If you live in countries such as United States,
United Kingdom, Canada, South Africa, and
Australia you will notice that when you want to
change your desktop background Windows 7 will
display a country specific desktop background theme
as well as the standard desktop themes already
available.
What many users are not aware of is that all of
the current country specific desktop background
themes are actually available but they are hidden.
If you want to see what the other desktop
backgrounds look like proceed as follows:
- Before you can see the new desktop themes
you need to unhide the hidden files and folders
along with the system and protected operating
system files. To do show the hidden files and
folders see this link
04 Show Hidden Files, Folders And Disks.
- After you have disabled the show hidden
files and folders in the Folder and Search
option View tab, scroll down to the Hide
protected operating system files (Recommended)
option and remove the check mark (tick) from the
box on the left of this option too. See
Fig:32.1.
Fig: 32-1 Folder Options
- A warning message will appear. Just Click on
the OK button.
- Next Open windows explorer and Click on the
chevron (>) next to your C: drive.
- The C: drive directory list will now appear.
- Click on the chevron (>) next to the Windows
folder to expand the Windows directory further.
- In the Windows directory, Click on the
Globalization folder.
- In the Right hand pane of the Globalization
folder you will see a folder called MCT.
Remember if you have disabled the show hidden
files and folders and the operating system files
you will not be able to see the MCT folder. See
Fig: 32.2
Fig: 32-2 Windows Explorer window showing the
Globalization and MCT folders
- Click on the MCT folder to open it.
- You will now see a list of 5 folders: MCT
AU, MCT CA, MCT GB, MCT US and MCT ZA. These
correspond respectively to Australia (AU);
Canada (CA); United Kingdom (GB); United States
(US) and South Africa (ZA).
- Select which country you wish to use as a
theme and Click on the folder.
- Once the folder opens Click on the Theme
folder you find inside.
- Finally, Click on the Windows theme, i.e.,
AU; CA; GB; US; or ZA to install the relevant
country.
- Your Desktop should now display the country
desktop background you have chosen.
- To turn the desktop theme into a slide show,
Right Click on the Desktop and select
Personalize.
- In the Personalization window, Click on the
Desktop Background Slide Show option at the
bottom of the personalization window.
- From here you can choose the picture
position and also how long it takes for each
image to change on your desktop.