The HPC Screen Saver Project

I've looked around, and all of the 'screen savers' for WinCE just aren't what I'm looking for. Although Dockware is a good application, it's not exactly my idea of a legitimate "screen saver". I've also seen Screen Saver Engine, now that was more on track... except that it was Shareware, had only stars and blank screen, and it had to have an icon running in the system tray.(Grrr...) There's also another screen saver program(by stingraze i think) that is much like the Win95 "Mistify your mind" screen saver, but it's just a program. You have to open it yourself... (But kudos to stingraze, it's a GREAT MYM clone!)

What we need, is a FREEWARE screen saver program that, after installing, adds a Control Panel icon called "Screen Saver"(No annoying brand names). From there, the screen saver can be configured(Type of screen saver, Settings, Preview, idle minutes until activation, and maybe? password protection). The user should be able to choose between the following types: (None), Blank Screen, Starfield, Marquee, Flying Windows, and Mystify Your Mind.

One of the must-have attributes is NO system tray icon. There's a time and a place, but for a screen saver, they're annoying. The goal here is to resemble the 95/98 screen saver tab as closely as possible, within reason.

I would be more than willing to help, IF we decide to do something like this, but my skills with C++ are questionable(I'm so-so at VB), so I could try my best. This is how Windows CE should have been. After all, isn't that what the subtitle of HPC:Factor is?

"HPC:Factor - The Handheld PC The Way It Was Meant To Be!"

PocketCandy is a lot like what you describe. It's made for Pocket PCs (big surprise ), but it does work fine in my MP790. But we do need to design a screensaver with the above features that: 1) is HPC:Factor themed; and 2) compatible all the way back to CE 2.0 (if that's possible).

Of course this is just my personal opinion here, and I in no way wish to detract from some developer activity.

The purpose of a screensaver on an instant-on device is ultimately moot. I'm really not sure what the purpose of having one will be. It will inexorably just be a drain on the main battery, keeping the CPU busy for longer periods, and, if in the dock will serve to put pressure on the screen parts with unecessary use. As has been shown before on these boards, the CCFL's have a limited life span, the more you use it the faster it will die.
The chances however of screen burn on the LCD are vary much reduced, and in the interests of preservation of the H/PC, you would be better off disabling the backlight or powering down all together.

But its not for me to argue with the way you want your device.

Good points. But sometimes I just like looking at the moving graphics in screensavers because it's relaxing. Maybe that's worth something.

Yes, it is useless(hardware saving wise) to have a screen saver on an LCD screen, but still. I guess the main idea here is authenticy...(Is that even a word?) But it could come in handy for security purposes, too.(Password protection)

Also, stingraze had a great thing going... the screen saver itself could probably be made in eVB, but we just need something(That dosen't show up in the taskbar) to trigger it after a certain amount of idle time, and to send it variables about the type and settings. Perhaps the control panel config utility module thing(Probably in C++ could output the settings to a save file(or better, registry), then the eVB screen saver could read it... to know what type of screen saver to display, and the settings...

I'll be back after school tomorrow. It's like 3AM and I have to get up for school at 6AM. (3 HRS of sleep...)

I did contact someone who now specialises in PocketPC screensavers as they did have an HPC engine. Let me dig out what they said, as I think they may have been willing to open up their source.

i quite like the idea of a screensaver, as perverse as it sounds

I must be plain boring, I have my system se to black screen after 14 min and power off after 20

If there is anything I can do to help encourage them to open the source, let me know.

you^ could launch a "say NO to screensavers" awareness group

It's first period, so I'm home for a few hours.

One thing we have to take into consideration is the type of LCD screen this is going to be presented on. I noticed that with the Screen Saver Engine program, the starfield was BARELY viewable on a passive matrix screen. I'm guessing that he was using the classic formula/code style from the Win95 one. This needs to be modified(smoother frame rate, larger and brighter stars, and maybe even a motion trail effect), so it looks normal on a DSTN screen.

Also, somewhere a while back, I was looking in a VB forum somewhere and someone posted all of the code/formulas/algorithms for the classic screen saver set. After searching last night, I couldn't find it again, but I think I remember most of the fundamentals.

Also, something that would make it really authentic would be if we included a "Windows CE" screen saver type. One that has the Windows CE logo slowly bouncing around the screen, or, just appearing random places at set intervals(like the 'Windows XP' screen saver in XP).

lol

I actually found a situation where I think a screen saver made sense:

You are listening to music being played with Windows Media Player and the HPC is plugged in. Maybe it's just my settings, but the screen does not shut off. If you are using the "Basic Black" skin, you notice after a couple of hours that the buttons are starting to "burn in". At that point, I started using the screen saver.

While I agree with Chris' points, I agree with CE Geek more

There is something to be said for a placid picture scrolling by on the desktop. I like the idea and would love to see it go forward....

the only one reason why i'd like a screensaver: enables password protection.
actually the builtin hp security on J72x is quite good, i can decide when i want password protection and when not, but this is limited, after 4 hours or so i will get the password prompt even if i didnt specify it at the last shutdown. - that's my problem...

Ok. I've got Microsoft eMbedded 3.0 eVB and eVC. I suppose I could try to mess around with some stuff in VB to try to create a working screen saver app, but does anyone know how to make an application read/parse the registry in eVB? That's going to be the key factor in communicating between the control panel app, the 'timer/trigger' app and the screen saver app itself.

I am with C:Amie on this one. My monitor goes to power save mode after some minutes (I don't remember how many). My HPCs and laptop do backlight off or whole screen off and later suspend/standby.

For CRT there is screensaver, but for any LCD systems I would suggest a change of name to screenkiller

Having said all that, yes a screensaver screenkiller is sometimes interesting to look at. Especially the ever popular aquarium. No thanks for me, but you guys have fun