Wife's desktop PC running Windows 10. Fully updated. Used for office,
Teams and browsing.

A week ago it developed a very strange behaviour that I have never seen
before:

It "lost" control of a vertical strip on the screen - approx. 20% of the
screen on the right hand side. It stays white, and Windows completely
ignores it - as if it is not part of the screen anymore: windows do not
expand or can be dragged to it etc.

When trying to drag a window into that area, the part of the window
being dragged that is over that space turns blurry.

The space “missing” seems to match that of the Action Center
(Notification window that opens when you click on the icon at the right
most on the bar at the bottom). However, when I open the Action Center
(click right most icon at the bottom) it opens, but only to the left of
that “dead space”.

Tried all the usual stuff - restarting, checked all the settings that I
could think of etc, but nothing.

When looking at the Task Manager I noticed 7 instances (???) of
Microsoft Edge there. Wife uses Chrome for browsing but is forced to use
Edge when she virtually logs into her account at work. The 7 instances
where there after a restart...

I started to kill them one by one, and after killing a few the screen
suddenly returned to normal... Very strange indeed.

Checked the Startup tab in msconfig and Edge is not there. Yet it does
seem to start automatically with the machine (not on the screen, but in
the background).

Problem is that after she uses the machine for a while (not sure exactly
what she does) the problem returns. The "fix" still works, but only
temporarily.

It is clearly software-related, but I cannot pinpoint what causes it.
She does need to have Edge installed on the machine.

Any thoughts?

JoeJoe wrote:

> Any thoughts?

faulty video hardware? presume it's using onboard graphics? try adding an
el-cheapo PCIe card?

On 15/09/2022 11:15, Andy Burns wrote:
> JoeJoe wrote:
>
>> Any thoughts?
>
> faulty video hardware?  presume it's using onboard graphics? try adding
> an el-cheapo PCIe card?

Read again...

Everything works fine when I kill all processes associated with
Microsoft Edge.

On 15/09/2022 12:34, JoeJoe wrote:
> On 15/09/2022 11:15, Andy Burns wrote:
>> JoeJoe wrote:
>>
>>> Any thoughts?
>>
>> faulty video hardware?  presume it's using onboard graphics? try
>> adding an el-cheapo PCIe card?
>
>
> Read again...
>
>
> Everything works fine when I kill all processes associated with
> Microsoft Edge.
>

Try turning off "use hardware acceleration" in Edge.

There are 100s of millions of people, possibly several billion, using
windows and Edge without any problems. I had Edge running earlier
today for a few minutes, and Task Manager shows 7 Edge processes still
running, all with 0% CPU, but using a small amount of memory. No
problems at all. So, the fact you found 7 processes running is nothing
special, although it's interesting that stopping those solved the problem.

You may have a hardware issue, but it's worth uninstalling and
reinstalling the graphics drivers, if you haven't tried that yet.

JoeJoe wrote:

> Read again...
> Everything works fine when I kill all processes associated with Microsoft Edge.

sorry, it was literally TL;DR

On 15/09/2022 14:42, Andy Burns wrote:
> JoeJoe wrote:
>
>> Read again...
>> Everything works fine when I kill all processes associated with
>> Microsoft Edge.
>
> sorry, it was literally TL;DR
>

No worries

On 15/09/2022 13:05, GB wrote:
> On 15/09/2022 12:34, JoeJoe wrote:
>> On 15/09/2022 11:15, Andy Burns wrote:
>>> JoeJoe wrote:
>>>
>>>> Any thoughts?
>>>
>>> faulty video hardware?  presume it's using onboard graphics? try
>>> adding an el-cheapo PCIe card?
>>
>>
>> Read again...
>>
>>
>> Everything works fine when I kill all processes associated with
>> Microsoft Edge.
>>
>
> Try turning off "use hardware acceleration" in Edge.
>
> There are 100s of millions of people, possibly several billion, using
> windows and Edge without any problems.   I had Edge running earlier
> today for a few minutes, and Task Manager shows 7 Edge processes still
> running, all with 0% CPU, but using a small amount of memory. No
> problems at all.  So, the fact you found 7 processes running is nothing
> special, although it's interesting that stopping those solved the problem.
>
> You may have a hardware issue, but it's worth uninstalling and
> reinstalling the graphics drivers, if you haven't tried that yet.

Thanks.

Took your advice and disabled hardware acceleration in Edge, and noticed
that it also gives the option to disable starting a process(s) at the
machine startup that will speed up starting Edge. Disabled that option
too, restarted the machine, and so far the problem is not there.

Fingers crossed.

On 15/09/2022 00:53, JoeJoe wrote:
> Wife's desktop PC running Windows 10. Fully  updated. Used for office,
> Teams and browsing.
>
>
> A week ago it developed a very strange behaviour that I have never seen
> before:
>
> It "lost" control of a vertical strip on the screen - approx. 20% of the
> screen on the right hand side. It stays white, and Windows completely
> ignores it - as if it is not part of the screen anymore: windows do not
> expand or can be dragged to it etc.
>
> When trying to drag a window into that area, the part of the window
> being dragged that is over that space turns blurry.
>
> The space “missing” seems to match that of the Action Center
> (Notification window that opens when you click on the icon at the right
> most on the bar at the bottom). However, when I open the Action Center
> (click right most icon at the bottom) it opens, but only to the left of
> that “dead space”.
>
> Tried all the usual stuff - restarting, checked all the settings that I
> could think of etc, but nothing.
>
> When looking at the Task Manager I noticed 7 instances (???) of
> Microsoft Edge there. Wife uses Chrome for browsing but is forced to use
> Edge when she virtually logs into her account at work. The 7 instances
> where there after a restart...
>
> I started to kill them one by one, and after killing a few the screen
> suddenly returned to normal...  Very strange indeed.
>
> Checked the Startup tab in msconfig and Edge is not there. Yet it does
> seem to start automatically with the machine (not on the screen, but in
> the background).
>
> Problem is that after she uses the machine for a while (not sure exactly
> what she does) the problem returns. The "fix" still works, but only
> temporarily.
>
> It is clearly software-related, but I cannot pinpoint what causes it.
> She does need to have Edge installed on the machine.
>
> Any thoughts?

Found the source of the problem (by accident)...

Windows Edge uses a side bar, exactly in the area that I had the issue
with. It also reserves it when not in use. Stupid, I know.

Anyway, to remove it (temporarily or permanently):
https://www.thewindowsclub.com/how-to-disable-edge-bar-in-windows