Start/taskbar takes up half the screen

[josie1one]

Where I live there are a number of power surges, my UPS doesn't handle these
too well.
After several surges within 3 minutes I ended up with half the screen being
green which is "active" - ie mousing over produces "Click here to begin"
anywhere over it. I can drag it down to a small width and use "auto hide" to
reduce the annoyance. This is short-term, however. No icons available on the
taskbar. My Office toolbar has lost the shortcut icons as well (not serious,
only a further indication of the problem). Everything else works.

I hate the idea of reloading Windows and no guarantee of success. Formatting
and starting over holds even less appeal.
Does anybody have an idea as to how I can fix this please?


--
Jo on a small Greek island






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[josie1one]

Perhaps I should mention:
XP Pro, SP2, Pentium 4 CPU 3.00GHz, 1GB RAM

--
Jo

Where I live there are a number of power surges, my UPS doesn't handle
these
too well.
After several surges within 3 minutes I ended up with half the screen
being
green which is "active" - ie mousing over produces "Click here to begin"
anywhere over it. I can drag it down to a small width and use "auto hide"
to
reduce the annoyance. This is short-term, however. No icons available on
the
taskbar. My Office toolbar has lost the shortcut icons as well (not
serious,
only a further indication of the problem). Everything else works.

I hate the idea of reloading Windows and no guarantee of success.
Formatting
and starting over holds even less appeal.
Does anybody have an idea as to how I can fix this please?


--
Jo on a small Greek island






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Provider ----
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[Bob]

Restart PC.

 

[Xandros]

The problems you are seeing are not going to change by reinstalling XP as
that will have no impact on how your power company delivers power to you.

It sounds like your UPS is not handling things well at all. You may wish to
check here to see if the UPS you have is designed to meet your needs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uninterruptible_power_supply

 

[josie1one]

Restart PC.

I did, many time. I also tried System Restore, no good.

--
Jo

Restart PC.

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[josie1one]

I'm sure the UPS is not designed to meet my needs - sadly, there is very
little choice here. I realise reinstalling won't help the power problems but
I'm really hoping I can fix the PC problem I have.

--
Jo

The problems you are seeing are not going to change by reinstalling XP as
that will have no impact on how your power company delivers power to you.

It sounds like your UPS is not handling things well at all. You may wish
to check here to see if the UPS you have is designed to meet your needs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uninterruptible_power_supply

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[Xandros]

If you are having frequent power surges, or brown outs etc you could buy a
UPS. I'm certain you can get them in whichever country you live in. As for
the video display that might be related to corrupted video drivers. You
could try reinstalling those to see if it helps before you attempt a
reinstall. Another thing to try is System Restore to revert back to the
system state just prior to the problem beginning. To access System Restore
click your Start button and go to Help & Support. Under the Pick a task
section click the link to System Restore and follow the wizard to Revert
back. If System Restore works , and it doesn't always work, you will roll
back but will not lose any data, or e-mail or the like. It is a good second
or third step when you run into a problem like this. I'd try reinstalling
the video drivers first though. If all fails then go for a Repair Install
( see here http://www.webtree.ca/windowsxp/repair_xp.htm How To Run A Repair
Install ) before trying a completely new install.

If you do a Repair Install or a fresh install you will be confronted with
having to reinstall the scores of Hotfixes that Microsoft will force feed
you. An alternative is to download all the hotfixes first and save them to
disc. You can get them here http://wud.jcarle.com/ and create a homespun
slipstreamed version of XP using nLite http://www.nliteos.com/ with your
legal XP CD and the updates.

 

[josie1one]

Thanks Xandros. I had already tried reinstalling the Video drivers - no help
and I should have said. Yep, tried the Restore, no improvement.
I'll certainly have a look at your links - thanks.

--
Jo

If you are having frequent power surges, or brown outs etc you could buy a
UPS. I'm certain you can get them in whichever country you live in. As for
the video display that might be related to corrupted video drivers. You
could try reinstalling those to see if it helps before you attempt a
reinstall. Another thing to try is System Restore to revert back to the
system state just prior to the problem beginning. To access System Restore
click your Start button and go to Help & Support. Under the Pick a task
section click the link to System Restore and follow the wizard to Revert
back. If System Restore works , and it doesn't always work, you will roll
back but will not lose any data, or e-mail or the like. It is a good
second or third step when you run into a problem like this. I'd try
reinstalling the video drivers first though. If all fails then go for a
Repair Install ( see here http://www.webtree.ca/windowsxp/repair_xp.htm
How To Run A Repair Install ) before trying a completely new install.

If you do a Repair Install or a fresh install you will be confronted with
having to reinstall the scores of Hotfixes that Microsoft will force feed
you. An alternative is to download all the hotfixes first and save them to
disc. You can get them here http://wud.jcarle.com/ and create a homespun
slipstreamed version of XP using nLite http://www.nliteos.com/ with your
legal XP CD and the updates.

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[BruceM]

I think I'd try a dif monitor first tho? Not sure but I never noticed what
sort of monitor it was? Can you reset it? Deguass it?
Be ashamed to reinstall only toi find out it's just the monitor?