Finally, plenty of sci-fi geeks are getting a chance to have their own sentient, “evil” computer right on their very own desktop. For those who are familiar with the film or the books, this one easily helps kickstart the imagination and lets users play pretend on what it must be like to become an astronaut on your way to the biggest planet in the Solar System. Having that red eye camera lens from your screen definitely brings its own category of cool. Give it a download.

The HAL 9000 has gained a place in popular culture thanks to the wonderful Space Odyssey books and films. HAL or the Heuristically programmed ALgorithmic computer is the main computer that interacts with the crew in Discovery One. He mostly shows up on screen in a representative red eye camera lens and is equipped with all the possible knowledge any artificial being can have. From lipreading, art appreciation, speech and facial recognition as well as interpreting complex emotions and reasoning, the computer pretty much knows everything.

This comes on top of the fact that he is programmed to run the entire Discovery One on its mission. Of course, what makes him even more celebrated is the fact that he’s the main antagonist in the movie. In fact, he’s included in AFI’s 100 Years…100 Heroes and Villains. He ranks at number 13.

The screensaver itself started as an animated wallpaper back in 1999. It wasn’t until June 2006 when it first went online as a screensaver and since then, has become quite a hit with fans and non-fans alike. It features all the basic look of the computer. Visiting the official website gives you a brief overview of the story if you are not familiar with it. Overall, the screensaver not only looks but works great.

Related Links:
HAL 9000 Official Website
HAL 9000 on Wikipedia
HAL 9000 on MacResource Forums

This awesome screensaver runs on a Mac OSX or a Windows and is definitely worth having.

It’s a bit addictive since every moment you look at the screen, you half expect something important to happen and don’t want to miss out.

With Surveillance Screensaver, it’s easy to get lost in a screen full of surveillance videos. Sure, some of the videos might not be updates in real time but majority of it are and it’s hard to take your eyes off from the screen everytime you are facing one. On their website, they describe it as similar to watching an “addictive soap opera.”

The program was first started back in 2007 and more than 30,000 people have downloaded the screensaver since. Michael Zoellner developed the program and according to him, it first started as a dissertation on a “Reality Filtering System.”  The very fact that people can easily watch what’s happening to something or someone across the globe is quite intriguing for a lot of people. Hence, the allure of having such a cool screensaver on hand.

Every it pops up, it shows a different video from a remote location. The location and date are indicated at the bottom portion of the screen while the latitude and longitude of the location is also displayed.

Despite its cool factor, the program isn’t perfect. For instance, many people are used to having the screensaver disappear whenever there’s a hint of movement on the mouse or keyboard, however, for this one, it doesn’t disappear. This might be a minor inconvenience for some but for others, it can become downright annoying.

Overall, it’s definitely one of the coolest screensavers I’ve seen to date. It’s interesting and available for both Mac or PC.

Related Links:
Surveillance Screensaver Official Website
Surveillance Screensaver on KittenFluff
Surveillance Screensaver on i-Hackef
Surveillance Screensaver on Neatorama

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Germany License.

The screensaver works on Snow Leopard and requires a Mac OS X  10.3 or a much later version in order to work properly. It’s definitely a cool screensaver that you can easily enjoy.

Go ahead and grab it. It’s available as a free download and will give your Mac an extra special look even when on standby.Even if you’re not much of a water person, this stunning screensaver will no doubt still impress. Lotsa Water makes your screen look like you’re looking at a waters surface. The ripple effect is quite realistic that everything in your desktop will look like it was submerged under water; giving that distorted image we are all familiar with.

Despite its beauty, the developer admits that it can take a huge chunk of your CPU power. Hence, it’s advisable that you tweak on the settings first before anything else. You can adjust the sharpness of the image or pretty much just tinker with the settings so it won’t eat so much of your CPU resources.

Overall, even though it is a bit of a power hogger, the program still makes your screen look absolutely wonderful. Download this screensaver by hitting the link on the upper left.

Related Links:
Lotsa Water Official Website
Lotsa Water on MacUpdate
Lotsa Water on CNET

This free screensaver features some of the most iconic and relaxing images from Japan. It is rendered in full 3D to give it a realistic feel. Every portion of your computer screen will come to life as it breathes Old World Japan with its stunning red pagodas, or maybe give you that modern, ethereal feel of the country with beautiful cherry blossom trees.

Click on the download link or the image to get this free screensaver today.

Just like there are plenty of great places to enjoy in Japan, you get several options as well when it comes to the theme of the screensavers. Some of the themes include Spirit, which is pictured above and Cherry, featuring wonderful Japanese cherry blossoms. There’s also the Garden, Bloom and Harmony.

