I’ve had my Dell computer and dual Samsung monitors for 6 months without a problem, then all of a sudden the left monitor stopped working and they display properties indicates only one monitor connected.

So I uninstalled the video driver and then installed the latest driver for my nVidia 7900 GeForce GS. Then both monitors worked fine and the display properties control panel listed 2 monitors again. But after several days, the display properties reverted back to 1 display only. So I uninstalled and then reinstalled the latest driver and both monitors worked and the display panel showed the correct number of monitors until this morning. Now I’m back to only one monitor working and the display properties panel is showing only 1 connected monitor.

My OS is Windows VISTA Home Premium.

Does anyone know why this is happening and what I can do about it?
Thanks.

I've been using Vista for a few months now. When I've had problems, User Access Control (UAC) was almost always involved. And the solution almost always involved right-clicking on the program and selecting "Run program as administrator" even if my user account has admin permissions.
UAC cries wolf a lot (useless because there's no information to make a decision, just the warning itself), but sometimes it will refuse an action without telling me. This is especially true when updates are involved.
Did it revert to the old configuration after a cold boot? Did you check your driver version after the update?
On the whole, I like Vista, but I had to learn its tricky ways.

Panpan thanks so much for your response. I'm not sure what a cold boot is. My driver version is the new one. So what I did was just reinstall the driver without uninstalling and now it seems to me working fine. At least for now!

Cold Boot :grin:

A long shot, but try this patch:
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=938194

Cold Boot :grin:

Ha, Ha. I need a cold boot like that.

A long shot, but try this patch:
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=938194

Thanks Doug. I'll keep that info on file incase my left monitor stops responding again.

sheika, as a method of exlusion, attach monitor to the primary and make sure it is working first ..............baby steps

Does anyone know why this is happening and what I can do about it?
Thanks.

Well this isn't the answer you probably wanted but.... Upgrade to a mac :) OS X has been nothing but nice to me even when using several non mac monitors or accessories...it always just works.

I have previously tried windows dos,95,98, me, 2000, xp ....all of them gave me headaches and relentless problems, win2000 being the most stable.

As cassidy suggested are you getting a signal with just one monitor? Will it show two monitors in the harware properties (i'm not pos. it shows the display itself though, cant remember)

Did you unplug one of the monitors at any stage? This would upset the settings. Also, if you did, when you plug it back in again, you should switch your computer off first, then plug it in, then start up your computer.

Syd

Dell Tech Support discovered the problem. My video card was defective. My computer is still under warrenty. So Dell sent out an In-House Tech to replace it. All is working fine now.

Thanks to all of you for your suggestions.

Good to hear. Thanks for reporting back.