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-------------------------------------------------------------- This story was printed from ZDNet Australia. --------------------------------------------------------------
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Gimme some Winamp skin! September 16, 2001 URL: http://www.zdnet.com.au/reviews/coolgear/audio/soa/Gimme-some-Winamp-skin-/0,139023372,120205810,00.htm
Make the look and feel of your Winamp player as groovy as the tunes you're rocking with. So you've downloaded Winamp, one of the most popular MP3 players, and you're already tired of looking at the visually generic program. Or maybe the default player just doesn't fit in well with your customised desktop. Fear not, because there is a solution, and it's called skins. Skins are what they sound like. Winamp's default graphical interface is composed of a series of pictures (or "bitmaps") that can be easily edited. This lets users quickly modify the look of their player using any art program, from MS Paint to Adobe PhotoShop. An enormous online community has already grown around skins, so finding one that you like more than the default one is easy. Before you start adding skins to your player, though, you should make sure that you have the most recent version of Winamp. (Earlier versions don't support the skin features, and it's always good to have the most recent version of an MP3 player.) For your first new skin, try the ZDNet customised face. If you click on this link, you'll be asked to save the installation file to begin downloading. When you have downloaded the file, unzip it into a folder called "ZDNet" in your Winamp skins directory. (If you don't know where this is, do a search for the folder "skins" on your PC.) Now start Winamp, type Alt+S to bring up the skin browser, and click on ZDNet. The skin will change in a few seconds.
Figure A: Try this ZDNet Music skin designed by James Cheung. Other skins are available as self-extracting .exe files, but beware: These may contain viruses, so open only if they've been downloaded from reliable sources. One of the best resources for Winamp skins is the Winamp home page. Clicking on the skins and plug-ins text at the top of the page will bring you to the main page, where you can select from a number of categories such as anime, cars, video games and sports, to name just a few. Another useful resource is 1001 Winamp Skins. It also offers a number of skins separated into several categories, and a number of tutorials and tools for constructing your own skins.
The easiest way to create your own simple skin is to find an image that you like and use Winamp Skin Maker. In the pull-down menu, choose "File" and then "Open Bitmap"--a pop-up box will prompt you to locate a .BMP or .JPG file on your hard drive. The recommended size is 275x116. If the image is too small, you should resize it in PhotoShop or any other graphics software. You can use an image that is larger than the recommended size, but only some of the image will be visible in the final skin. To further customise your skin, you can also use the program to edit the colour of the text and the way the buttons are displayed. These options are available from the pull-down menu. When all is in place, click the "make skin" button, and then save the skin to the Winamp folder. Congratulations! You just made your first skin!
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