Vista - Need black background for vista

I'm trying to select a black background for Vista [32bit home premium](to
increase battery life when working on the laptop). Is there just a way to
select a black coloured background. I can't seem to find it as an option.
I can choose other photos, but there's no pallet with colours to choose
from. I'm thinking the darker colour will extend my battery life by perhaps
a half hour. I've got the brightness down as far as it'll go, but my
current background image is too bright.

I'd appreciate any input. Thanks.

Hello Cowtoon,

You should be able to select "Solid Colors" from the "Picture Location" drop down menu to select your black background. You can see an example of this in step 4 of this tutorial to help if needed.

Desktop Background Wallpaper

Hope this helps,
Shawn

> I'm thinking the darker colour will extend my battery life by perhaps aSurely it will make no difference. The backlight is what uses the power,
and you've already turned that down.

LCDs work by blocking the backlight to some greater or lesser degree, so a
dark background colour only means that the backlight is blocked from the
viewer. There is no resultant reduction in power consumption.

One or two of the latest LCD TVs use an array of white LEDs to provide the
backlight. These are selectively adjusted, dimming those behind the dark
parts of the picture in order to increase the perceived contrast ratio.
These will reduce their power consumption with dark pictures, but I don't
think any laptops use this sort of screen.

Of course, maybe you know better :-)

SteveT

My vaio laptop has a "power saving" background and it's solid white. My
guess is that aligning those crystals to block the backlight actually
takes more power.