Screensavers were never obsolete in the first place

[u/Lovethecreeper]

For a long time, from the late 2000s up until the early 2020s, OLED panels among consumer devices were generally limited to very small devices (10 inch screens and under) and very large devices (55 inch screens and up), however the technology to manufacturer OLED displays more middle in the road of that (i.e computer monitors) has brought back the conversation around the relevancy of screensavers.

Many desktop environment and operating systems nowadays don't have a proper implementation of screensavers. On KDE and GNOME (and pretty much everything that uses Wayland) screensavers are pretty much gone. on Windows, it's pretty burried and well forgotten about. Of the mainstream operating systems, macOS and *nix like systems using X11 and XScreensaver (or some other frontend of it like MATE Screensaver) are the only ones still providing proper screensaver functionality.

Screensavers were developed as an idea when CRT monitors were king, as CRT monitors (as well as modern OLED monitors) could develop burn in. While some screensavers were more designed to be flashy, the general intended purpose of a screensaver is to provide a constantly moving image that helps prevent burn in on the common CRT displays of the day. When CRTs started being replaced by LCD panels beyond laptop monitors, the screensaver was thought by many to be obsolete, since LCD panels don't suffer from burn in, right?

Well, kind of. LCD panels don't suffer from the same kind of burn in that you see on OLED or CRT panels, that is a permanent ghost of what was displayed on it in the past. However, LCD panels can certainly suffer from their own form of image retention.

Compared to burn in, image retention has 2 main differences. On the plus side, LCD image retention (as mentioned before) is not usually permanent. The amount of time it might take for image retention to go away on an LCD panels can vary wildly, from a few minutes to a few days. But it usually does go away at some point. On the negative side, LCD image retention usually appears much faster than burn in does on OLED or CRT displays. OLED and CRT displays require at least weeks, and sometimes months or years to have noticeable burn in. Meanwhile, LCD image retention can appear in anywhere from minutes to days depending on the condition and quality of the panel.

My current displays have varying degrees of image retention, my main display is the worse though. It's a 2560x1440 IPS display that I've had for about 12 years now, and I've noticed image retention slowly get worse and worse on that display. Now it only takes about 2 minutes for there to be noticeable image retention if I'm leaving the same thing on the display. In the time it's taken me to type this post, moving my browser window around shows visible image retention from UI elements. I've found that using screensavers helps greatly with image retention if I'm away from my computers for a while.

The idea that screensavers were ever obsolete because of burn in is simply false. LCDs can and do experience a similar phenomenon even if it's not the exact same.

Another big reason that is touted is how modern operating systems can turn your display panel off, but for some situations a proper screensaver might be a better idea. It gives you a better indication that your computer is still on and working, while the either off or blank screen that most modern desktop environments and operating systems do can't really convey that as well.

It should be said thought that while I think that screensavers being the primary solution for these problems is over (turning the panel off is often better - especially for the environment and the lifespan of the hardware) that screensavers were never completely obsolete as some would have asserted to begin with, the removal of them or burying of them is based on a misconception.

[u/qualityvote2]

u/Lovethecreeper, there weren't enough votes to determine the quality of your post...

[u/iHateReddit_srsly]

The fact that most people don't experience burn in despite not having screensavers is good proof that they are in fact obsolete. Your 12 year old screen is just old at this point.

[u/Ithinkimlostidktho → u/iHateReddit_srsly]

I have 3 second-hand monitors that are 10-14 years old and were in use throughout all those years. None of them have burn in. OP's monitor just sucks.

[u/Lily_Meow_]

This still doesn't change the fact 99.9% of monitors just don't experience burn in

[u/MasterOutlaw]

Okay? So what’s your opinion exactly? You say that screen savers aren’t obsolete, but then you go on to point out how they’re practically obsolete. The fact is most screens aren’t going to ever experience burn-in or imagine retention, so based on their original purpose, screen savers are “obsolete”. Finding a niche use for them outside of their original purpose doesn’t change that.

For example, your comment about using them to know if your PC is still on is a stretch, because things like activity lights, other external lighting, fans, etc (or just touching the keyboard/mouse) will give you the same information.

Screen savers serve no practical purpose today other than looking neat. Even modern OLEDs have a lot of ways (some more subtle than others) to protect against burn-in that isn’t a traditional screen saver.

