The irony is that LCD screens removed the need for screensavers almost entirely. It became a fun, harmless way to customize with your desktop.īy the time that flat-screened LCD monitors showed up in homes, the idea of a screensaver was so rooted in the consumer mind that no one ever considered ditching them. And since people are easily bored, screensavers quickly grew in complexity, color, and customization. The rise of LCD LCD Monitors Tim Samoff/Flickrīecause screensavers were so ubiquitous back in the 1990s and early 2000s, no one questioned their necessity. The solution was a simple program that kicked in after several minutes and ran some basic images across the screen to keep the phosphors from getting bored. Thus, the screensaver was born. Those old CRT monitors also used a lot of power and time to start up again after being turned off, so shutting the monitor down wasn’t the best idea, either.
This led to after-images and certain graphics, like menu bars, to stay on the screen constantly, essentially ruining the monitor. The burnt phosphors lost the ability to respond in different ways to the beams, and kept reproducing the same image over and over. If you left a computer on for hours, then the dreaded “burn in” effect occurred. You see, the phosphorus materials were not designed to be heated in the same colors for long periods of time. While all that sounds awesome, it was actually a very old technique dating back to the first TVs, and it had trouble keeping up with the uses of modern computers.
CRT stands for Cathode Ray Tube, an older way of projecting images on a screen.ĬRT monitors heated phosphorus via electron beams to produce light that was bent using magnetic deflection. Back in the days of the first at-home computers, all the desktop models were boxy, clunky models CRT monitors.
To find the origins of the screensaver, we have to go all the way back to the Neolithic era of the 1990s, when dial-up Internet still prevailed and people were getting used to this whole gosh-darned email thing. The wonderful days of CRT CRT Monitor Eric E. But to find out why, we have to remember why screensavers were created in the first place. Technically, you do not need to use a screensaver at all with modern computers. ITunes Screensaver brett jordan/FlickrWhen was the last time you thought about your desktop screensaver? If those flashy images and graphics don’t seem as important these days, well – that’s because they aren’t.
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