
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  • Tuesday, October 09, 2012 2:37 PM
     
     
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    That worked, Brian! Thanks a bunch. 

    Really wish there was an easier way to do this, though. That Seattle image looks terrible. (IMHO, of course.)
     
  • Thursday, November 01, 2012 3:51 AM
     
     
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    Thank you.

    This almost worked for me. I renamed the original file to "<same file>_2" and put in a new jpg that had the same exact name as the original file ("Lockscreen__1920_1080_notdimmed.jpg") however now no image is seen at that login screen. It seems it Windows does not find an image and just chooses to display a color.

    I can't restore the original Seattle image either (not that I want to).

    Anyone have an experience like this one?

     
  • Thursday, November 01, 2012 2:08 PM
     
     
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    Yes, that same thing happened to me. I've got a nice light-blue screen now. I can't get the Seattle picture back or substitute one that I like either. Just solid colors.

    Orange County District Attorney

     
  • Thursday, November 01, 2012 3:59 PM
     
     
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    Sorry everyone. The _notdimmed is in ADDITION to the original image in my first answer (so you will end up with two images). I think the_notdimmed part was because I tested this on a laptop. Try my original answer and if you have a laptop, add the second image with_notdimmed added to it. Again, sorry for the confusion.
     
  • Friday, November 02, 2012 2:25 AM
     
     
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    You need to give 'SYSTEM' permissions then it will work.  This can be done by right-clicking the image and selecting properties.  Select the tab for Security and click edit and then click add.  Under object name type SYSTEM and click the 'Check Names' button then click Apply.  Give SYSTEM Full Control by selecting the check boxes below
    • Edited by KuuHomeOKahaluu Friday, November 02, 2012 2:32 AM
    • Proposed As Answer by Ionut Seba Wednesday, November 07, 2012 1:26 PM
    • Unproposed As Answer by Ionut Seba Wednesday, November 07, 2012 1:26 PM
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  • Wednesday, November 07, 2012 1:32 PM
     
     
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    The solutions mentioned above worked for me; now I want to restore the defaults, so I want to choose manually a lock screen picture from Settings>Change PC Settings>Personalize.

    I gave SYSTEM permission to the folder C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\SystemData, mentioned above and thus I was able to change lock screen manually as default procedure.

    I saw that in the folder C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\SystemData\S-1-5-18\ReadOnly, everytime I change my lock screen, manually from Settings>Change PC Settings>Personalize, it is created a folder named LockScreen_Y, LockScreen_X, LockScreen_U etc, as the same as in the folder C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows.

    That's OK, but when I wanted to come back to your sollutions above, I deleted all the folders in C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\SystemData\S-1-5-18\ReadOnly, after I took all permissions, and also I delete all the folders such LockScreen_Z in C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows and then I restarted the machine, but, for my surprise, I discovered that the current lock screen was last which I had set manually (not and empty blue screen as mentioned in an above post).

    So I think there is another path where is the cache for lock screen in Windows 8.

    Could you tell me where it is?

    Thanks.

     
  • Friday, December 07, 2012 4:33 PM
     
     
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    I had the same problem. Wanted to change the ugly Seattle montaged picture, why couldnt Microsoft just use the real picture, eh? But I managed to change the space needle login without editing the registry. Just assign a new password to your account and the login screen can be changed to your liking (according to your lock screen) , no more space needle montage. Any resolution seem to be okay, just dont use HD. It seems this is the only way for windows 8 to detect the new picture assigned for lock screen. As for the blue screen login background change dont know how yet, but there are software you can use to change that. Still trying another way to change manually.
     
  • Friday, December 07, 2012 4:42 PM
     
     
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    You can change the lock screen but hovering the mouse in the bottom
    left to get the charms bar, click settings, on the bottom click on
    "Change PC settings", Personalize, Lock Screen...
     
     
    Bob Comer - Microsoft MVP Virtual Machine
     
  • Wednesday, December 19, 2012 7:00 AM
     
     
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    Try this:

    Open: C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\SystemData\S-1-5-18\ReadOnly\LockScreen_Z\

    Replace the picture in there with your custom background picture. IT MUST MATCH THE NAME OF THE CURRENT BACKGROUND PICTURE (for me, it's LockScreen___1680_1050.jpg). Logoff (or restart) to see the result.

