How to edit your SlingPlayer Remote Skin-Part 2

In the article How to edit your SlingPlayer Remote Skin-Part 1 we discussed the basics on the Slingplayer remote and how to edit a custom remote skin that the Slingplayer uses to suit your own tastes. In this one we are going to talk about the default Slingplayer remote skin.  If you have not read part 1 we suggest you do so first. We will be talking about things that are mentioned in that article.

The default remote skin is the what you see when there is no realistic remote skin available for your device. It looks like the one pictured on the right. It is nothing special when it comes to the world of remotes but if you are stuck using it there are some changes you can make to it.

Download an editable default remote skin

First you need a default remote skin you can work with. You can download the default one here.  Also as shown in the part 1 article you need the property.xml file also. You can get it here.

Uncompress and edit the skin

You will need to uncompress the zipped files and put them both into a folder on your computer. Once you have done so you can edit the images as required.

Compress the files

After you have finished editing the file(s) they all need to be ZIPped up into one file named “Default.spr” This includes the Property.xml file you saved earlier.

Where to put your new remote file

After you have compressed your new remote file you need to overwrite the existing default.spr file in your  slingplayer remote folder. For  Windows XP users they are in your “C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Sling Media\SlingPlayer\2.0\Remote” folder.  For Vista users they are in your “C:Program Data\Sling Media\SlingPlayer2.0\Remote” folder.

Just copy your new default remote over the top of your old one.

Change the properties on the new Default.spr

The Slingplayer is very cautious when it comes to the default remote skin file. To make sure that it does not delete the new one you have just created and replace it with theirs you need to change the properties of  your new default.spr  file to “Read Only”.  To do this you would right-click on it in your Windows Explorer program, select properties and then click on the “Read Only” property. If you fail to do this your new file will vanish and be replaced with the Sling default.

Run Slingplayer and test

Now you just need to run your Slingplayer program and retest the remote. Look it over and see if it suits you or needs modifications. If you do need to modify it then go back to the original folder you saved the working files in, make the changes, reZip, save and overwrite the last default.spr file you created. Don’t forget to make this one read only also!

That’s all there is to it. Now you too can have a funky weird-looking default remote like this.

If you have any questions or want to share a remote that you have created we would love to hear about it!