The cat blitzed my graphics

[Greldin]

On booting up the computer, my cat decided to jump on the desk and mash some keys in the top right of the keyboard. I know that he at least pushed the Scroll Lock key, and probably also pressed Pause/Break and Num Lock, and maybe some others. So I put him on the floor with a bit of muttering, but figured there'd be no harm done.

When I looked back at the monitor, I was horrified to see that the loading screen had a grid of small black squares all over it. When Windows loaded, the display was blitzed (as you can see in the screenshot). I figured it was just a glitch, I'd reboot and it would go away. It didn't. I shut the computer down, left it off for a minute, rebooted. Still blitzed.

I updated my graphics card driver through Windows Update, and checked all the cables were plugged in properly, but no joy.

Help!

[mshah007]

Try taking the Graphics Cards out of its slot and putting it back it in.

[Greldin]

Alright, I'll try that over the weekend and let you know how it went.

Edit: I've just done it now, and it worked!

Thanks very much - I would never have thought to do that myself.

Cheers!

[Greldin]

...and I'm back.

It only worked for the first boot-up after reinserting the graphics card. It now blitzes at every startup. I've tried reinserting the card twice more but it's having no effect.

Any suggestions?

[bookworm]

Originally Posted by Greldin

...and I'm back.

It only worked for the first boot-up after reinserting the graphics card. It now blitzes at every startup. I've tried reinserting the card twice more but it's having no effect.

Any suggestions?

Try a System File Check, in case win files damaged, go to Run > type "sfc /scannow" ( without quotes and note space after sfc ) have win cd available in case sfc needs to replace or repair missing or damaged files.

Hope this helps

[Greldin]

Thanks for the tip. I ran the program and it seemed to find a few errors but, alas, no change in the blitzed graphics department.

Thanks anyway.

[bookworm]

Originally Posted by Greldin

Thanks for the tip. I ran the program and it seemed to find a few errors but, alas, no change in the blitzed graphics department.

Thanks anyway.

Take a look at this http://www.cbttechs.com/forums/showt...top+background

Hope this helps

[Greldin]

I'm afraid not, but I've been fiddling with things and I'm now pretty certain that it's not a Windows XP problem, so I'll stop posting here now.

Thanks for the help.