    *NOTE* You may have to take ownership (or grant yourself permission) to view the contents of the SystemData folder and it's subfolders.


    *EDIT* It seems Microsoft may have released an update which the above solution no longer applies. It's still a picture in the SystemData folder, but it now has _notdimmed appended to the end of the name of the picture.

    This worked for my personal pro version at home, didnt need to use the _notdimmed part. MS really needs to find an easyier solution.

    But after a restart of the computer the folder containing the image had removed system for the folder rights, but the custom image was still present and being used. so Thanks a bunch Brian!!!!

    Uniscrap A/S


    • Edited by uniscrap Wednesday, December 19, 2012 7:02 AM
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  • Wednesday, December 19, 2012 8:23 AM
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    MSFT listened and released a ways to customize the lockscreen image:

    Win8: How to Manage the Lock Screen Image on Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012
    http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2787100/en-us

    The update “Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 cumulative update: November 2012” adds functionality to the Control Panel group polices that allow an administrator to designate a lock screen image on their Windows 8 and Windows 2012 computers. This setting lets you specify the default lock screen image shown when no user is signed in, and also sets the specified images as the default for all users (it replaces the inbox default image).

    The new group policy is named “Force a specific default lock screen image” and can be found in this path in the group policy editor: “Computer Configuration\Policies\Administrative Templates\Control Panel\Personalization”

    "A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code"

     
  • Friday, December 28, 2012 1:01 AM
     
     
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    MSFT listened and released a ways to customize the lockscreen image:

    Win8: How to Manage the Lock Screen Image on Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012

    The update “Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 cumulative update: November 2012” adds functionality to the Control Panel group polices that allow an administrator to designate a lock screen image on their Windows 8 and Windows 2012 computers. This setting lets you specify the default lock screen image shown when no user is signed in, and also sets the specified images as the default for all users (it replaces the inbox default image).

    The new group policy is named “Force a specific default lock screen image” and can be found in this path in the group policy editor: “Computer Configuration\Policies\Administrative Templates\Control Panel\Personalization”

    "A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code"


    No they didn't listen. That only pertains to Windows 8 ENTERPRISE and SERVER. It doesn't work for standard Windows 8. I don't understand why MSFT decided that users wouldn't want to change the ugly, cartoonish images used for login on Windows 8.
     
  • Friday, December 28, 2012 4:49 PM
     
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    Totally agree... as a designer I would prefer to "Personalize" my Win8 with images I choose.

    Look forward to MS sorting it out ASAP!

    • Proposed As Answer by Florian Wartner Sunday, December 30, 2012 10:53 AM
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  • Thursday, January 10, 2013 5:03 PM
     
     
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    This is NOT the answer to the question. This tells you how to change the image when the PC is at the Account Lock Screen. The question asks how to change the "Pre-Login picture".

    edit:

    I also love how when you comment on a post it doesn't list you anywhere near the post you commented on. Very useful for anyone else reading the thread at a later date.

    • Edited by arthiusc Thursday, January 10, 2013 7:40 PM
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  • Thursday, January 10, 2013 7:57 PM
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    This is NOT the answer to the question. This tells you how to change the image when the PC is at the Account Lock Screen. The question asks how to change the "Pre-Login picture".

    Hi arthiusc

    There is no background "picture" on the log-in screen. That screen only shows a 'color'.

    You can change the color of that screen, but this only changes the color if you are viewing All User Accounts. It does not change the color of the log-in screen if you are just viewing the last user account.

    Here is a tutorial to make this change.

    Sign in Screen - Change Background Color in Windows 8:
    http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/15554-sign-screen-change-background-color-windows-8-a.html

    Regards

     
  • Friday, January 11, 2013 4:29 PM
     
     
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    I have to agree with arthiusc. So far my original question has not been answered. I'm still rooting around looking for a way customize the PRE-login page. Not the Lock Screen. When you first power things on, the screen with the clock on it. Out of the box, my install came with the Space Needle. I've tried mucking around with the Lockscreen*.jpg files and now it's just a different color. Maybe time to open a support case on this one.

    Orange County District Attorney

     
  • Friday, January 11, 2013 4:40 PM
     
     
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    >When you first power things on, the screen with the clock on it. Out of the box, my install came with the Space Needle.
     
