Shoutbox

A contact shared a picture as a background and I would like to open it. Thanks.

i think this is what you want


Click for large


Click for large

please tell me if i am wrong...

They are stored here:

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C:\Documents and Settings\Your User\Application Data\Microsoft\Msn Messenger\User ID\Background

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Your User is the name of the logged in user and User ID is a 64 bit hash of your .NET Passport

If  you want to work out your user ID you can use one of these:

• Segosa's Web Based Converter
  
• Choli's Program

Once you get to that folder you will notice a bunch of files that end in .bin (they looked liked T34DF.bin), all you need to do is
right click -> Open With -> Paint

and then in paint you will be able to choose save as.

Thanks a lot, I did not find any file in that folder with the .bin extension. Instead, all files were of the .dat type, but I managed to open them with Paint as you suggested and saved it as .jpg. regards.

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Originally posted by Stigmata
...and then in paint you will be able to choose save as.

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quote:

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Originally posted by alegator
...but I managed to open them with Paint as you suggested and saved it as .jpg. regards.

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Don't save them as JPGs... You will loose a lot of quality.
The images are already in JPG or PNG format (but with another extension). So there is no need to open them and save them again (and especially not as JPG). Simply copy the file (background) you want and rename the file from *.dat to either *.jpg or *.png.

Also, a search:
CookieRevised's reply to 'where does MSN store all its stuff?'
CookieRevised's reply to 'where is your custom stuff stored?'

ok thanks, I suspected you could just rename it to .jpg.However, I don't notice any resolution difference compared to "Saving As" with Paint.

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The resolution will stay the same, but the quality will drop.

Artifacts will show up, and the overall sharpness of the image will drop.

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I zoomed into different picture areas and don't notice any new artifacts. However I stay with the procedure you mentioned (rename extension to jpg)  since it obviously is cleaner (does not involve any processing).

[OFF TOPIC - just for info]

Do a bit by bit comparisson of the two files (the one you saved and the one you renamed) and you'll see the difference

You can use the DOS command FC for this

Or arithmetically compare both images in a graphics program

[/OFF TOPIC]

ok ive tried this and i cant find the picture i want.

back in feb my msn broke cuz a riched.dll file went missing so i uninstalled and have only recently reinstalled it.

someone sent me a pic as a background today and i went to the folder u have all said,

in this folder is all the old backgrounds from before it stopped working, nowhere are any of the new ones ive been sharing?

can anyone shed any light on where it would be??

or if i have to share it with one u guys so u can save it, and then send me as a jpeg?