New monitor, windows expand when dragging, ease of access did NOT fix!

Normal PC. Windows 7 Professional 64-bit. ATI 5770 graphics card. NOTHING ON THIS BOX HAS CHANGED TODAY. The O/S not changed, applications NOT changed, NOTHING else changed......

I have dual monitors, primary WAS a Dell 2405, secondary generic 22".

TODAY, I replaced the 2405 with a Dell U3014. That's ALL. Installed the monitor, installed the drivers.

Now, any time I have a window open and put the mouse in the top bar to drag the window, it resizes to fill the screen. I get a RED BAND around all four edges of the monitor and the window fills the screen. I don't even have to DRAG the window, just clicking the mouse will cause it to expand........................

I'VE BEEN TO THE EASE OF ACCESS CENTER...... I've UNCHECKED THE BOX. I've UNCHECKED THE BOX IN AT LEAST THREE of the Ease of Access options. I've hit apply REPEATEDLY. As soon as I go back into the option, the checkbox is RECHECKED...

I'VE BEEN INTO THE REGISTRY......... I"ve CHANGED the Setting on the desktop from "1" to "0" so the windows SHOULDN'T resize this way. As soon as I go to a window and put the mouse in to drag it, the window fills the screen. The VALUE in "WindowsArrangementActive" is STILL ZERO (0).

This ONLY happens on the new monitor. I HAVE READ the user manual and I found NOTHING that says I should get a RED border on the monitor and windows should fill the screen......

I've spent hours searching the Internet and ALL I'VE FOUND is the Ease Of Access thing. Which DOES NOT WORK since the checkbox keeps getting turned back on... I have no idea if this is what's causing the problem, but need something to MAKE IT STOP......

Is there ANYTHING ELSE that can cause the window dragging to constantly makes windows full screen? If there is, HOW DO i MAKE IT STOP. If there's NOT, how do I get rid of this <bleeping> Ease of Access garbage?

What exactly makes you think Ease Of Access is involved?

The red band makes it sound like a display adapter issue, so double check that you have the lastest Display driver, run all Important and Optional Windows Updates after enabling Automatically deliver drivers via Windows Update (Step 3) to make sure there are no drivers or patches that windows wants that might apply.

Next I would try managing the Dual Monitors with Windows 7's built in Utility from the right click Menu on the Desktop, to the exclusion of the Display adapter's own software even if that means uninstalling it to turn it off. In fact uninstalling it may give Windows Updates a clearer shot to deliver the driver Win7 wants as the first driver-complete OS.

If you can't get the built-in display manager to work correctly then try the latest full software package for the display adapter, adjusting its settings to see if it can make it work correctly. It may be one or the other of these that resolves the issue.

If none of these help we can elevate this to hardware experts who may even want to look at the memory and power needs of the GPU and PSU, and how these may have been affected by the monitor upgrade.

Thanks for the thoughts. I THINK I've tried pretty much all of them, but...

The only thing(s) that pointed me at ease of use were the results of the umpteen searches over several hours. Everything about windows filling the screen kept talking about the ease of use section. And, that I can't uncheck the "Prevent windows from being automatically arranged" checkbox (which at this point I've gotten conflicting information so I'm confused about what DOES and DOESN'T make windows snap to full screen).

I have the current drivers for the GPU (dated 9/2014). I also have tried the driver from the 3014 install disk AND downloaded the most current 3014 driver from Dell. Windows, so far, hasn't wanted to do anything.

I've BEEN "managing" the monitors with the built-in utility, just like I've been doing for the LAST SEVERAL YEARS. I've installed the latest version of the Catalyst Control Center and UNINSTALLED the Catalyst Control Center. It's not a "display manager" problem unless the display manager can cause dragging a window to snap to fill the screen.

Again, had a 2405 on the box. Unplugged it. Plugged in a new cable (with the 3014). Connected the 3014. Put on the driver(s). Tried the monitor at the recommended resolution. Got an 1/8" red band around the border of the monitor and windows snap to fill the screen. Tried the monitor at 1920x1200, the resolution of the OLD monitor. Got the same result. Went out and got the most current graphics card drivers and installed them. Got the same result. Went to Dell and got the most current 3014 driver(s) and installed them. Got the same result.