    Hover the mouse in the bottom right to bring out the charms bar,
    select the settings charm, then left mouse click on "Change PC
    settings" on the bottom, the select "Personalize", if it isn't already
    selected and you can change the screen on the right.
     
     
    Bob Comer - Microsoft MVP Virtual Machine
     
  • Friday, January 11, 2013 8:54 PM
     
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    move to start screen -

    left click the user name ( mine is Admin)

    left click change  account picture.

    left click lock screen

    select what you want.... by using browse to find your new screen. 

    • Proposed As Answer by blue boy Friday, January 11, 2013 8:57 PM
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  • Friday, January 11, 2013 9:49 PM
     
     
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    This still don't do it. I'm not worried about the Lock Screen or the Start Screen. It's what happens before everything. There's not a setting on our systems that does this.

    Orange County District Attorney

     
  • Friday, January 11, 2013 10:19 PM
     
     
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    >It's what happens before everything.
     
    It changes it here on all my machines. I switched from the sky needle
    to the honeycomb on all of them.
     
     
    Bob Comer - Microsoft MVP Virtual Machine
     
  • Friday, January 11, 2013 10:20 PM
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    you mean the backgrond color? This can be changed in the registry:

    Go to HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Accent\ create a DWORD32 DefaultColorSet and give it a value with the base of 2.

    You can also try this tool:

    http://winaero.com/comment.php?comment.news.190

    "A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code"

     
  • Friday, January 11, 2013 10:46 PM
     
     
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    No, not the background color, a .jpg is what we'd like to add to the first screen. We want to brand our systems so when they're logged off and the screen has the Time, Date and Network Icons, we want to have a picture instead of a color.

    Orange County District Attorney

     
  • Saturday, January 12, 2013 7:01 AM
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    No, not the background color, a .jpg is what we'd like to add to the first screen. We want to brand our systems so when they're logged off and the screen has the Time, Date and Network Icons, we want to have a picture instead of a color.

    Orange County District Attorney

    Hi Sandy

    Sorry about all of the frustration.

    Many very advanced programmers have attempted to find a way to add an image to the Sign On screen all of these attempts have ended in failure.

    The Time, Date, and Network icons don't appear on the Sign On screen, they appear on the Lock Screen, where you can change the image.

    Regards


     
  • Saturday, January 12, 2013 7:46 AM
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     We want to brand our systems so when they're logged off and the screen has the Time, Date and Network Icons, we want to have a picture instead of a color.

    this is the Lock-Screen. The function to set a picture to the Logon-Screen, you were able to set in Windows 7, is removed in Windows 8.

    You can only change the color of the Logon-Screen or the Lock-Screen Image.

    "A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code"

     
  • Monday, January 14, 2013 7:44 AM
     
     
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    Hi Sandy

    You can purchase a program from Stardock called Decor8 for about 5 dollars and it will let you change all the screens...Enjoy

    http://justaboutwindows.blogspot.com/2012/11/windows-8-pro-my-waya-new-begining.html

    just visit my blog and I have instructions to customize windows 8 any way you want to.

     
  • Saturday, January 26, 2013 6:00 AM
     
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    Wow, there's a remarkable amount of confusion on this thread, probably caused by the way Windows 8 automatically remembers the last login and has both a lock screen and a login screen. Here's what's going on, and here's how I have achieved this.

    First, the important thing to recognize is that Windows 8 has two different lock screens plus two different login screens. There is a lock screen that is customizable per user, and that one is changeable via WinKey+I, "Change PC Settings", "Personalize". This is the screen that appears whenever that user has locked his/her workstation, until a key is pressed, which brings up a user-specific login screen with only one user shown. The color, but not a regular full background image, of this latter screen (the single-user login screen) can be changed (at the same place as above, by changing the "Start Screen" instead of the "Lock Screen".

    The user-specific lock screen, besides appearing when you lock your computer, also shows after a restart, because Windows 8 automatically jumps to the last logged-in user upon rebooting. This is why everyone is confused here, because what isn't obvious is that there is actually a second, system-wide lock screen, one that typically only appears after a user actually logs out (not restarts). This is the lock screen that, after a key press, goes not to the login screen with just one user tile, but the login screen with all the user tiles- two screens which you may not be able to tell apart if you only have one user. And if you only have one user, you likely never log out, just shut down and restart and log in, so you might not care in that case about the system-wide lock screen.

