tried switching to new 15.06 7-zip, and it now worked. unfortunately, there are no xp explorer toolbar buttons in that package.
i've just used resource hacker as suggested in post # 2 to extract images of some of the most important buttons. i have cropped them and converted to .png. they're all around 20-24 by 20-24 pixels, which is small, but fine with me. I want all the buttons in original size and aspect ratio.
i then tried about 10 different online .png to .ico converters. but they all distort images that don't have 1:1 ratios, which most of those buttons don't have.
example: one of the buttons: "properties" is 18 by 23 pixels, all the converters distorted it; either change in number of pixels, or flat/rectangular pixels (original pixels are all squares)
anybody knows how to convert .png images properly to .ico files?
9 xp exlorer toolbar buttons in .png format:
http://wikisend.com/download/195594/xp-buttons.7z