Bright and washed out looking Office documents inc IE

Hi, my Office docs, inc Outlook and even the pages on IE have suddenly
appeared washed out and a lot brighter. It is making my eyes strain and the
blue wording you often see on IE pages such as on forums, is faint now, at
least the small words that are often to the side of boxes etc.

I did a system restore and that came back as successful but there was no
change to the bright pages, they are still bright and washed out.

All of the boxes for instance in Outlook at the bottom left of the screen,
are all bright and washed out, everything is.

I've not been fiddling with buttons anywhere or altered any settings. I'd
like to have it back the way it was. I do a bit of gaming with the table lamp
off and I may have hit a key combination and ended up with it due to that. I
don't know for sure.

Does anyone know a sure way to make my screen look normal again?

I'm using Vista Home Premium OS and my graphics card is NVIDIA 950GT

Thanks

"Ted" <> wrote in message
news:437FAA61-8A80-4E19-97B3-...
> Hi, my Office docs, inc Outlook and even the pages on IE have suddenly
> appeared washed out and a lot brighter. It is making my eyes strain and
> the
> blue wording you often see on IE pages such as on forums, is faint now, at
> least the small words that are often to the side of boxes etc.
>
> I did a system restore and that came back as successful but there was no
> change to the bright pages, they are still bright and washed out.
>
> All of the boxes for instance in Outlook at the bottom left of the screen,
> are all bright and washed out, everything is.
>
> I've not been fiddling with buttons anywhere or altered any settings. I'd
> like to have it back the way it was. I do a bit of gaming with the table
> lamp
> off and I may have hit a key combination and ended up with it due to that.
> I
> don't know for sure.
>
> Does anyone know a sure way to make my screen look normal again?
>
> I'm using Vista Home Premium OS and my graphics card is NVIDIA 950GT
>
> Thanks

Have you tried the latest drivers? If a driver update has no effect, your
video card may well be failing. Only way to find out is to try a different
card.

Hi Ted,

I had this problem on my laptop:

On your start up page click on Help & support; Type in "Getting the Best
Display on your Monitor", you get a drop down with a list of things to do
with displays ect. try having a look at No.1 & 3 hope this helps.
--
muffet


"Ted" wrote:

> Hi, my Office docs, inc Outlook and even the pages on IE have suddenly
> appeared washed out and a lot brighter. It is making my eyes strain and the
> blue wording you often see on IE pages such as on forums, is faint now, at
> least the small words that are often to the side of boxes etc.
>
> I did a system restore and that came back as successful but there was no
> change to the bright pages, they are still bright and washed out.
>
> All of the boxes for instance in Outlook at the bottom left of the screen,
> are all bright and washed out, everything is.
>
> I've not been fiddling with buttons anywhere or altered any settings. I'd
> like to have it back the way it was. I do a bit of gaming with the table lamp
> off and I may have hit a key combination and ended up with it due to that. I
> don't know for sure.
>
> Does anyone know a sure way to make my screen look normal again?
>
> I'm using Vista Home Premium OS and my graphics card is NVIDIA 950GT
>
> Thanks

Yes, I have tried a driver update and I'm up to date as it is. I have tried
all the obviousd things too.

It's a NVIDIA 950 GT video card but the good news is it's all still under
warranty from where I bought it so I'll call them and take it in. I may as
well it's all under cover for parts and labour. I think the card is failing
as you suggest. Many thanks

"PvdG42" wrote:

>
> "Ted" <> wrote in message
> news:437FAA61-8A80-4E19-97B3-...
> > Hi, my Office docs, inc Outlook and even the pages on IE have suddenly
> > appeared washed out and a lot brighter. It is making my eyes strain and
> > the
> > blue wording you often see on IE pages such as on forums, is faint now, at
> > least the small words that are often to the side of boxes etc.
> >
> > I did a system restore and that came back as successful but there was no
> > change to the bright pages, they are still bright and washed out.
> >
> > All of the boxes for instance in Outlook at the bottom left of the screen,
> > are all bright and washed out, everything is.
> >
> > I've not been fiddling with buttons anywhere or altered any settings. I'd
> > like to have it back the way it was. I do a bit of gaming with the table
> > lamp
> > off and I may have hit a key combination and ended up with it due to that.
> > I
> > don't know for sure.
> >
> > Does anyone know a sure way to make my screen look normal again?
> >
> > I'm using Vista Home Premium OS and my graphics card is NVIDIA 950GT
> >
> > Thanks
>
> Have you tried the latest drivers? If a driver update has no effect, your
> video card may well be failing. Only way to find out is to try a different
> card.
>
>
> .
>