    But if you switch users, you'll see it, and it is a pain in the neck to change from the space needle picture, but it can be done. There seem to be two ways. The most common way you'll find by searching the web involves the group policy editor. This solution only (allegedly, I can't test it with my own system) works on systems that connect to a domain, so if you aren't running Server 2012 or logging onto a Windows domain, forget about that one. (If you don't know, and this isn't a business machine, then you probably are not using a domain.) After a bunch of trial and error (that for a while resulted in losing my image altogether in favor of just a pale blue screen before finally getting it back and then successfully customizing it), here's how I did it:

    1) Log in as a user with administrative privileges.

    2) Open Windows Explorer, browse to C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows (or the equivalent if your system drive is not C:). (Also note, ProgramData is a hidden folder, so you will have to either type it in yourself or have viewing hidden folders turned on.) Here you will see a folder called SystemData. Getting into that folder is tricky, because even the Administrator doesn't have permission to view it, so the only way to do so is to use your administrative privileges to take ownership of it, then assign yourself rights to view it. Do so by right-clicking on the SystemData folder, choose Properties, then the Security tab. Click the Advanced button. It will say "Unable to display current owner" because you don't even have permission to see that, but you do have permission to change the owner. Click the "Change" link. Put in the name of the administrative account you're using, click OK just once, then when it comes back to the Advanced Security Settings dialog, check the "Replace owner on subcontainers and objects" box, and click OK again. Click "Yes" on the warning that comes up about granting yourself full control, then OK on the one remaining properties dialog. Now you should be able to look inside the SystemData folder...but don't yet. One more thing we have to do here is give back one of the permissions that just got overwritten. Right-click on SystemData again, choose Properties, and the Security tab. Your user is probably the only one listed there now, which is going to result in the system not being able to read the directory and see the image file you're placing there. So click on the "Edit..." button, then on the "Add..." button, type "SYSTEM" (without the quotes), click OK, and click in the "Full Control" box under "Allow", so the system can again control these files and directories. Click OK, then OK again to close out the dialog box.

    3) Inside the SystemData folder will probably be a few folders with names of the form "S-x-x-xx-xxx...". There might be several, but there should be (or is in my case) only one with a much shorter name than the rest, on mine it is "S-1-5-18". Browse to that folder, then to the ReadOnly folder inside it. There are probably several folders there with names like "LockScreen_X". These have copies of the images used by the per-user lock screens, but LockScreen_Z has the images used by the system-wide lock screen. Go into that folder. Depending on your computer, you may have one or two images there, and they will have names based on your screen resolution- for me, it is LockScreen___1920_1080.jpg and LockScreen___1920_1080_notdimmed.jpg. These are the space needle pictures. Take a look at these files and verify their dimensions. Copy them somewhere to back them up so you can put them back if you want to later.

    4) Now go find the image you want to use. Size or crop it to the same exact dimensions of the images found above.

    5) Finally, remove the images that were there and copy your image in, twice if both the regular and _notdimmed versions were present, and give your image files the same names as the files that were there before.

    6) Finally, log out. You should see the new image as the system-wide lock screen. The goofy thing is that if you log back in and look again with Explorer, you'll find that all those folder and file permissions have been reset back to what they were, so if you need to go back into that directory, you'll have to go through the whole ownership-changing and permissions-adding process again. But hopefully you won't have to do this until you decide to change this lock screen again.

    I hope that's helpful to someone. It took me quite a while of fooling around to figure out a way that actually worked. And I do note that there is another copy of the Space Needle picture in the C:\Windows\Web\Screen directory, called img100.png and with 1920x1200 resolution, so it is possible that the jpg version I described replacing is actually created by Windows from this png version at some point, based on its determination of your screen resolution. (Let's just hope that doesn't mean it will at some point overwrite your replacement image from this source copy and require you do to this over again...but I wouldn't be terribly surprised if exactly that does happen if you replace your main monitor with another having a different resolution.)

    • Proposed As Answer by Smiley1992 Thursday, February 14, 2013 12:32 PM
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  • Tuesday, January 29, 2013 10:15 PM
     
     
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    TMcGill, that's a very informative and thorough answer.  Thank you.

