xp not shutting down all the way

[revron]

my xp2 does not shut down all the way. it stops most of the time with "windows is shutting down" but never completes the shutdown. i have to hole the power button until the laptop shuts off.

then, if i reboot while my laptop is still hot/warm, it reboots with a shrunk screen on the right hand side. that is, the icon is around 3 to 4 inches to the left of the regular screen border.

if i force the laptop to power off and then wait for 10 minutes and reboot, all is well.

this seems to have happened several months, hmmmm, almost a year ago, when i added a camera picture with many pixels as my background. i think at that time, i had to do a control shift and get to change the image of the display to accommodate the pixels ... but that is only a guess.

so, thanks for any comments.

ron

[glc]

Have you tried removing the background picture and using one of the standard XP backgrounds? Have you blown the dust out of it? It may be overheating.

[revron]

i decided to rebuild from factory originals and then reload my application s/w. this solved the screen size problem i've had regarding the background image. i'm using a standard background now rather than our personal digital camera shot.

this also solved the shutdown problem as windows now shuts down all the way.

what this does not solve is the reduced screen size upon a reboot when the system is warm. my system still reboots to a reduced screen size. if i wait for ten minutes and reboot, all things come up in full screen size.

i'm wondering if there is some residual memory, perhaps in rom, that maintains some system settings for awhile. perhaps there is cache that stays loaded with stuff that has some wrong values. when the system cools or perhaps gets to the state that this suspected memory or cache disappears (is erased), then on a reboot, the system gets its info elsewhere.

i'm thinking that perhaps a reloading of my rom/firmware may be needed to clean up some settings. if so, i don't know how to do this.

i know you suggested blowing out the dust but i don't know how to do that either on my toshiba m45 laptop. i am not wanting to take my system too far apart as went out of warranty in may. and, i am a tightwad and don't relish bringing my laptop into bestbuy for a service call.

your comments will be appreciated.

thanks in advance!

oh, also, i am enjoying my recovered speed since the rebuild. my laptop was taking around 20 minutes to get fully up. :-) now, it zips right along.

ron

[doubledragon5]

Down load and run ccleaner http://www.ccleaner.com/download. Plus do a disk defrag,

[revron]

regarding the reduced screen size upon a warm system reboot: the small screen size occurs right away, ie, before the windows xp logo screen. so, given such an early reduced size, i don't see how ccleaner would have any effect on the problem.

also, as i have just rebuilt my disk and reloaded all the factory and other highly used applications, i expect the registry to be ok.

please explain.

thank you in advance!

ron

[revron]

dragon: i saw your note and several others who recommended ccleaner and i tried it but it did not fix (all) my registry errors. i also noted something called dial-a-fix which was also said to fix registry errors. it worked for me.

thank you for getting me to think of cleaning the system as it also got me to look around some more for a solution.

best,

ron