My xp start bar is gone

[tomster2300]

My brother tried to run an old windows game called the incredible machine the other day. It didnt run, and when it came back to the desktop the entire blue bar at the bottom was gone. When I minimize things they fly to off the screen to the right, so I thought maybe it just got dragged to the right side of the screen. So I tried putting my mouse off the screen to the right and attempted to drag it back, but no luck. So I dont know what to do. I can hit the windows key on the keyboard and nothing happens, though i can click up on the arrow keys and click enter and it chooses what's on the start menu, so I know it's still working, it's just not on the screen anymore for some reason. Anyone know what to do? I always have the weirdest problems. Lol. Thanks.

[colecifer]

First off restart if you haven't. Then try going to the ctrl alt del menu, check that explorer.exe is running(under processes) and if not go to file new task and type in explorer.exe. It is worth a shot. If explorer ever stops on my machine the taskbar goes with it.

[el_novato]

The game might have somehow adjusted the screen resolution. Right click on the Desktop>Properties>Settings Tab. Adjust the resolution. These steps are for XP. They may or may not be different for OS you are running.

e.n.

[tomster2300]

Yes, I'm running xp and I did try to change the resolution, nothing works.

[Miz]

It may be that somehow the display got changed to dual monitors. So now the rest of the desktop is on the other monitor...which doesn't exist.

To find out, go into Display Properties, Setttings tab. On mine, the ability to change monitor location is right there, on others you need to go to the Advanced button. Poke around to see where you change it from dual monitors to a single monitor.

[trulad]

Why not try "System Restore" ?
trulad

[drivn dav]

I have read the first post a few times trying to figure out what he/she is talking about. I am a newbie so if this is wrong, sorry. Have you gone into Start>Setting>Control Panel> Task and Start Menu to find if it gone turn off. I know you can do auto hide in there and make sure taskbar on top of other windows is checked

[tomster2300]

That's the weird thing. I checked the Task and Start Menu when this thing first happened, and it won't appear. Everything else in the control panel opens normally, except for this. When I click alt-tab the thing shows that it's open, but when when i tab over to it it never appears. I know my screen is set right because when I open something like IE it automatically adjusts itself to fit the screen size. I dont know whats wrong, it's all very weird with my taskbar just disappearing. I think for some reason it either got disabled or it went to the far right side of the screen. When I minimize things they fly to the right then disappear. Once I pushed my mouse off the screen to the right of where I could see (it just disappeared off the monitor) and blindly put it where I thought the start bar should be and successfully double clicked. It hit a minimized program and made it maximize onto the screen. This helps reinforce my theory that it's just been moved somewhere off the screen, but I've attempted to click where it should be and drag it but nothing works. Should I try replaying the game and seeing if it resets anything? I doubt that would work though. Hope this might shed some light upon my dilemma. Thanks.

Drvn, I'm a guy.

[glc]

Shrink your monitor display with the on screen display controls - you probably are running a different resolution that has overfilled the screen.

[tomster2300]

I tried that and it didnt work. I've fixed the problem for the meantime by creating a new administrator account which has brought back the start bar when you log on as it. I'd still like to fix the problem though. Should I just delete the original account? Thanks.

[kram 2.0]

I would say leave the old acct. The problem, I'm thinking, is a registry edition. My handy TrendMicro OfficeScan NT detected the same thing that made my blue bar disappear.

If that's not the case, clear up your startup programs (except necessities such as explorer) and try that. I would also appreciate it if you would let meknow if it works.

Hope that helps,
kram