Change the Desktop Wallpaper

Changing your desktop wallpaper is one of the easiest ways you can customize your computer.

To get to the control panel where you can make this happen, you will want to do the following:

1. Right-click on a blank area of your desktop and select Properties.
2. Click the tab labeled Desktop

You will have many options to choose from but there are namely two routes you can go: Make the desktop a solid color, or have an image display as the background.

If you would like to have a solid color for the background just do the following:

1. In the Background selection box you will see many images listed that you could choose to have as your background, since we want a solid color not an image, you will want to scroll to the top and select None

2. Now go the drop down box right above the Apply button and you will see a variety of colors you can choose. Experiment with the color you like best.

If you would like to have an image for the background you can do the following:

1. In the Background selection box you will see many images that are installed with Windows XP. You can choose one of Microsoft's images or you can use one of your own.

2. Click the Browse? button and you will see a new window asking you to locate your image. Find it and then click Open.

3. Now that you have your image, you will want to decide how you want it displayed. In the Position; drop-down box, below the Browse..; button, you will see three choices: Center, Tile, Stretch.

4. Which one should you use? Well, it depends on the image you want as your background. Center places the image in the middle of the screen, Tile takes the image and repeats enough times until the screen is filled, and stretch takes an image that does not totally fill up the screen and stretches it until it does.