    Here's an alternative to your interesting but intricate step number 2).  From the charms bar, go to Change PC Settings > General > Advanced startup and click Restart now.  From there, click Troubleshoot > Advanced options > Command Prompt.  The system will restart and prompt you for an admin user and password.  From there, you get a command prompt, with no permissions issues.  Change your default drive to C: (if that's where Windows is), then navigate to ProgramData and beyond, as in your instructions.  Of course you need to do everything at the command prompt.

    This is a dangerous method, since you have wide open access to sensitive directories and files.

     
  • Thursday, February 14, 2013 12:32 PM
     
     
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    Wow, there's a remarkable amount of confusion on this thread, probably caused by the way Windows 8 automatically remembers the last login and has both a lock screen and a login screen. Here's what's going on, and here's how I have achieved this.

    First, the important thing to recognize is that Windows 8 has two different lock screens plus two different login screens. There is a lock screen that is customizable per user, and that one is changeable via WinKey+I, "Change PC Settings", "Personalize". This is the screen that appears whenever that user has locked his/her workstation, until a key is pressed, which brings up a user-specific login screen with only one user shown. The color, but not a regular full background image, of this latter screen (the single-user login screen) can be changed (at the same place as above, by changing the "Start Screen" instead of the "Lock Screen".

    The user-specific lock screen, besides appearing when you lock your computer, also shows after a restart, because Windows 8 automatically jumps to the last logged-in user upon rebooting. This is why everyone is confused here, because what isn't obvious is that there is actually a second, system-wide lock screen, one that typically only appears after a user actually logs out (not restarts). This is the lock screen that, after a key press, goes not to the login screen with just one user tile, but the login screen with all the user tiles- two screens which you may not be able to tell apart if you only have one user. And if you only have one user, you likely never log out, just shut down and restart and log in, so you might not care in that case about the system-wide lock screen.

    But if you switch users, you'll see it, and it is a pain in the neck to change from the space needle picture, but it can be done. There seem to be two ways. The most common way you'll find by searching the web involves the group policy editor. This solution only (allegedly, I can't test it with my own system) works on systems that connect to a domain, so if you aren't running Server 2012 or logging onto a Windows domain, forget about that one. (If you don't know, and this isn't a business machine, then you probably are not using a domain.) After a bunch of trial and error (that for a while resulted in losing my image altogether in favor of just a pale blue screen before finally getting it back and then successfully customizing it), here's how I did it:

    1) Log in as a user with administrative privileges.

    2) Open Windows Explorer, browse to C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows (or the equivalent if your system drive is not C:). (Also note, ProgramData is a hidden folder, so you will have to either type it in yourself or have viewing hidden folders turned on.) Here you will see a folder called SystemData. Getting into that folder is tricky, because even the Administrator doesn't have permission to view it, so the only way to do so is to use your administrative privileges to take ownership of it, then assign yourself rights to view it. Do so by right-clicking on the SystemData folder, choose Properties, then the Security tab. Click the Advanced button. It will say "Unable to display current owner" because you don't even have permission to see that, but you do have permission to change the owner. Click the "Change" link. Put in the name of the administrative account you're using, click OK just once, then when it comes back to the Advanced Security Settings dialog, check the "Replace owner on subcontainers and objects" box, and click OK again. Click "Yes" on the warning that comes up about granting yourself full control, then OK on the one remaining properties dialog. Now you should be able to look inside the SystemData folder...but don't yet. One more thing we have to do here is give back one of the permissions that just got overwritten. Right-click on SystemData again, choose Properties, and the Security tab. Your user is probably the only one listed there now, which is going to result in the system not being able to read the directory and see the image file you're placing there. So click on the "Edit..." button, then on the "Add..." button, type "SYSTEM" (without the quotes), click OK, and click in the "Full Control" box under "Allow", so the system can again control these files and directories. Click OK, then OK again to close out the dialog box.

