Slideshow screensaver unique image each monitor?

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886 points

Slideshow screensaver unique image each monitor?

Snow Leopard screensaver slideshow put a different image on each of my two monitors (displays). I believe this has been true since OS X 10.3.

Mountain Lion behaved the same way with 'classic' slideshow screenshow -- until recently. Now the images are synchronized. I think when the images came from Aperture they were desynchronized, but now that I've unified libraries it shows 'iPhoto' and they are synchronized.

I would prefer, of course, a different photo on each display.

Any tips on how to do this? I studied the pref file but didn't see any obvious clues.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">

<dict>

<key>Center</key>

<true/>

<key>Crossfade</key>

<true/>

<key>DisplayType</key>

<string>Slides</string>

<key>Random</key>

<true/>

<true/>

</dict>

</plist>

Posted on Nov 24, 2012 6:23 PM

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Answer 1

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jfaughnan Author

Level 3

886 points

Nov 24, 2012 6:38 PM in response to jfaughnan

I tried toggling the 'shuffle slide order' setting and after a couple of round trips I ended up with a desynchronized display pair. So there are things to try.

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Answer 2

Apr 11, 2013 3:35 AM in response to jfaughnan

Yes, I've been trying to achieve the same result, and I found that with "shuffle slide order" selected I frequently have different images on each screen, but (at random?) the pictures are identical, probably returning to different at the next activation of the screensaver. Sounds like we need an additional prefs parameter to either load all displays with the first image in the queue or to proceed down the queue, loading each display sequentially.

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Answer 3

jfaughnan Author

Level 3

886 points

Apr 11, 2013 5:44 AM in response to allanfromcork

One other thing to try Allan -- try Aperture/iPhoto's database repair feature. (I'm on most current versions where they share same database).

After I do that I get dysnchronized slide shows. Might be coincidence, but the plain database validation/repair seems to be a good thing to do routinely anyway. (Which doesn't speak well for Apple's dev team, but oh well.)

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Answer 4

jfaughnan Author

Level 3

886 points

Apr 17, 2014 8:51 PM in response to jfaughnan

Coming back to this a year later, when my Aperture driven screensaver slideshow was again stuck in dual monitor synchronized display. I actually found my original post via Google, I'd forgotten about it.

This time rebuilding (ctrl-option-click library) Aperture's database didn't work the first time I tried it. The 2nd time I rebuilt the database AND I removed a folder from User\Library\Cache called: "com.apple.ScreenSaver.Engine".

I put the folder on my desktop, it contains a curious file: com.apple.vision.64FaceCoreCLKernel.dylib dated a few weeks ago (about when Aperture got synchronized actually).

After Aperture was done rebuilding and I opened screensaver the Cache file was regenerate. After that my two monitors again displayed different images.

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Answer 5

jfaughnan Author

Level 3

886 points

Nov 6, 2015 10:58 AM in response to jfaughnan

I still get this in Yosemite. Annoying. I'll have to try all the fixes from my last post ...

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Answer 6

jjconti

Level 1

5 points

Nov 9, 2015 7:06 AM in response to jfaughnan

You can achieve this using http://screensaver.ninja/ 1.2. You can get it asking it by email in that page and then use 2 of the new features: slideshow + diferente content in each screen.

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Answer 7

jfaughnan Author

Level 3

886 points

Nov 26, 2015 4:26 PM in response to jfaughnan

I still haven't found a fix for this 2012 bug. I'm told the same bug is found in El Capitan.

Today I tried AskDifferent: http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/217278/force-screensaver-slideshow-to-d esynchronize-images-when-using-multiple-displays

Hope I get some new ideas there.

I've found that folders will desynchronize if you wait long enough. Sometimes they're unique from the start, sometimes on a restart. The randomness suggests this really is a bug.

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