Black area on LCD Monitor

Question

I was working away on my Dell XPS which has Windows XP Pro and a 20 inch flat screen display monitor (a dell product), when suddenly the entire screen was blue (no words on it, like what appears on the infamous "BSOD") and the speakers produced a high pitched squeal.

I tried to shut down with the button on the CPU but that didn't have any effect. So I cut the power for about one minute.

I got it back up and running, but now I have this black rectangle in the upper left corner of the screen. You can't see anything there, even though on the desktop the icon for "My Computer", among other icons. I have also noticed that when I start up or shut down with the speakers on, the little start up/shut down music is jumpy and sometimes barely can be heard.

In an attempt to resolve this, I updated the drivers for both the video and audio cards, but that didn't have any affect.

Has anyone experienced this? know how to solve it? Is my monitor broken? Did I blow my video and/or audio card?

The entire system is only 6 months old.

tomintx · Answer

If you have the Dell 2000FP, the rectangle is the PIP (picture in picture) window. Simply disable that feature and it should go away. The BSOD you describe sounds simply like a crash, if you have loaded any programs or drivers recently it may be wise to use the restore function to go back to before that if it occures again. To shut down the PC manually you must press and hold the power button sometimes for as long as 10 secs. It is not a good idea to disconnect power to the PC to shut it down.

PIP setting from OSD menu:

<ADMIN NOTE: Broken link has been removed from this post by Dell>

Message Edited by tomintx on 01-07-2004 06:20 PM

Tuckermania · Answer

Thanks to your suggestions, I actually found the controls that affect the PIP (on the front of the monitor console). I when I selected the PIP feature, I found that it was set on "off". On a whim, I toggled it between the "off", "s-video" and "comp" settings and found the black area cut in half. So I'm halfway there!

It is a 2000FP actually.

I'm still stumped with a 2 inch by 2 inch black area on the screen. If you have further ideas, let me know (I thank you for your inititial response), otherwise, I will be calling Dell over the weekend.

tomintx · Answer

You could try first to perform the monitor self test (disconnect video cable from PC and power on monitor) if little square is still there then it is a monitor issue. If it is not there in self test, reconnect video cable, and if you haven't already, perform a monitor reset. If this all fails, start your PC in safe mode and see if little square is there, if not likely again it is either a settings or a video driver (kinda unlikely) issue. Good luck.

Tuckermania · Answer

Ok. so I disconnected the video cable from the PC and powered on the monitor. The little black square wasn't there! I reconnected the video cable and reset the monitor. The black square is still there. I started my computer in safe mode and it is still there! Sorry to keep asking, but any further advice?

tomintx · Answer

You have confirmed it is a monitor settings issue (PIP present in safe mode). The monitor must be defective if when you disable PIP it is still there. Your instinct to contact Dell Support directly is the right one. Good luck.

Monitors

Black area on LCD Monitor

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