turning off screens

i have a question with dell laptop monitors. is it possible to turn them off when i want it to? i know they have a timer that sets to turn off monitor within whatever minutes or hour but what if i want to manually turn it off. is it possible?

 

I found a program that you can buy to for that ($17), but I don't think there is any native way in XP to do it.

monitor control

 

u could change the setting to "do nothing" when u close the lid...and when u close it..the screen will go off

 

Another option (doesn't sound like exactly what you're looking for tho), is to use the key combo to go immediately into standby (on mine it's <Fn><Esc>--don't know if it's the same for all Dells).

 

yea...u could use that 2..but only if you wanted to go into standby mode really

 

You could use Fn+F8, which switches it from the LCD to a plugged in CRT... assuming no CRT is plugged in... it's like turning it off?

 

That doesn't work for me. Did it for anyone else?

 

switching between LCD/CRT/etc only works if your hardware recognizes an external display is currently plugged in; i.e., "if there is no CRT, you cannot use that key"

 

although this is a similar suggestion .... you can close the lid 90% of the way, and it should turn off. You don't have to lock the lid, but there is a default setting that turns off the LCD once it has been closed beyond a certain point.
SG

 

That's good to know. I know that if I was just listening to music, I wouldn't want to leave the screen on and waste power. But going into standby would probably stop the music, so turning off the screen would be a great feature to use.

 

I just found out how!! Here's a link to instructions

It's really pretty easy; you put a shortcut to a screensaver on your desktop and then assign a key combo to it. So you can't do it by hitting just one key, but you can assign any <ctrl><alt><key> combo to it.

Cool!

 

u want to turn your LCD off or lock your computer?

 

i want to turn off my computer's lcd. i tried the fn+f8 and no help. it doesnt do anything. also when i put it on "do nothing" it doesnt turn the screen off. i also tried the close "half way" but then that works when your computer goes to standby. pretty tricky stuff here. haha.

 

Do the procedure I linked to. The "blank" screensaver that you need to search for is named "scrnsave.scr." This is a toally blank screen.

 

yeah, but that doesn't turn off the LCD, it merely projects a blank image. there is still power going to the LCD.

 

yea. i dont want to fool myself thinking the lcd is off. i want to actually turn it off (if its possible). i think other brands actually have a little switch or something, but i'm not too sure.

 

So, why do you want to turn the monitor off? To save power? Then use the standby function key. To clear the screen for security purposes? Then use the screensaver shortcut. What other reason is there?

 

could be for many reasons. like if i was listening to music or downloading and i'm going to be away for a while. not necessary to save power, but to have that function to turn the screen when i want it to. but if there is no such function i guess i have to stick with the "turn off monitor" in however minutes.

what is the difference between locking down a computer and putting it on standby with password?

 

So... in standby mode, can your computer keep playing music? I know that I often turn off my desktop monitor while doing things with the computer. Does anyone know if this could help increase the life of the LCD?

 

i didn't know LCD's had life spans...??

 

Yep, they do. Here is a good example (i read about this): A teenage boy had an graphic image on his laptop (not sure if it was just an image or background). He turned the brightness all the way up and made some other changes. Then he fell asleep and didn't check on the laptop for another 12+ hours. When he checked it, he could see the outline of the image. It didn't matter what he used for the background, he could still see the image. It had made an impression in the LCD.

This is why its always recommended to either use a screensaver or turn off the LCD when you are not using.

For me, I just shut my lid. It is set to do nothing, and turns off when it is shut, but it doesn't go into standby. Therefore my laptop is still running, but I'm saving my LCD. If you tried this and changed your settings (either in Dell Quickset or XP Display properties) and the LCD did not shut off when you shut the lid, try rebooting. I've noticed that when i changed my settings, it did not turn off the LCD until i rebooted.

SG

 

lol crazy lcds. i'm going to give that a try. thx.

 

burn in on an LCD is for the most part urban legend. it would take a very very very long time to do something like that to an LCD; for example, leaving an image on your display for hundreds, maybe even thousands of hours.

 

plus you would have to have it pretty bright for that to work. I just read that story somewhere. I've heard you can create problems with your LCD if you don't take proper care of it.

 

oo...ok...thanks...i'll be more careful now...like closing the screen when i'm not using it ..thanks again

 

oh wow. haha i better also watch out for that too. dont want anything happen to this sexy screen haha

 

lol...who would???