    3) Inside the SystemData folder will probably be a few folders with names of the form "S-x-x-xx-xxx...". There might be several, but there should be (or is in my case) only one with a much shorter name than the rest, on mine it is "S-1-5-18". Browse to that folder, then to the ReadOnly folder inside it. There are probably several folders there with names like "LockScreen_X". These have copies of the images used by the per-user lock screens, but LockScreen_Z has the images used by the system-wide lock screen. Go into that folder. Depending on your computer, you may have one or two images there, and they will have names based on your screen resolution- for me, it is LockScreen___1920_1080.jpg and LockScreen___1920_1080_notdimmed.jpg. These are the space needle pictures. Take a look at these files and verify their dimensions. Copy them somewhere to back them up so you can put them back if you want to later.

    4) Now go find the image you want to use. Size or crop it to the same exact dimensions of the images found above.

    5) Finally, remove the images that were there and copy your image in, twice if both the regular and _notdimmed versions were present, and give your image files the same names as the files that were there before.

    6) Finally, log out. You should see the new image as the system-wide lock screen. The goofy thing is that if you log back in and look again with Explorer, you'll find that all those folder and file permissions have been reset back to what they were, so if you need to go back into that directory, you'll have to go through the whole ownership-changing and permissions-adding process again. But hopefully you won't have to do this until you decide to change this lock screen again.

    I hope that's helpful to someone. It took me quite a while of fooling around to figure out a way that actually worked. And I do note that there is another copy of the Space Needle picture in the C:\Windows\Web\Screen directory, called img100.png and with 1920x1200 resolution, so it is possible that the jpg version I described replacing is actually created by Windows from this png version at some point, based on its determination of your screen resolution. (Let's just hope that doesn't mean it will at some point overwrite your replacement image from this source copy and require you do to this over again...but I wouldn't be terribly surprised if exactly that does happen if you replace your main monitor with another having a different resolution.)

    I would like to thank you, as well as Sandy Wood. Your conversation helped me get through this !!! THANKS GUYS! :)
     
  • Monday, February 18, 2013 12:45 AM
     
     
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    I'm SO annoyed because this is just NOT working. I've done everything, and the image is STILL there.

    After I go through the process of logging out and back in to see the image, it's still the needle building and not the image I picked. Whenever I go back to the Lockscreen folder, the file "LockScreen__1600_0900_notdimmed" managed to come back on it's own...

    What can I do?

     
  • Tuesday, February 19, 2013 1:39 PM
     
     
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    Sandy -  I have spent the last hour trying to get this to work with Win 7 and it did not stick either. I have a big project on my list for this weekend. To set up my machine for a dual boot with Ubantu . Only Windows has such consistent problems. I would never consider buying Windows 8. I was half way impressed with Win 7 until I started running into all it's standard limitations.
     
  • Tuesday, February 19, 2013 1:40 PM
     
     
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    Funny how we learn to "Live with it" in so many Windows situations. Are we stupid or just swallowed the Bill Gates Kool-Aid? 
     
  • Tuesday, February 19, 2013 4:08 PM
     
     
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    I've pretty much resigned myself to let it be. I've messed with many of the suggestions in this thread and at this point I've got solid colors, instead of the image, on both of my test systems. We originally wished to put our agency seal on the first page instead of the default image. I would've hoped there'd be at least a Group Policy to get this done by now.

    Orange County District Attorney

     
  • Monday, February 25, 2013 11:54 AM
     
     
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    Wow, there's a remarkable amount of confusion on this thread, probably caused by the way Windows 8 automatically remembers the last login and has both a lock screen and a login screen. Here's what's going on, and here's how I have achieved this.

    First, the important thing to recognize is that Windows 8 has two different lock screens plus two different login screens. There is a lock screen that is customizable per user, and that one is changeable via WinKey+I, "Change PC Settings", "Personalize". This is the screen that appears whenever that user has locked his/her workstation, until a key is pressed, which brings up a user-specific login screen with only one user shown. The color, but not a regular full background image, of this latter screen (the single-user login screen) can be changed (at the same place as above, by changing the "Start Screen" instead of the "Lock Screen".

    The user-specific lock screen, besides appearing when you lock your computer, also shows after a restart, because Windows 8 automatically jumps to the last logged-in user upon rebooting. This is why everyone is confused here, because what isn't obvious is that there is actually a second, system-wide lock screen, one that typically only appears after a user actually logs out (not restarts). This is the lock screen that, after a key press, goes not to the login screen with just one user tile, but the login screen with all the user tiles- two screens which you may not be able to tell apart if you only have one user. And if you only have one user, you likely never log out, just shut down and restart and log in, so you might not care in that case about the system-wide lock screen.