Some of the cool features you can expect include gorgeous realistic rendering of the various sceneries of Japan. The screensaver is also animated so you can get a feel of the various places. To add to the mood, it also comes with beautiful sound effects that will provide you with an even better sense of the Japanese landscape.

Why not imbue your day with the beautiful and relaxing scenery of Japan by downloading and installing these beautiful free screensavers.

Related Links:
Free 3D Japan Screensaver on 3D Savers
Free 3D Japan Screensaver on FreeWareFiles
Free 3D Japan Screensaver on Brothersoft

The program Seti@Home allows you to join a scientific experiment that uses computers that are interconnected to help track down extraterrestrial signals. The free program will help you download and analyze radio telescope data straight into your home computer. The program is essentially an interesting screensaver and science experiment rolled into one.

This unique screensaver offers more than just beautiful colors. It helps you analyze radio frequencies beamed down by radio telescopes in search of something out of the ordinary or extraterrestrial life. The entire program works under the basic premise that there is intelligent life out there and that these intelligent life forms will begin transmitting their own radio signals. Of course, other intelligent life forms who assume there are others like them all across the universe will do something to help track down these signals as well. This is where SETI comes in.

The only problem with this is that SETI needs a huge computational resource in order to be able to translate all the various radio signals out there. Hence, they have enlisted the help of people all over the world to go ahead and do this. Every time your computer goes idle, it is wasting its computing capabilities. Hence, by installing a SETI@Home screensaver, you help process the data that the SETI servers are receiving. Making you a huge part of the project and the search for intelligent life in the universe.

The computer screen will display the computer’s progress and will transmit the data once it is done analyzing and computing.

Related Links:
SETI@Home Official Website
SETI@Home on Cnet
SETI@Home on How Stuff Works
SETI@Home on Wikipedia

The program is still in its beta stages but it works great in providing users with a visual idea of the entire blogosphere. It gives users and bloggers, a chance to see exactly how many people are blogging at the same time all across the world. It is definitely a nifty and fascinating tool to have right in front of your computer screen. Twingly has the capability to let you visualize the blog activity of people all across the world. It can function as a pure program or simply as a screensaver. Of course, you would need to tweak several things in your computer to get the best results. For instance, you might want to enable language support in your pc and make sure that you have an OpenGL graphics card.

Normally, you would see the blogs as dots all across the globe. However, there is an option to view the title so that you can simply click on the title of the blog if you find it interesting and just read it. Just take note that the content for the blog will not be filtered so user discretion is advised.

Overall, the screensaver is a pretty fun and interesting way to get updated on the latest blogs available for your perusal. It makes everything easier and simpler.

Related Links:
Twingly Official Website
Twingly on Cnet
Twingly on SoftSea
Twingly on SnapFiles
Twingly on Make Use Of

Choose one from the collection of 11 free screensavers, you surely won’t look at your computer the same way again. Put on these screensavers, stare at your monitor for some time, close the lights and throw a party – they are definitely hypnotizing and can take you to another world.

Here’s a quick list and some descriptions for each of the 11 screensavers in the Really Slick Screensavers collection.

• Hyperspace – can really put your graphic card’s test to the limit! It feels some kind of a colored blackhole pulling you towards some kind of energy. You can always lessen the settings if your computer responds too slow.
• Helios – particles exploding with some smooth ribbons. Really nice.
• Euphoria – if you love psychedelic stuff, then this is for you. Stare at it for some minutes and you’d surely need a barf bag.
• Sky Rocket – for fireworks lovers. You can also control various rockets, and then pause fireworks movements. Control the view with your own mouse, and say “Happy New Year” in a different setting.
• Solar Winds – quite mesmerizing, indeed. Change your own settings to fit any pattern you’d definitely love. Connect them with lines, and gaze into your own colorful windstorm.
• Lattice – love rings? Then lattice is for you. With lots and lots of linked rings, you can even change their textures however you want them to be.
• Flux – the website says that if you know anything about strange attractors, you might be able to know the patterns in this saver.
• Plasma – another saver which can hypnotize or make you want to grab another barf bag. Lovely colors, still.
• Field Lines – For those who want a taste of electric field lines in physics
• Flocks – a 3D variation of flocks.
• Cyclone – if you are a cyclone chaser, you might want to chase your own cyclone here in your computer.

Give it a try. Turn off your lights, invite your friends, put on some music, lay out some drinks, and show these screensavers on your wall through a projector. What would you get? One heck of a house party.

Related Links:
Really Slick on SourceForge
Really Slick Screensavers

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