Edit

Share via

BlueScreen Screen Saver v3.2

  • Article

By Mark Russinovich

Published: November 1, 2006

Download Download BlueScreen (64 KB)

Introduction

One of the most feared colors in the NT world is blue. The infamous Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) will pop up on an NT system whenever something has gone terribly wrong. Bluescreen is a screen saver that not only authentically mimics a BSOD, but will simulate startup screens seen during a system boot.

  • On NT 4.0 installations it simulates chkdsk of disk drives with errors!
  • On Windows 2000, Windows 95, and Windows 98 it presents the Windows 2000 startup splash screen, complete with rotating progress band and progress control updates!
  • On Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 it presents the XP/Server 2003 startup splash screen with progress bar!

Bluescreen cycles between different Blue Screens and simulated boots every 15 seconds or so. Virtually all the information shown on Bluescreen's BSOD and system start screen is obtained from your system configuration - its accuracy will fool even advanced NT developers. For example, the NT build number, processor revision, loaded drivers and addresses, disk drive characteristics, and memory size are all taken from the system Bluescreen is running on.

Use Bluescreen to amaze your friends and scare your enemies!

Installation and Use

Note: before you can run Bluescreen on Windows 95 or 98, you must copy \winnt\system32\ntoskrnl.exe from a Windows 2000 system to your \Windows directory. Simply copy Sysinternals BLUESCRN.SCR to your \system32 directory if on Windows NT/2K, or \Windows\System directory if on Windows 95 or 98. Right click on the desktop to bring up the Display settings dialog and then select the "Screen Saver" tab. Use the pull down list to find "Sysinternals Bluescreen" and apply it as your new screen saver. Select the "Settings" button to enable fake disk activity, which adds an extra touch of realism!

More Information

You can find out how real Blue Screens are generated, and what the information on the Blue Screen means in my December 1997 Windows ITPro Magazine NT Internals column, "Inside the Blue Screen."

Note: Some virus scanners flag the Bluescreen screen saver as a virus. If this is the case with your virus scanner, you may not be able to use this screen saver.

Download Download BlueScreen (64 KB)

Runs on:

  • Client: Windows Vista and higher.
  • Server: Windows Server 2008 and higher.