Resource Hacker FX: the improved Resource Hacker

Note: The most recent version of Resource Hacker incorporates most of the changes that this patch offers. Therefore, Resource Hacker FX is considered obsolete, and the post is here mostly for historical reasons.

Remember the good ol’ Resource Hacker?
It’s a popular Resource viewer/editor, I use it to quickly view and edit resources. I tried to find an alternative, but I did not find any that I liked, so I decided to just improve Resource Hacker.

Here is a patcher that needs to be used on the original Resource Hacker v3.6.0.92:
zip Resource Hacker FXer.zip (117.97 kB, changelog)

Here is how it looks:

What does the patcher change:

  1. Partial Unicode support.
    More details.
  2. A new interface with modern icons and a manifest.
    Icons by Yusuke Kamiyamane.
  3. Resource Hacker FX does not create tree nodes for every language. Usually only one language is used anyway, so it makes it much faster to navigate through resources.
  4. Resource Hacker FX uses the new open and save common dialogs instead of the old outdated ones. Also, some saving as parameters got improved: the directory of the current file is initially shown, the file name gets filled, the extension is automatically added if not specified.
  5. If you have a modified file open and you close Resource Hacker FX, you have a Cancel option when asked whether you would like to save the file. Also, if you choose to save it, it just gets saved instead of saving as.
  6. The Hex viewer shows only the first 10 KB of the binary resource by default to prevent hanging Resource Hacker FX. I could not really fix it, as it’s the Rich Edit control’s fault, it’s quite slow with large texts. Well, it’s not too smart to use Rich Edit to view a Hex dump, but that’s how it works. 10 KB should be usually enough to understand what the resource is about. If it isn’t, you can hold shift to load the whole resource.
  7. Other minor additions, like e.g. double click to replace resource, minimizing/maximizing effects.
  8. Lots of bug fixes.
Posted in Releases, Software by Michael (Ramen Software) on March 13th, 2011.
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399 Responses to “Resource Hacker FX: the improved Resource Hacker”

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  1. Hiren says:
    December 17, 2015 at 1:15 pm  (Quote)

    I can add the button but not sure for adding code on button click event.

    Can you please assist?

    Reply
  2. kennedy says:
    June 24, 2017 at 4:06 am  (Quote)

    You have future updates? This fix is very good!!!

    You. Can send for my e-mail the Angus Johnson E-mail?
    The new version of Resouce Hacker have a little bug: “some Delphi dfms not displayed in the version.”
    You can pass Angus Johnson E-mail? I am need send feedback.

    Reply
  3. Дима says:
    January 5, 2018 at 5:06 pm  (Quote)

    Есть версия программы, где на добавленную кнопку можно привязать событие?

    Reply
  4. Дима says:
    January 5, 2018 at 5:08 pm  (Quote)

    Is there a version of the program where you can tie an event to the added button?

    Reply
  5. Stamimail says:
    March 12, 2018 at 8:23 pm  (Quote)

    Hi,
    A question regarding RTL system (Hebrew).
    From time to time I get an English app, aligned to the right (RTLed).
    Most of the cases, this can be fixed by changing the lang to English.
    But sometimes, you can’t, or there are few Dialog-Boxes with English text, that you have them RTLed.

    What is controling the RTL/LTR view of each Dialog-Box?
    Is this something I can edit by Resource Hacker?

    Thanks, Stamimail

    Reply
  6. Stamimail says:
    March 14, 2018 at 10:08 am  (Quote)

    “child windows”???
    I didn’t try to invert the whole program, only one Dialog-Box.
    When I tried to invert the tab, only the headaer was inverted, but not all controls in the tab.
    Unless, there is a way to invert all the controls at once that I am not aware of.

    Reply
  7. Rouin says:
    April 8, 2018 at 12:55 pm  (Quote)

    Hello,
    Helpful article!
    I have one question: How can I use resource hacker to change an app background?

    Reply
    • Michael (Ramen Software) says:
      April 8, 2018 at 9:19 pm  (Quote)

      Hi,
      It depends on the method that the application uses to set the background. If that’s a dialog, you can try adding a static bitmap image. If that doesn’t work, then it might not be possible with Resource Hacker.

      Reply
  8. Rinat says:
    April 16, 2018 at 9:04 am  (Quote)
    Reply
  9. P says:
    August 9, 2018 at 2:34 pm  (Quote)
    Reply
  10. Augustin says:
    May 9, 2019 at 10:37 am  (Quote)

    I have to change title in RCData it shows “Access Violation” any idea?

    Reply
  11. Valokordin says:
    November 7, 2019 at 9:19 pm  (Quote)

    Hi! I need to mоdifу an executable that has Sаnsсrit text strings in its diаlоgs. I cаnnot add the Sаnsсrit suppоrt to our Windоws cоmputer (long story why…). Is there a way to modify DIALОGEХ so that a СОNTROL property will display Uniсоde correctly? I read about adding “L” before the string, but cannot figure out the соrrect sуntax. I tried something like this %u0904%u0905%u0906%u0907 instead of АNSI, but that did not work…

    Reply
  12. Dave says:
    March 9, 2021 at 10:16 pm  (Quote)

    Anyone know how Resource Hacker plays back midi files? I am developing several applications that require playing back midi embedded in the executable.

    Reply
  13. Axel says:
    February 19, 2022 at 9:13 am  (Quote)

    Patcher is obsolete.

    Reply
  14. Patser says:
    April 19, 2025 at 2:14 pm  (Quote)

    I get an error “File doesn’t look like Resource Hacker” and the file “pre-requisites(I.e. *.*)” in the File Open dialog are ResHacker.exe.. my install or reshacker is v5.0 and is named “Resource Hacker.exe”, not “ResHacker.exe”, I did try to rename it to see if it would work, but I’, still getting the error message, maybe this is down to it being a newer version?

    Thanks for supporting the modding community 🙏

    Reply
    • Michael (Ramen Software) says:
      April 19, 2025 at 2:17 pm  (Quote)

      What’s your Resource Hacker version?

      From the post above:

      Here is a patcher that needs to be used on the original Resource Hacker v3.6.0.92

      And:

      Resource Hacker FX is considered obsolete, and the post is here mostly for historical reasons.

      Reply
  15. Patser says:
    April 19, 2025 at 2:25 pm  (Quote)

    Thanks michael, I just Ctrl+F’d the error code on this page instead of actually reading the comments, lazy habit I’ve to kick 👌

    Reply
  16. Patser says:
    April 19, 2025 at 2:27 pm  (Quote)

    Seems I’m not even reading full posts these days either, I’m worse than ChatGPT “summarizing” lol, thanks, I’ll try source the older version 👌

    Reply

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