Black screen with video card enabled

[joezethobias]

hi, newbie here. i need help on my pc. my 1 year old messed up the pc by randomly pressing on the keyboard sometimes so i don't know how things happened.

our taskbar, and programs i open do not appear on the desktop but on a "secondary monitor". i was able to prove this by making a printscreen and it shows that everything i open shows on a secondary screen to the right. (btw, i use windows 7 ultimate)

i read somewhere that if you select monitor 2 on display settings, you'll be able to see what's on monitor 2. so i did, then everything just went to a black screen upon reboot. mouse moving, but just black.

i run in safemode ok, but not in normal mode. i disable my nvidia geforce 5500 and it works in normal mode, (but screen resolution stuck at a lousy 800x600).

i can't afford a 2nd monitor right now and i don't have an adaptor to use.

PLEASE HELP.. (newbie skills...)

 

[Leeky]

1. Click start
2. In the text box type screen resolution and press enter
3. In the box that opens up,
4. Click detect display, and it should then tell you another one isnt present.
5. Click identify to identify your display number, and then check
6. Display lists the display number for your monitor that you just saw (e.g. 1 or 2).
7. Select apply, and it should sort itself out.

 

[joezethobias]

do i do this in safe mode or normal mode?
if i do it in safe mode, it only shows me one default monitor
if i try to go to normal mode, i just get the black screen that i can do nothing with.. i click on windows button and see nothing but the black screen and the mouse cursor

 

[Leeky]

Then I don't know, but I would be un-installing your graphics drivers, and then re-installing them. It sounds like a problem with your graphics driver to be honest.

 

[joezethobias]

i uninstalled and reinstalled the video card and driver. once uninstalled, i can use the desktpo like normal except for the resolution being stuck at 800x600. but once i reinstall and reboot, it goes back to the black screen..

thanks for helping leeky, at least i can narrow down my options.. for now i'll have to settle with an uninstalled video card and a low resolution until i can resolve this..

any more helpers? i'll appreciate any help

 

[Leeky]

Then it sounds to me like its a driver problem. If the GPU was U/S it wouldn't be likely to work at any resolution.

What driver version are you using?
Are you getting the latest driver from www.nvidia.com ?
Has it worked previously, but been playing up since you updated your Nvidia driver?

 

[joezethobias]

while my card is currently disabled, it shows driver version 9.6.8.5 in device mgr.
i checked on nvidia and here's the driver i got so i think it's current.. nvidia.com/object/winvista_x86_96.85_2.html

when i try to reinstall the card, windows7 just automatically finds the driver for it..

it started playing up when my kid clicked on i dunno what then poof....

 

[Leeky]

Go into the Nvidia control panel, and see if it has a menu with keyboard shortcuts. I can't comment on whether it does as I use a ATi GPU.

I'm guessing the keyboard shortcut to whatever it's done is going to be inside that software menu, so with some luck you should be able to reverse it - Maybe at the expense of trying every shortcut. lol.

 

[mailpup]

Let's work on the theory that there is something wrong with the graphics driver. Uninstall the graphics driver from Add or Remove Programs (XP) or Programs and Features (Vista and W7). If you tried to uninstall the graphics driver through the Device Manager, that only disconnects the driver and does not actually get rid of it. That's why Windows reinstalls the same corrupted driver when you restart because it's still there. Once uninstalled, install a freshly downloaded copy of the driver. See if that helps.