Boxee breaks screen saver/display sleep

[mgertner]

I have the screen saver and sleep display settings on my Mac Pro configured. When I run boxee, the screen saver and sleep display both appear to be disabled. This means the screen saver never starts and the display never sleeps (not a very green setup). This prevents me from running boxee all the time, which makes it a lot less convenient to use.

Is there any way to configure boxee just to leave the screensaver and energy saver settings alone?

[DPK]

So (correct me if I'm wrong) if I'm understanding you right, you have boxee's screen saver enabled and your computers sleep mode enabled? The result being the problem described. Correct? Is your computer screensaver also enabled along with boxee's and sleep mode?

So...
boxee screensaver: enabled
computer screensaver: ?
computer sleep mode: enabled

Just trying to verify before I make any suggestions. There's definitely some bugs with boxee's screensaver, so this wouldn't surprise me.

What OS is your Mac running?

[mgertner]

I'm running 10.5.6. I have the OS X screensaver turned on and the energy saver settings configured to sleep the display after an hour of inactivity. As far as I can tell, the boxee screensaver is turned off.

The behavior I observe is that my screensaver never turns on and the display never sleeps, whenever boxee is running. I would definitely appreciate any advice on this since it is currently preventing me from using boxee. The product looks awesome but it's too time-consuming to have the start the client every time I want to watch something and quit it afterwards.

[aedbmx]

How long does it take for Boxee to load for you? Geez. You make it sound like it sits there for minutes before you can use it. Quitting does take a lil but starting only takes me less than 10 secs.

Anyways. I believe what he is saying, is, that Boxee overrides any and all screensaver and/or power saving settings while it is running, even if Boxee's screensaver is set to off. For example, when I watch NBC shows through Firefox the OS doesn't recognize the video as "activity" and turns on the screensaver. Lame.

So if Boxee doesn't override the OS setting the screensaver and or sleep will activate halfway through a video. So you need a way to tell the OS that while Boxee is playing Video to not activate the screensaver or sleep mode.

Yes?

[mgertner]

How long does it take for Boxee to load for you? Geez. You make it sound like it sits there for minutes before you can use it. Quitting does take a lil but starting only takes me less than 10 secs.

Okay, maybe I was a bit harsh, but the reality is that I have VLC and Firefox running at all times. I'd rather use Boxee to watch e.g. the Daily Show or video from my disk, but the extra step of starting the app makes me tend to stay with the apps I already use. Not the end of the world, but I think we can all agree it would be better if the app would respect the screensaver and energy saver settings so we could leave it running all the time.


Anyways. I believe what he is saying, is, that Boxee overrides any and all screensaver and/or power saving settings while it is running, even if Boxee's screensaver is set to off. For example, when I watch NBC shows through Firefox the OS doesn't recognize the video as "activity" and turns on the screensaver. Lame.

So if Boxee doesn't override the OS setting the screensaver and or sleep will activate halfway through a video. So you need a way to tell the OS that while Boxee is playing Video to not activate the screensaver or sleep mode.
Yes?

I definitely think that if the Boxee screensaver is turned off it should only suppress the screensaver/sleep settings if video is playing. It would be very nice if using the remote would turn off the screensaver, of course.

[pkgill]

This is also a concern if you are running a dual screen setup like i am. I have a VGA fed through the wall from my office into my living room to display boxee on a 40" LCD.

The problem is that running boxee at all times on the 40" means the iMac display in my office NEVER turns off or starts the OSX screen saver. And to top it off the boxee screen saver doesn't even cover the iMac screen if the event it activates.

The "screen saver" menu in boxee needs to provide an option to turn off this over ride of the screen saver/display sleep. In which case i can just set my display to sleep after ~2-3 hours of inactivity (long enough to watch an entire movie)

This extra step (several steps considering you need to log in) to turn boxee on/off is not user friendly for people (old and non-tech savy). to fully replace my stupid PVR it needs to be VERY easy to use.

[bolinec]

I also am frustrated with the screensaver in boxee. Here is my tale of woe - I use both boxee and Mythtv. I have mythfrontend, and boxee on a macmini. This is connected to my plasma in the living room. I'd like to keep both apps running and tab between them.

When I run boxee in the background it appears to disable the system screensaver. Night before last some inlaws left the TV on, with boxee in the background and safari in the foreground - Now I have burn in because the screensaver never came up!

Is there any solution for this? (the system screensaver not coming up)

Thanks!