    But if you switch users, you'll see it, and it is a pain in the neck to change from the space needle picture, but it can be done. There seem to be two ways. The most common way you'll find by searching the web involves the group policy editor. This solution only (allegedly, I can't test it with my own system) works on systems that connect to a domain, so if you aren't running Server 2012 or logging onto a Windows domain, forget about that one. (If you don't know, and this isn't a business machine, then you probably are not using a domain.) After a bunch of trial and error (that for a while resulted in losing my image altogether in favor of just a pale blue screen before finally getting it back and then successfully customizing it), here's how I did it:

    1) Log in as a user with administrative privileges.

    2) Open Windows Explorer, browse to C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows (or the equivalent if your system drive is not C:). (Also note, ProgramData is a hidden folder, so you will have to either type it in yourself or have viewing hidden folders turned on.) Here you will see a folder called SystemData. Getting into that folder is tricky, because even the Administrator doesn't have permission to view it, so the only way to do so is to use your administrative privileges to take ownership of it, then assign yourself rights to view it. Do so by right-clicking on the SystemData folder, choose Properties, then the Security tab. Click the Advanced button. It will say "Unable to display current owner" because you don't even have permission to see that, but you do have permission to change the owner. Click the "Change" link. Put in the name of the administrative account you're using, click OK just once, then when it comes back to the Advanced Security Settings dialog, check the "Replace owner on subcontainers and objects" box, and click OK again. Click "Yes" on the warning that comes up about granting yourself full control, then OK on the one remaining properties dialog. Now you should be able to look inside the SystemData folder...but don't yet. One more thing we have to do here is give back one of the permissions that just got overwritten. Right-click on SystemData again, choose Properties, and the Security tab. Your user is probably the only one listed there now, which is going to result in the system not being able to read the directory and see the image file you're placing there. So click on the "Edit..." button, then on the "Add..." button, type "SYSTEM" (without the quotes), click OK, and click in the "Full Control" box under "Allow", so the system can again control these files and directories. Click OK, then OK again to close out the dialog box.

    3) Inside the SystemData folder will probably be a few folders with names of the form "S-x-x-xx-xxx...". There might be several, but there should be (or is in my case) only one with a much shorter name than the rest, on mine it is "S-1-5-18". Browse to that folder, then to the ReadOnly folder inside it. There are probably several folders there with names like "LockScreen_X". These have copies of the images used by the per-user lock screens, but LockScreen_Z has the images used by the system-wide lock screen. Go into that folder. Depending on your computer, you may have one or two images there, and they will have names based on your screen resolution- for me, it is LockScreen___1920_1080.jpg and LockScreen___1920_1080_notdimmed.jpg. These are the space needle pictures. Take a look at these files and verify their dimensions. Copy them somewhere to back them up so you can put them back if you want to later.

    4) Now go find the image you want to use. Size or crop it to the same exact dimensions of the images found above.

    5) Finally, remove the images that were there and copy your image in, twice if both the regular and _notdimmed versions were present, and give your image files the same names as the files that were there before.

    6) Finally, log out. You should see the new image as the system-wide lock screen. The goofy thing is that if you log back in and look again with Explorer, you'll find that all those folder and file permissions have been reset back to what they were, so if you need to go back into that directory, you'll have to go through the whole ownership-changing and permissions-adding process again. But hopefully you won't have to do this until you decide to change this lock screen again.

    I hope that's helpful to someone. It took me quite a while of fooling around to figure out a way that actually worked. And I do note that there is another copy of the Space Needle picture in the C:\Windows\Web\Screen directory, called img100.png and with 1920x1200 resolution, so it is possible that the jpg version I described replacing is actually created by Windows from this png version at some point, based on its determination of your screen resolution. (Let's just hope that doesn't mean it will at some point overwrite your replacement image from this source copy and require you do to this over again...but I wouldn't be terribly surprised if exactly that does happen if you replace your main monitor with another having a different resolution.)

    This worked for Win8! Thank you.

