Windows Vista™ Inside Out

Customizing the Player’s Look and Feel

Windows Media Player offers fewer customization options than its predecessors, and most of those options are well hidden. The most radical customization option allows you to completely change the Player’s appearance by using an assortment of custom visual designs, known as skins.

Even without using a skin, you can do a few things to modify the Player’s appearance. In Now Playing, you can display or hide the List pane. You can change the color that appears behind the Player taskbar and in the Now Playing pane from its default blue to any shade. You can collapse the full Player to compact mode, leaving only the playback controls visible, or enable a Mini Player toolbar that embeds playback controls in the Windows ...