How to Install and Apply Custom 3rd Party Login Screens in Windows without Replacing Default LogonUI.exe File?

First of all lets show you the benefits of this tutorial:

• The biggest benefit: you will not need to replace any system file to change login screen
• You’ll not need to use TuneUp Utilities or any other 3rd party utility to apply login screens
• This method will also help you in fixing various login screen related problems mainly caused by malware

We all know about Login Screen present in Windows OS. Its also called Welcome Screen, Logon Screen or Startup Screen. Its the screen where you see user accounts list and enter your password to log into Windows. Login screen UI is generally changed with each new version of Windows.

If you are a Windows customization lover, you might be already using a custom 3rd party login screen in your Windows to get a refreshed welcome screen each time you start Windows.

Many people modify or download 3rd party login screens from Internet to customize default login screen look. We have also shared many login screens for Windows XP in past. Some of them are Windows 8 login screen, Mac OS X Lion login screen and Windows 7 login screen for XP.

Windows XP login screen resources are stored in a system file “LogonUI.exe” which is present in Windows\System32 folder. Whenever you want to modify or install new login screen, you need to replace this default system file with your new customized file using Replacer. Or you use 3rd party software such as TuneUp Utilities to apply new login screen.

But TuneUp Utilities is not a free software and replacing system files is a bit dangerous task. If you make a mistake while modifying the file or if the downloaded login screen file was corrupt, you’ll not be able to boot into Windows.

That’s why today in this tutorial, we are going to tell you a very easy to use and safe way to install and apply custom 3rd party login screen in Windows XP. In this method, you’ll not need to replace existing system file. You just need to edit Windows Registry and modify an existing String value to point it to your new login screen file. Its very similar to our custom Explorer.exe file method which we posted recently:

How to Apply and Safely Use Custom User Interface (Shell or Explorer) in Windows?

So without wasting time, lets start the tutorial:

STEP 1. First copy your modified or downloaded login screen file “LogonUI.exe” to a safe place such as D:\ drive or any other desired location and note down the full path of it.

STEP 2. Now type regedit in RUN dialog box and press Enter. It’ll open Registry Editor.

STEP 3. Now go to following key:

STEP 4. In right-side pane, look for a String UIHost. Its value would be set to logonui.exe by default.

STEP 5. You just need to double-click on UIHost string and change its value to the full path of your new logonui.exe file.

For example, if you renamed the new downloaded login screen file to MyLogonUI.exe and copied it to E:\ drive then set the value of UIHost to E:\MyLogonUI.exe as shown in following screenshot:

Its not necessary to rename the file. You can use any desired name of the file or you can use default logonui.exe name. It doesn’t matter. But you’ll need to provide correct full path of the file along with its name.

STEP 6. That’s it. Close Registry Editor and restart your system and get ready to enjoy new login screen.

PS: This is the same method which is used by TuneUp Utilities to apply new login screens.

Bonus Tip 1: You can also use this method if you are facing problems with login screen. Many times virus and malware install their own logonui.exe file in your system and set the value of UIHost to their malicious file. You can reset value of UIHost to logonui.exe to fix login screen related problems.

Bonus Tip 2: Sometimes if the value of UIHost is changed to new login screen file and in future if the file is deleted by you, you’ll start getting classic login dialog box instead of new welcome screen. In such case you can again reset value of UIHost string to logonui.exe and your problem will be solved.