Problem returns

On Tue, 27 Nov 2012 15:51:49 -0800, "Gene E. Bloch"
wrote:

On Tue, 27 Nov 2012 13:20:31 -0600, Gordon wrote:

On Tue, 27 Nov 2012 11:00:09 -0800, "Gene E. Bloch"
wrote:

On Tue, 27 Nov 2012 12:44:43 -0600, Gordon wrote:

On Sun, 25 Nov 2012 12:10:22 -0600, Gordon
wrote:

My new HP Pavilion desktop computer's problem with the Notification
Area and the Time and Date box has returned. After I set all the
possible sleep and turn off monitor settings to automatic after 30
minures of inactivity, these problems didn't show up for a while. The
comptuer went through two or three phases of going into sleep and
being restored to activity and these icons were in place as the
belong.

But, this morning, after being shut off and completely powered down
over night the problem returned. By "powered down" I mean that I went
through the key sequence Windows + I to open the Settings screen then
used the Power option to turn the comuter off. After it was off and
all the lights had gone out I turned the power supply off for the
night.

This morning when I powered this computer back up the process went
normally except the icons at the right end of the Task bar were
missing, again.

Fortunately, all I have to do is press the computer's power button
momentarily then press it again to cycle through a restart process and
the task bar comes up complete with the Notification Area and the Time
and Date box where they belong.

What might I try next...other than throwing this computer in the trash
barrel and buying a different one??? Gordon

I may have stumbled onto a solution to this problem. I just noticed
that I had inadvertently connected the monitor to the computer, using
both of the supplied monitor cables. I took the white one off and have
been checking the monitor sleep related problem. So far it has come
out of sleep mode with no loss of the Notificateion Area or the Time
and Date box. All seems to be working well.

I still intend to check this out with the white cable replaced and the
blue one removed, but I should wait a while just to be sure things are
working well with only the blue cable connected.

Thanks to all who have responded. I've learned a bit from all this and
I hope the problem is now resolved. Gordon

White cable? Blue cable? I wonder if you could tell us what kind of
cables they are?

Here's a link which will help you, and will also help you to help us:

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/video-c...vi-hdmi-ports/

It should give you an idea not only of the names of the cables, but of
how they differ. It's brief, so it's not too hard to read compared to a
total encyclopedia :-)

Thanks Gene. This site did clear up my questions as to what these
cables are technically called. In my setup the white cable is a DVI
and the blue one is a VGA. I've seen these cable definitions before,
many times, but had never committed them to memory. I just thought
things would work out okay as long as the cables matched the sockets
on the computer and monitor. I guess I can't justify making this kind
of assumption, huh??? Gordon

Actually, I would've thought that having both cables installed would be
OK, but it looks like I'd be wrong :-)

When there is more than one cable connected, my monitor lets me decide
which input to use, and so does my video card, but different monitors,
different video cards, and different video driver software most likely
will behave differently. Also, maybe it matters, at least on some
systems, when both cables go to the same video card.

I prefer to use the digital interface (DVI - white cable, or HDMI when
available), but these days the cards and the monitors seem to do just as
good a job with the analog interface (VGA - blue cable). So my attitude
is probably more like superstition than anything else.

And I agree with the remarks by Robin, Paul and Bill, including Happy
Birthday, Robin!

I'm much obliged to all of you.
Paul is right about manuals. With my copy of Win 7, Microsoft said
"Insert the disk and follow the instructions on the screen". That was
essentially it. It was only in the section of my motherboard manual
that dealt briefly with OS installation that I learned that I should
load drivers at the place where it asks you what disk you want to
install it on. Win 8 was just as brief.
--
Robin Bignall
Herts, England

On Sun, 25 Nov 2012 12:10:22 -0600, Gordon
wrote:

My new HP Pavilion desktop computer's problem with the Notification
Area and the Time and Date box has returned. After I set all the
possible sleep and turn off monitor settings to automatic after 30
minures of inactivity, these problems didn't show up for a while. The
comptuer went through two or three phases of going into sleep and
being restored to activity and these icons were in place as the
belong.

But, this morning, after being shut off and completely powered down
over night the problem returned. By "powered down" I mean that I went
through the key sequence Windows + I to open the Settings screen then
used the Power option to turn the comuter off. After it was off and
all the lights had gone out I turned the power supply off for the
night.

This morning when I powered this computer back up the process went
normally except the icons at the right end of the Task bar were
missing, again.

Fortunately, all I have to do is press the computer's power button
momentarily then press it again to cycle through a restart process and
the task bar comes up complete with the Notification Area and the Time
and Date box where they belong.

What might I try next...other than throwing this computer in the trash
barrel and buying a different one??? Gordon

All is well that ends well, I suppose. My new HP Pavilion desktop
computer seems to be working very well today. I changed the monitor
cable to the white DVI cable yesterday and have left the blue VGA
cable disconnected. I set the monitor's sleep time at 10 minutes so it
would cycle through several sleep/awake cycles. Each time it came back
on with no problems at all.

So, I guess the bottom line is, "Don't hook up both monitor cables,
ever."

I've settled on the white DVI cable because it is the latest design,
but I really cannot see any difference in performance between the two.