Hi, thanks for your advice. I have already had a look around those little
corners but it was a vain hope. I had no luck.

Thanks again.

"Muffet" wrote:

> Ted,
>
> I should have said 1 & 6 [not 3]
> Sorry!
> --
> muffet
>
>
> "Muffet" wrote:
>
> > Hi Ted,
> >
> > I had this problem on my laptop:
> >
> > On your start up page click on Help & support; Type in "Getting the Best
> > Display on your Monitor", you get a drop down with a list of things to do
> > with displays ect. try having a look at No.1 & 3 hope this helps.
> > --
> > muffet
> >
> >
> > "Ted" wrote:
> >
> > > Hi, my Office docs, inc Outlook and even the pages on IE have suddenly
> > > appeared washed out and a lot brighter. It is making my eyes strain and the
> > > blue wording you often see on IE pages such as on forums, is faint now, at
> > > least the small words that are often to the side of boxes etc.
> > >
> > > I did a system restore and that came back as successful but there was no
> > > change to the bright pages, they are still bright and washed out.
> > >
> > > All of the boxes for instance in Outlook at the bottom left of the screen,
> > > are all bright and washed out, everything is.
> > >
> > > I've not been fiddling with buttons anywhere or altered any settings. I'd
> > > like to have it back the way it was. I do a bit of gaming with the table lamp
> > > off and I may have hit a key combination and ended up with it due to that. I
> > > don't know for sure.
> > >
> > > Does anyone know a sure way to make my screen look normal again?
> > >
> > > I'm using Vista Home Premium OS and my graphics card is NVIDIA 950GT
> > >
> > > Thanks

Many thanks Stan. My desktop and flight simulator (FSX) all look good and
work well, I can't see any colour shift at all and every thing looks fine.
But, I think your right, maybe it is washed out too but not so obvious as
with Office documents.

For example. I'm on Office 2007 and in Outlook as most other Outlook
versions, there is a block of tabs in the bottom left for Calandar, Contacts,
Tasks, Notes etc. Well, the tabs are almost white. Those are obvious tabs
that are easliy seen and when I realised the colours had become faint I had a
hunt around the PC and noticed that everything looked pale and light.

But I understand your point, it cannot be selective and my care is slowly
giving up the ghost I think. As I said to one of the other guys who
responded, my PC is still under warranty from my local shop and I know they
will take care of it. I just wanted to be sure before putting my machine in
for surgery.

Many thanks Stan, appreciate it.

Ted.

"Stan Starinski" wrote:

> What do you mean by Office and IE ONLY?
>
> That i shighly unlikely.
> Mor elikely is that ALL video is now busted on your machine., it's unlikely
> that Office & IE are selectively washed out but all other softwares are
> still OK.
> Even if it's true, and only affects Office and IE - try changing their color
> schemes AND/OR "Accesability options" which I personally always use (I set
> them to override Webpage's own colors and in Office I only use darkest/black
> color scheme).
>
> However more likely it's everything is busted now.
> First there's a faint hope that video driver could be updated and help you,
> and if it's a highend videocard like nVidia or Radeon, in addiiton to
> hardware buttons regulating brightness (mine are Fn+F7/F8), and in addition
> to any other controls, you can also go into videocard's own little
> controlpanel (e.g. mine is called nVidia controls) and lower brightness
> there, start with brightness. Only after than do contrast lowering).
>
> If nothing helps, connect to external display and see if it looks good,
> ythen obvious your internal display is failing.
> If it looks as bad as internal display - that's it, your video is busted
>
> .
>