    I had just spent an hour on this previous to reading this reply. The "sign in screen" would change to the image I copied to the folder but then when logging out I would get a blue screen again. I believe adding "SYSTEM" to the permissions solved the issue I was having

    Edit* I have no idea why the text changed size mid-sentence...


    • Edited by c411um Monday, February 25, 2013 11:58 AM
    •  
     
  • Monday, February 25, 2013 2:23 PM
     
     
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    Found it. This video explains a way to mess with the lock screen image without messing with permissions:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yusczt18RGg

    Windows 8 generates the LockScreen_Z (and _Y and _V, etc) images from img100.png, but the folder where that lives only has modify permissions for the TrustedInstaller user.

    Rather than mess with permissions, I used the Windows 8 startup DVD and copied the file using that. Then I deleted the generated LockScreen*.jpg images in the TrustedInstaller's user profile as described in earlier posts.

    If you have a domain or use Windows 8 Enterprise, do use the new Group Policy settings instead of messing with your file system, though.

    --


    • Edited by gordonf4msdn Monday, February 25, 2013 2:25 PM Added caveat for Enterprise editions
    •  
     
  • Monday, February 25, 2013 3:36 PM
     
     
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    I should test before I ask.  But it'd be generally good to know.  What happens if you run SFC /scannow.

    Does it change it back?  I've had that happen with other mods in the past.



    I'm still curious about that golden thing in the left corner.  Am I just missing the obvious?

     
  • Thursday, February 28, 2013 6:30 AM
     
     
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    I should test before I ask.  But it'd be generally good to know.  What happens if you run SFC /scannow.

    Does it change it back?  I've had that happen with other mods in the past.



    I'm still curious about that golden thing in the left corner.  Am I just missing the obvious?


    Yes, unfortunately it does change it back.

    - Tim

     
  • Thursday, February 28, 2013 6:43 AM
    Answerer
     
     
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    why are you not using the official way which was added with the update?

    "A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code"

     
  • Thursday, February 28, 2013 8:05 AM
     
     
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    Maybe your "answer" is glowing such bright green that you cannot see the post directly beneath it?


     
  • Thursday, March 07, 2013 11:34 PM
     
     
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    double click whatever picture it is that you want to switch it to,when the pic comes up right click on the screen and a "set as" prompt will come up click "lock screen" and there u go!hope it helps

     
  • Sunday, March 24, 2013 7:26 AM
     
     
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    I didn't test this solution yet, or other solutions to that problem that can be found at various places, but my guess is that while this might change the picture to another one, this probably won't fix the issue that the time displayed on the 'no one's logged in' lockscreen is Pacific, and not the correct localtime (UTC+1 as far as I'm concerned).

    Do you concur?

     
  • Monday, March 25, 2013 3:10 AM
     
     
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    Microsoft needs to note something here:

    That so many people are working so hard to not have to send the space needle into orbit every time they log in is testament to the fact that people believe they own their systems - NOT YOU, MICROSOFT.  They want things to look the way THEY want them to look, NOT YOUR WAY, MICROSOFT.

    Did we forget that the P in PC stands for "Personal"?

     

    -Noel

    Detailed how-to in my eBooks:  

    Configure The Windows 7 "To Work" Options
    Configure The Windows 8 "To Work" Options
     
  • Thursday, May 09, 2013 11:13 AM
     
     
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    After reading top to bottom every post I managed to do the trick this way:

    First, I found I had "img100.png" in  C:\Windows\Web\Screen  and
    C:\Windows\WinSxS\x86_microsoft-windows-themeui-client_31bf3856ad364e35_6.2.9200.16384_none_69ee3fa2269e545e

    1. Belonging to the Administrators Group, I replaced file Owner TrustedInstaller with my Username on both "img100.png" files

    2. After resizing the image I wanted to see on the Login screen to the resolution of "img100.png" file,
    I copied and pasted it to both "img100.png" files keeping this way the format (extension) and resolution of the original "img100.png" file,
    which I permanently deleted. In Portugal we use to eat what we like, not what others may give us like that IMHO ugly image...

    Of course I only arrived here after reading the few very good posts I read on this thread, which I thank.



    • Edited by angelolopes Thursday, May 09, 2013 11:15 AM
    • Edited by angelolopes Thursday, May 09, 2013 11:15 AM
    •