[jhgreene]

Hello - I recently bought my teenager an Inspiron E1505. It is running XP Home edition. The other day, we were putting it away, and he accidentally dragged half his hand across the lower right half of the keyboard while it was still on...and something amazing happened. The horizontal width of the video shrunk, and now there are two blank stripes - one on the left and one on the right, each about 1-1/2 inches wide - as if I had decided to shrink the horizontal display. I've checked the properties dialog where you set screensavers, resolution, etc., but to no avail. I even tried examining the registry - there's a property called Full Screen, and I thought that might be it, but the value was the same as the other profiles, which were not affected. When I select this profile after being in one of the others, the desktop appears properly for a second or so, and then "snaps" to the narrower size. Rebooting doesn't work, turning off and on doesn't work. Dragging the hand across those few keys seems to have set a display property for this profile, and I cannot figure this out. Please, any help would be appreciated. Thank you. - Joe

 

[TheMatt]

Hi Joe,

I have seen this on an an Inspiron E1505 actually. Don't know how it happened, but adjusting the screen resolution from 1024 x 768 to 1280 x 800 fixed it.

 

[SafeFromSites]

sounds like you changed the screen mode, more specifically, when a screen resolution doesn't line up pixel for pixel, they strech to fit. how ever if this mode/option is turned off, it will center the image, and if it fits it pixel for pixel, and it is less than the native screen res, you will end up with what you described. I would check the BIOS first, to see if the options are there, then I would check your video card settings. and if it is a physical screen setting, odds are pretty good it will be mentioned in the manual, or you can randomly, try the FN button with every double labeled key(one of them has to work).

 

[jhgreene]

Thanks for the suggestions. I'll try these things this weekend, and will post back again if I find the solution.
-Joe

 

[jhgreene]

Well, TheMatt, looks like you were right. I'm kinda confused, though, because I thought I had tried this before and that it didn't work - must have been my imagination. Thanks for the response. Oh! And my son thanks you, too.

- Joe

 

[TheMatt]

You're welcome.

 

[laboye]

This might be the result of a "display zoom" function. In many laptops that I've used, Fn+Space Bar triggers a 3rd party adjustment of the screen, essentially lowering the resolution of the display. Does this transition show itself only in Windows or during phases such as the "Dell Screen" and starting up?