I downloaded a screensaver,the files went into the C/windows directory but when I go into control panel/display/screensaver to select it…it isn’t there. So I go back to the C/windows directory,find the icon and click on it and it works just like a screensaver…i move the mouse it disapears,no problemo…so I know the program works, but why isn’t it showing up my list of screensavers? Ak! It’s driving me nuts!
it’s probably not a real/standard screensaver, probably just
some exe/swf type graphics program that has been renamed
to have a scr extension.
Actually, screensavers are executeable files, the main reason you see a lot of virii running around these days disguising themselves with .scr extensions. They are as much an executeable as .exe, .com, .bat, and .pif files are. A file with .scr simply tells Windows to list it in the screensaver list in Display properties.
There are three reasons you might not see the screensaver listed. First off, most .scr files have a name embedded in them that is the actual namve of the screensaver as listed in the screensaver list in Display properties. Most of the time the embedded name is fairly close to the filename, but not always. Have you clicked on all the unfamiliar screensavers in the list to see if one of them might be the one?
Second reason is that Windows may not recognize it as a valid screensaver file. You can make a copy of Notepad.exe and rename the extension to .scr. It will function when you double-click it but will not show up in the screensaver list.
The third reason may depend on your version of Windows. Win9x versions could only have so many screensavers listed before it would not list any more even though they were in the right directory. I know this from going on a screensaver binge for a few weeks. Windows seems to read from the C:\Windows\System directory first, then C:\Windows. I can’t remember what the limit was (128 maybe?) before screensavers stopped showing up in the list. Try putting the file in the System directory. If it still doesn’t show up, right-click the file and choose Install (a handy way to get around the limitation). I don’t know if NT flavors of Windows (2000 and XP) have this problem or not.