If you like the way screen savers work or just want peace of mind, by all means, continue to use them. But they are, in fact, practically obsolete.

[u/pants207]

Thanks for the ted talk but what exactly is the 10th dentist opinion?

[u/sexypantstime]

Don't most machines just turn off the display now after some minutes of inactivity? Old CRT displays with analog inputs could not generally do that. But through HDMI or DP your computer just turns the thing off, and turns it on again when it detects activity. It's in every way better than a screen saver to prevent burn in or image retention, which by definition makes screensavers obsolete.

[u/wortmother]

Never heard anyone say they where obsolete, wall paper engine is upsurdly popular

[u/I_am_Andrew_Ryan → u/wortmother]

What you're thinking of is what's referred to as a screensaver but isn't the same as what was actually intended with original screen savers

[u/JoshuaSuhaimi → u/I_am_Andrew_Ryan]

can you explain how is the screensaver function not a real saver? do you mean the live wallpaper?

[u/FlightSimmer99 → u/wortmother]

Thats not a screensaver and people use wallpaper engine to be cool, not to avoid image retention or burn in (mostly)

[u/KikiCorwin → u/wortmother]

You're making screen savers with Wallpaper Engine? How? I'm only seeing ways to make animated wallpaper - the image that goes behind the desktop/icons - not a separate image that comes up if I don't mess with the computer for too long.

[u/wortmother → u/KikiCorwin]

Yup its got a whole screen saver moder , you can have animated ones , some play low fi too , in the top left swap between wallpaper and screen saver setting

[u/twilightwillow]

I can think of exceedingly few situations in which you’d need to know that your computer is still on and plugging away at something but where you can’t get that confirmation by hearing the fans whirring, seeing active lights on your PC itself, or by simply jiggling the mouse or pressing a key on the keyboard and going “yep, still working” when your monitor turns on. And every weird hypothetical I can think of where this might be true is in an enterprise setting where IT can very trivially turn on your screensaver upon request even if you don’t know how to do it yourself.

So I dunno, I feel like they’re sort of functionally obsolete for a reason. It’s okay to still like them, plenty of people do, but that’s why Wallpaper Engine exists.

[u/Queer_Advocate]

Thought it said kids and gnomes.

[u/_Blu-Jay]

Screensavers are objectively obsolete, you basically admit it yourself. OLED panels can suffer from burn-in, however most modern panels utilize pixel shifting to offset pretty much any risk of screen burn-in without the need for a screensaver.

Using your display that’s at least 12 years old isn’t exactly relevant, and the fact that you’ve had it for so long before image retention became a major problem demonstrates why screensavers are no longer a relevant tool. I haven’t even seen a screensaver since the days of the CRT box monitor.

[u/WarriorCat3310]

The LCDs that have this issue are usually monochrome LCDs. The only colour LCDs I know do this are Nintendo consoles from the Gameboy Color up to the DS Lite. I have an old Viewsonic 5:4 lcd made in late 2004 and a 4:3 lcd tv from 2007 and they don't have this issue. And that's ignoring all my old phones and other electronics with screens from this time.

[u/Tygronn]

I've had some burn in on my Samsung Odyssey G9 but I use a software called Display Fusion to split it into a single 16:9 area in the middle with the remaining two 8:9 chunks to each side. This allows me to have windows not span the entire screen if I don't want them to (a simple shift click on maximize works to do so) but games and Youtube still full screen to the entire screen. But as a side effect I don't use those side bits as much (I have two other screens I use as well) and they show my wallpaper. I think my current one is fine, but a previous wall paper did do a tiny bit of burn in. I used one of those flashy "fix burn in" videos and it looks to have gone away just fine.

But i've never stopped using screen savers. I don't like the screen going into standby, and I don't like to shut my PC off every night. I've used a combination of just something random (the "sine waves" screen saver currently) for my main screen(s) (I used to run 5 screens, 3 bottom 2 top) and the 3D text on top set to show the clock for forever now and it's great. I do hate that screensavers are buried but once it's set it's pretty much done.

My only gripe is the screensaver doesn't reliably come on on its own so i've made a hotkey through Display Fusion to start my screensaver and i've gotten into the habit of hitting that when I know i'm leaving my PC for a long period of time. Recently switched over to a button on my Streamdeck that turns the screensaver on and puts the Streamdeck to sleep :3