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Sudden increase in zoom/icon size/screen tint

Anonymous
2022-01-20T23:21:10+00:00

All in one go, my screen took on a greenish tint, affecting everything (all apps, desktop, etc.; e.g., in the toolbar, the Google Chrome icon has a pale blue center dot, but is surrounded by three shades of green, not red/green yellow; and the fox in the Firefox icon is green instead of orange), at the same time, all the desktop icons got huge (as did the text below them, to the extent it now overlaps itself), and all apps are greatly zoomed in.

I assume the greenish tint is not a monitor/cable/video card issue since the other changes took place at the same time; also, no Windows app/icons will show any red, but if I go to the menu for my monitor, it has red in some areas). I think my hand may have accidentally brushed the keyboard (lower left corner) right when this happened, so is it possible some accessibility related function?

Running Windows 7; have tried a restart but it did nothing to solve the problem. Tried to do a system restore; it failed because Norton 360 was running, but it did manage to delete all my system restore points, so trying again is no longer an option.

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Desktop, Start, and personalization

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  1. Anonymous
    2022-01-21T16:33:03+00:00

    Almost sure it is a monitor issue, if you have ruled out those other sources. If yours is a laptop, that requires replacing the monitor which in most cases is technically a pretty complex tax that should only be undertaken by a competent technician. I've done this before. TIP: be very careful the replacement is the right replacement. There are a large number of replacements that may be offered. There is likely a part number on the BACK of the monitor panel that you cannot see until you remove the screen.

    If you have a desktop PC, this is really, really easy. Buy a new screen. Cost is about $150. If a laptop, and your laptop has a VGA output port, try plugging in an external monitor to verify.

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  2. Anonymous
    2022-01-21T18:10:14+00:00

    Thanks for your reply! You were correct it was not settings or (machine) hardware—luckily for me, it turned out to be the VGA cable, not the monitor. I was convinced it couldn't be the cable because everything I'd read about bad cables talked about color issues only, and I had the app zoom and icon size change at the exact time the color problem occurred (but it turns out a cable can alter that too!). Brought my VGA cable home after work today and swapping that in solved it!

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  3. Anonymous
    2022-01-21T18:50:32+00:00

    I have seen instances of bent or broken VGA cable pins.

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