I gotta be missing something small but..
 

I cannot get my screensaver to work anymore.

Winxp, p4 3.2ghz, gb ram.

For some unknown reason my screen saver and power saving settings no longer work. I have enabled and disabled my virus scanner, disk keeper, anything I can think of that could be using up cycles making the pc think it is still active, but i am coming up empty every time. I have changed the settings down to 1 minute for the ss to activate yet it still won't come on. I have done everything possible which makes me think I am missing something small somewhere, the screen saver still works when I hit the preview button in the desktop settings, but when it is time for the system to do it automatically it doesn't happen.

Idiot question: have you tried changing to a different screensaver?

yup.............

This happened to me once and I never fixed it. I just ended up turning my monitor off when I wasn't using it. :( It fixed after I formatted though! :thumbsup:

you mean it doesnt turn on or you just cant view them? cuz thats weird!

What mouse/keyboard? Connected via PS2 or USB? Some generate spurious activity. Try removing them or switching to alternates to test.

standard mouse and keyboard hooked up through USB, the computer is about 6 months old never had any problems with this until 2 days ago, I noticed it did not kick on, and then when I got home from work yesterday morning it had not kicked on again, nothing new installed, no new programs in the last 2 days to cause this to happen either, I will just turn the monitor off when I am in bed and at work then I guess.

It is not so much a problem as it just annoying that I don't know what is going on, I have ran all my av and spyware programs and nothing comes back abnormal I ran hijack this and again found nothing out of the norm that I did not put there or install myself.

Only screen savers I have are the default set that come with Winxp, nothing new installed or third party ones downloaded, I can view every single one of them in the desktop settings, as well as when I hit preview they all come on like normal, but when it comes time for the system to sleep/power down/screen saver come on, nothing happens

Did you try removing them?

MS wireless combo's seem to cause this frequently, though not always immediately, which can lead to much head scratching.

Ya, sometimes the mouse moves by itself...

doh, ignore me, it's been suggested.

I don't have another kb/mouse to try and this is not a wireless one that I am using currently.

The thing most bugging me is when I go into the desktop tab then the screen saver settings is that if I hit preview on any of them they will run just fine until I move my mouse, it is just when it comes time to do it automatically it doesn't work.

Which XP? If MCE try killing ehtray.exe. That's a "fix" for an MS kbd/mouse combo under MCE. Not knowing otherwise I have to suggest it.

Yep, that's the usual behavior. The loop exit is different for preview vs. normally executing screensavers.

XP home, I have looked all over google and any resources I can think of and nothing fixes this error I am having.

there is no ehtray.exe process to kill on my machine, I looked in my services, and in my task manager it is not there, like I said earlier, thanks for the help I will probably just start turning off the monitor when not in use.

My girlfriend's computer started doing this today. I changed the screen saver from 4 minutes to 10 minutes the other day and it worked. Then I changed it back to 4 and now it won't turn on no matter what. Hmm.

I think I have sorta narrowed down what may be the problem but no clue on how to resolve/fix.

I just noticed I only had one window open and while typing I got a beep like something was wrong I start looking at the screen and see that somehow the window focus has changed, but not really. I only have one window open, but the title bar at the top was no longer highlighted like it was my active window, it was grey like the focus was on another top window (but there were no other windows open) I clicked back on the text entry block and went back about my business, this has done it a few times now, so this is making me think that is why the screen saver is not coming on, there is something evil at work here and I have no idea what it could be. I have done online scans with symantec for av, and nothing, I have used symantec corp, norton 2007 trial, and both avg and avast all come back clean, I have ran ad aware, spyware blaster and looked at all my running processes with the task manager, there is something on here messing around but I am totally clueless as to what it could be or where to find it.

I also dug up an older logitech wireless mouse and hooked it up and still having this problem, I have done driver updates for video, sound, and any other peripherals but nothing gets rid of this window focus changing.

Armed with this new information, anyone have any other suggestions on what to look for or try? I am at a total loss now.

Focus-stealing is a shootin' offense. Nothing like touch-typing away only to find a series of dialogs have come and gone and done their things.

Try without your anti-vir/spyware. I've had some steal focus at the most annoying times. (Spyware Doctor is bad about it) Try scanning with Emsisoft's a-squared or superantispyware after a safe-boot. If nothing shows up it might be time to post a HJT report.

it cannot be the av, I have changed numerous times from avast to avg and running symantec corp ver 10.x right now, and it only started about 3 days ago. I don't have any active anti spyware programs installed, just stuff I manually run on a regular basis adaware, spybot etc.

Now I am just pissed off, I was running scans in safe mode and....THE SCREEN SAVER WORKS!!! So there has to be something associated with my profile that is loading up and messing up the screen saver, I ran all my scans in safe mode and nothing was found, I checked all my processes that load and found nothing new or out of the ordinary. This will be the end all of end all computer problems, I cannot rest until I get this resolved now.


Hijack this log removed, I think I may have resolved the problem. I thought of an old bot/trojan scanner I used to run back in the day called Swatit, it only found one entry and that was for a file in my Windows directory called gamedelete.exe I have no idea where it came from and what it was for, it was never in my running processes, it never showed up on any scans, but after removing it, I think everything is back to normal, I changed my screen saver timeout to 1 minute sat back and it kicked on like normal, 30 minutes later the monitor went into sleep mode, and nothing has tried to change window focus the entire time I have been typing this, so for all the PC help threads don't forget to add Swatit to your list of must haves.

Great news! (knocking on wood)

wild!!! I thought I was the only one!!!

sometimes my mouse moves horizontally for no apparent reason then stops.

Glad that your question has been answered, but I'm curious now what reason you have for using a screensaver?

I understand custom screen savers, because they can be themed and show images that you like, but a standard screensaver?

I don't know of any modern CRT that could "burn-in," so the true use of a screensaver is moot; if you want to save energy, just use your standby modes - not hibernate, but standby.

Just a thought..