Gordon

On Wed, 28 Nov 2012 08:20:45 -0600, Gordon wrote:

On Sun, 25 Nov 2012 12:10:22 -0600, Gordon
wrote:

My new HP Pavilion desktop computer's problem with the Notification
Area and the Time and Date box has returned. After I set all the
possible sleep and turn off monitor settings to automatic after 30
minures of inactivity, these problems didn't show up for a while. The
comptuer went through two or three phases of going into sleep and
being restored to activity and these icons were in place as the
belong.

But, this morning, after being shut off and completely powered down
over night the problem returned. By "powered down" I mean that I went
through the key sequence Windows + I to open the Settings screen then
used the Power option to turn the comuter off. After it was off and
all the lights had gone out I turned the power supply off for the
night.

This morning when I powered this computer back up the process went
normally except the icons at the right end of the Task bar were
missing, again.

Fortunately, all I have to do is press the computer's power button
momentarily then press it again to cycle through a restart process and
the task bar comes up complete with the Notification Area and the Time
and Date box where they belong.

What might I try next...other than throwing this computer in the trash
barrel and buying a different one??? Gordon

All is well that ends well, I suppose. My new HP Pavilion desktop
computer seems to be working very well today. I changed the monitor
cable to the white DVI cable yesterday and have left the blue VGA
cable disconnected. I set the monitor's sleep time at 10 minutes so it
would cycle through several sleep/awake cycles. Each time it came back
on with no problems at all.

So, I guess the bottom line is, "Don't hook up both monitor cables,
ever."

I've settled on the white DVI cable because it is the latest design,
but I really cannot see any difference in performance between the two.

Slightly apropos, whatever the competitor to Blue-Ray was before it lost
out, I couldn't tell the difference between it and ordinary DVDs because
I don't have a huge TV and my DVD player is one of those upgrading ones
that improves quality.
But if I had had a huge TV the difference would have been apparent.
Maybe you need a huge monitor to see any difference between DVI and VGA.
Just a guess.
--
Robin Bignall
Herts, England

Robin Bignall wrote:
On Wed, 28 Nov 2012 08:20:45 -0600, Gordon wrote:

On Sun, 25 Nov 2012 12:10:22 -0600, Gordon
wrote:

My new HP Pavilion desktop computer's problem with the Notification
Area and the Time and Date box has returned. After I set all the
possible sleep and turn off monitor settings to automatic after 30
minures of inactivity, these problems didn't show up for a while. The
comptuer went through two or three phases of going into sleep and
being restored to activity and these icons were in place as the
belong.

But, this morning, after being shut off and completely powered down
over night the problem returned. By "powered down" I mean that I went
through the key sequence Windows + I to open the Settings screen then
used the Power option to turn the comuter off. After it was off and
all the lights had gone out I turned the power supply off for the
night.

This morning when I powered this computer back up the process went
normally except the icons at the right end of the Task bar were
missing, again.

Fortunately, all I have to do is press the computer's power button
momentarily then press it again to cycle through a restart process and
the task bar comes up complete with the Notification Area and the Time
and Date box where they belong.

What might I try next...other than throwing this computer in the trash
barrel and buying a different one??? Gordon

All is well that ends well, I suppose. My new HP Pavilion desktop
computer seems to be working very well today. I changed the monitor
cable to the white DVI cable yesterday and have left the blue VGA
cable disconnected. I set the monitor's sleep time at 10 minutes so it
would cycle through several sleep/awake cycles. Each time it came back
on with no problems at all.

So, I guess the bottom line is, "Don't hook up both monitor cables,
ever."

I've settled on the white DVI cable because it is the latest design,
but I really cannot see any difference in performance between the two.

Slightly apropos, whatever the competitor to Blue-Ray was before it lost
out, I couldn't tell the difference between it and ordinary DVDs because
I don't have a huge TV and my DVD player is one of those upgrading ones
that improves quality.
But if I had had a huge TV the difference would have been apparent.
Maybe you need a huge monitor to see any difference between DVI and VGA.
Just a guess.

VGA eventually looks worse, because the cable and connector design
isn't "perfect". You get reflections during signal transmission on
VGA, and that can result in cabling artifacts (ghosting). And be perhaps
a little more visible, at extreme resolutions. DVI and digital transmission,
there should be no visual anomalies of that type. DVI has a different
style of anomaly. If DVI isn't working right, you see "colored snow"
or "speckles" on the screen. But otherwise, transmission is "perfect"
with DVI. As long as there's still some signal budget to work with,
and enough eye opening, DVI should give very good looking results.

As long as the yellow part, doesn't touch the dark blue part, it
should work pretty well. This is a DVI "eye diagram", complete with
standard template in dark blue, overlaid for compliance checking.
Those are data bits at 1430Mbit/sec in the example (1650Mbit/sec max).
Newer standards of HDMI, support even higher speeds (and perhaps,
shorter cabling as a result). The scope to do this, might cost
$35000 or more, while the software package might have been $1400.
It's certainly a fun toy to play with. I've used this stuff, but
for a different standard interface. The instrument does all the
hard work.

http://img.tomshardware.com/uk/2004/...i-5700-tx0.jpg

Paul