Windows XP

Windows XP, codenamed Whistler, is an operating system released by Microsoft in 2001. It is the successor to Windows 2000 and Me, being the first version of Windows NT intended for both businesses and home users. It has a memorable set of wallpapers, sample pictures and user account pictures, including the iconic Bliss, one of the most viewed photos on Earth due to it being the default wallpaper and XP's popularity. Also notable are Red moon desert, taken by Bliss' Charles O'Rear, Autumn, which was the subject of a 2007 Vanity Fair article and the branding wallpaper. It would be followed by Windows Vista in 2006, after years of its messy development.

Wallpapers
According to program manager Gregory Raiz, the wallpapers were selected "to evoke natural themes of hills, trees & sand", as Microsoft aimed for XP to look more human than previous versions. The wallpapers were primarily licensed from Corbis and used a mix of royalty free and rights managed licenses, while Bliss was fully acquired from Corbis and Charles O'Rear so that no company would ever use it again. With the exception of Vortec space, the non-photographic wallpapers were created by various contractors that worked internally at Microsoft, according to Raiz through email correspondence.

Like with earlier versions, the wallpapers are at a rather low resolution of 800x600, which would quickly become outdated not long after the release of Windows XP, due to screen resolutions progressively increasing. Downloadable wallpapers would later be provided in higher resolutions, while Windows Vista onwards features wallpapers at 1920x1440 and 1920x1200.

Media Center Edition-exclusive
As Media Center Edition came with many features of Microsoft Plus! for Windows XP, its wallpapers were also included, albeit with proper names. Most of these wallpapers appear to have been taken from Getty Images, although some were presumably taken down many years ago, leaving their origins unclear.

Starter Edition
Each localized version of Starter Edition has around three to six wallpapers. Most of them come from Corbis and Getty Images and use a rights managed license, with a few being royalty free. Similar to the Home and Professional editions of Windows XP, these wallpapers have a resolution of 800x600 (with the exception of one being 801x600, likely by accident). Unlike these two editions, however, Windows XP Starter Edition includes wallpapers in the Bitmap (.bmp) file format instead of the JPEG (.jpg) file format. The practice of having regional wallpapers would be used again by Microsoft for Windows 7, where 20 countries received two themes (built-in and downloadable) consisting of six wallpapers each.

The default wallpaper is SE_neutral_wallpaper, which is completely unrelated to the one used in most other editions. Also, due to the rarity of XP Starter Edition in several countries, not all wallpapers are known so they cannot be listed. Starter Edition also came out in Egypt, sub-Saharan African countries and possibly others, although this is unconfirmed as no ISOs or even photos are known to exist.

Sample Pictures
All four were royalty free Corbis images, three of which were available from royalty free CDs, with the other one seemingly being online only. Similar to the wallpapers, all of these images have a resolution of 800x600.

Media Center Edition-exclusive
Windows XP Media Center Edition added five new images, which were also royalty free Corbis images. Like a few Windows 7 Beta sample pictures, these wallpapers retain the aspect ratios of the original images (usually around 3:2). Rather than using 800x600 like the original four sample pictures, they appear at various 3:2-ish resolutions, all 1280px wide.

User Account Pictures
A mix of royalty free Corbis images and PhotoDisc images, including a few rights managed Corbis images, all having a resolution of 48x48, comprise the Windows XP user account picture choices.