Skip to main content

RSS Screensavers: Let Blog Buzz Invade the Desktop While You're Away

If you live and breathe RSS, it's time to uninstall those Scrolling Marquee Text and Photo Slideshow screensavers that bore you by repeating the same images from your My Pictures folder again and again.

While the computer is not in use, bring life to your desktop screens with RSS screensavers that fetch fresh content from your favorite RSS feeds (including images).

Mac OS X Tiger already ships with RSS feed screensaver but Windows XP users, as always, are not so lucky. Infact, Windows Vista Screensavers don't support RSS. But there's reason to be disappointed, there are bunch of third-party RSS screensavers available on the web alread and here we'll help you choose the best one for your desktop.

» MSN RSS Screensaver - This RSS feeds cum Picture screensaver from Microsoft comes pre-configured with feeds pointing to MSNBC news sources plus you can add any of your favorite web feeds. The screensaver also doubles as a Photo slideshow like the Google Screensaver.

You will also see how many unread Hotmail messages and current Messenger conversations you have plus real time weather updates from US Cities based on Zip Codes.

Windows Live Spaces members can just add user name and the screensaver will display blogs and photos from their friends’ MSN Spaces.

Unfortunately, we could not test our XML feed to MSN Screensaver since this kind of format is currently unsupported. [Download MSN RSS Screensaver]

» Newsgator RSS Screensaver - This is our favorite screensaver that shows RSS feeds content and also the images attached inside the feed items.

Picture fans can subscribe to Yahoo! Interesting Photos or Flickr tags and the screensaver will turn the images from these XML feeds into your screensaver. Unlike the regular slideshow screensavers, these images are fresh and rarely repeat. Plus the screensaver offers multi-monitor support.

You however need a free Newsgator online account since this screensaver shows unread posts from your XML subscriptions. [ Download RSS Screensaver from Newsgator ]

Which RSS Screensaver do I choose ?

Other than the ones mentioned above, there are a couple more like NuParadigm and RSSMore but we didn't get a chance to review them.

But we'll highly recommend Newsgator Screensaver since it supports feed enclosures and adding multiple feeds is a one-click process. And above all, Newsgator is "the" RSS company that makes amazing RSS products like FeedDemon and Netnewswire.

Popular posts from this blog

How to Download Contacts from Facebook To Outlook Address Book

Facebook users are not too pleased with the "walled garden" approach of Facebook. The reason is simple - while you can easily import your Outlook address book and GMail contacts into Facebook, the reverse path is closed. There's no "official" way to export your Facebook friends email addresses or contact phone numbers out as a CSV file so that you can sync the contacts data with Outlook, GMail or your BlackBerry. Some third-party Facebook hacks like "Facebook Sync" (for Mac) and "Facebook Downloader" (for Windows) did allow you to download your Facebook friends' names, emails, mobile phone number and profile photo to the desktop but they were quickly removed for violation of Facebook Terms of Use. How to Download Contacts from Facebook There are still some options to take Friends data outside the walls of Facebook wall. Facebook offers the Takeout option allowing you to download all Facebook data locally to the disk (include
Read more

Firefox Keyboard Shortcuts for Power Users

All features in Mozilla Firefox browser are accessible through the use of the keyboard. You can use shortcut keys to view and save Web pages, search the web, open new webpages, work with bookmarks, or find text on the current webpage. Some of the most common keyboard shortcuts in Mozilla Firefox are Ctrl+N (to open a new Firefox window), Ctrl+T (to open a new tab), Ctrl+F4 (to close the current tab) and Ctrl+S to save the current webpage. Mozilla Firefox supports many more powerful keyboard shortcuts. For instance, by pressing a simple key combination, you can manually delete autocomplete entries from the Firefox location bar or Web forms. I am sharing a list of my favorite Mozilla Firefox Keyboard Shortcuts that make web browsing with Firefox even more fun . And you also save your precious time as navigating through several layers of Firefox Toolbar menus is no longer necessary. 1. Web Search Ctrl+K moves the cursor to the Search Bar. You can then type in the terms you wish to fin
Read more

Digital Inspiration

Digital Inspiration is a popular tech blog by  Amit Agarwal . Our popular Google Scripts include  Gmail Mail Merge  (send personalized emails with Gmail ),  Document Studio (generate PDFs from Google Forms ) and   File Upload Forms ( receive files  in Google Drive). Also see  Reverse Image Mobile Search , Online Speech Recognition and Website Screenshots , the most useful websites on the Internet.
Read more