Screensaver

[Joram]

Windows Media Center (we are impending refugees from it) has a screensaver feature by which, if you leave WMC on a static image in full-screen mode for a certain amount of time, the screensaver kicks in and starts showing (for example) images from the Pictures folder. This happens whether you were watching a recorded program and put it on pause, or were displaying the list of recorded programs (nothing actually playing) on the screen.

I see that NextPVR has what looks like an analogous feature, which can be accessed from the .exe client UI by right-clicking anywhere in the NPVR window, then selecting Settings --> General and choosing one of the available options next to "Screen Saver."

However, thus far I have not gotten this feature to work as expected. I've tried this on two different PCs with NPVR. The default time for the screensaver to kick in is 10 minutes. If I pause a recorded show with NPVR in fullscreen mode and then check it 15, 20, 55 minutes later, the paused image is still showing -- no screensaver goes into action.

I've tried several of the options listed in the dropdown menu (CutOut,FixedImage, None, Blank) and they haven't affected this behavior. On one of the NPVR systems, the screensaver selection remains unchanged from what I set it to (to no apparent benefit), but on the other system the selection reverts to FixedImage no matter which one I'd picked.

Additional data point: Just finished testing this on the second one of the above NPVR machines. What I described does occur if NPVR is left paused on a show; but if left on a list of recorded programs, then Windows's own screensaver eventually launches.

How do I get NPVR to use the screensaver chosen in its settings menu and at the selected time?

I'll be happy to provide logs if necessary.

[mvallevand]

The screensaver won't kick in on paused video, just on the NextPVR.exe and UI client GUI screens.

Martin

[Joram]

That's the thing though, on my two test systems the NPVR screensaver (as opposed to the Windows screensaver) isn't kicking in at all and one of them isn't respecting the screensaver selection.

(In case it matters, the system that's not respecting the screensaver selection is Windows 11, while the one that keeps the selection one has set is Windows 10.)

[mvallevand]

Did you restart NextPVR.exe after changing the setting?

Martin

[Bobins]

As Martin said, the NPVR screensaver does not cut in on paused video playback. It only functions if the NPVR client is displaying a static screen such as the TV Guide, Recordings or What's New etc and there has been no keyboard OR mouse activity for the set timeout period.

I have used the feature on Windows 10 and currently on Windows 11 and can confirm it functions correctly according to the settings.
There must be something very specific on your systems preventing the timeout. When I'm testing new releases I reduce the timeout to 1min for testing purposes.
If you turn off the NPVR screensaver and set the default Windows screensaver instead, does that comply with the timeout and show the correct screensaver?

Ray.

[Joram]

If you turn off the NPVR screensaver and set the default Windows screensaver instead, does that comply with the timeout and show the correct screensaver?

Thanks, I tried setting the NPVR screensaver timeout to None and 1 minute. Before waiting out the minute, out of curiosity I exited NextPVR as Martin suggested and then relaunched it and checked the Settings again. Guess what -- the screensaver settings had reverted to FixedImage and 10 minutes!

On the other machine (the one that doesn't change back the screensaver setting on its own), I changed the timeout to 1 minute and, after exiting NextPVR.exe and then relaunching, left it in full-screen mode on the recorded programs list for more than two minutes: it never went into the NPVR screensaver.

So it would appear that each machine has its own distinct issue with the NPVR screensaver function. 

[Bobins]

Did you confirm that the Windows default screensaver works correctly with the NPVR screensaver set to none?

The settings for the screen saver are held in the config.xml file.
e.g.
<ScreenSaver>
<ActiveScreenSaver>CutOut</ActiveScreenSaver>
<InactivityMinutes>3</InactivityMinutes>
</ScreenSaver>

If you change the screen saver to say 1 minute and blank using the settings in the client exe you should see they've been saved in the config.xml file.
If they're not being saved that's very odd.
I would suggest you send the logs from each machine after you've set the NPVR screensaver on and left it beyond the expiry time. (Ensure the windows OS screensaver is turned off)

When the screensaver triggers, the logs should show something like:-

2025-11-19 11:06:39.689 [DEBUG][1] ActivatePopup: CutOut
2025-11-19 11:06:39.689 [DEBUG][1] ANIMATE
2025-11-19 11:06:39.689 [DEBUG][1] ANIMATION COMPLETE
2025-11-19 11:06:39.696 [DEBUG][1] No C:\Program Files\NextPVR\data\Scripts\ScreenSaverStart.bat file found

Ray

[mvallevand]

To answer your earlier questions logs are always needed to diagnose issues.

Martin

[Joram]

It's a busy day today, so I haven't had the opportunity to do some of the things suggested just above, but I am getting the chance to send logs.

Because we're dealing with two different machines, this troubleshooting could get awfully confusing very quickly. For the sake of simplicity, I'd like to focus on the main NPVR machine, which I'll call "Laptop." The other one ("Desktop") was used only in the beginning to get acquainted with NextPVR and doesn't even have a tuner connected to it currently. "Laptop" is the one that's not accepting the screensaver settings.

I'm attaching the log archive for Laptop.

FWIW, at some point during the baseball post-season (sorry 'Jays, I was rooting for you), I attached an external HDD to Laptop for new recordings.

[mvallevand]

I looked in the 4 NPVR.log files in that zip and I didn't see these necessary line once

2025-11-19 09:35:13.464 [DEBUG][1] About to save settings
2025-11-19 09:35:13.472 [DEBUG][1] Saving config.xm

So it seems your testing meets the definition of insanity. Do you click Save?

Martin