Memory has not changed. GPU has not changed. PSU has not changed. O/S has not changed in any way I'm aware of. Applications have not changed.

I'm about the put the 2405 back on here to see if the same thing happens... If I get the same result I'll figure the O/S is screwed and have to clobber things and rebuild the box. Which will *iss me off mightily.

I"ve got one response from the Dell forum that says they've NEVER heard of a monitor doing this... Neither have I. But then, I've never heard of Windows 7 doing this either! And I can't find ANYTHING in my searches where anybody ELSE has ever had Windows do it either...

OK........ Just to check I REINSTALLED THE 2405 MONITOR. It works absolutely FINE. No red border, no windows jumping to fill the screen, NO problems at all........


SO, anecdotally I'm guessing it's either a totally unheard-of graphics card problem (which seems unlikely), a monitor problem, or a cable problem. Or some other truly bizarre thing?

I've tried several resolutions. No difference. I've tried different drivers - have (hopefully) the current ones.

The only thing I have left to try is a displayport cable. The one with the monitor appears to have a mini on one end and my graphics card has a full-sized end so I'll have to see if I can find a cable somewhere.


Just to ensure this is as frustrating as possible, I called Dell support... Got a guy that was TOTALLY interested in the serial number and totally NOT interested in the problem. So, I put the phone on speaker and told him I'd have to disassemble the monitor from the stand to get it - yes, DELL in their infinite wisdom put the service tag UNDER THE MOUNT FOR THE DESK STAND so you have to disassemble the thing to get the drone a serial number..... Told the guy it would be a minute and got an "OK". While going through the dissassembly process he HUNG UP......


Called back and the automated phone system sent me to India or somewhere, where I was told I was in "extended warranty". Requested someone to help with a monitor and was transferred. This person, likewise, was only interested in the serial number, so I GAVE it to him. He was going to "CHECK"... Waited, waited, and you guessed it, DIAL TONE......


Called a THIRD time and got the extended warranty person again and had him transfer me AGAIN. This time, instead of a human I got a recorded message that the number to which I was transferred IS NOT IN SERVICE...


So far, NOT impressed with the new Dell.



Anyhow, if anybody has any ideas about the problem being in Windows rather than the monitor I'd love to hear them before this thing goes back in the box and out of here.

Did you try managing the Dual Monitors with the Windows utility alone when you had Catalyst uninstalled, from the Graphics Options which appear when you right click the Desktop. I think you might have missed this suggestion in my original reply because it was not responded to.

Are you getting Aero transparency on all Windows? If not run the Aero troubleshooter to see if it finds a problem. Then try a Basic Theme to see if the problem replicates.

Hm... I unloaded the catalyst installer and control center. So there wasn't anything to manage the graphics except the Windows one....... Still got the same problems - red band, full screen......

So, I downloaded a 3rd party thing that cleans off ALL the nVidia and ATI drivers and remnants and whatevers...... Rebooted. I don't have full resolution, but AT THE MOMENT there's no more jumping to fill the screen when dragging.......

I'll go back to ATI and get just the most recent set of drivers and see if that works. Problem may be that installing the graphics drivers also installs all the other gunk too, but I'm gonna play and see what I can do.

I'll check back once I've reinstalled a clean set of stuff...

A quiet whoo-hoo!

I got everything off, downloaded the current graphics software again and installed it. I couldn't uncheck the install manager, but I WAS able to tell it NOT to install the catalyst control center...

As near as I can tell, things are now behaving... I've never used Catalyst to control anything (all my calibrations are done using hardware calibration, which I hope won't be necessary with this monitor)...

So, for whatever reason there appears to have been a driver, remnant, catalyst, or something else on the system that was causing the bizarre behavior. Nuking everything associated with ATI and nVidia graphics stuff seems to have fixed it.......

gregrocker - thanks much for the help. Can you by any chance shed any light on WHY I got this behavior only with the 3014 and not on the 2405?

Because CCC is buggy bloatware which causes all kinds of problems which we have frequently solved by uninstalling it.

I would never have it on any install, nor have any Nvidia or other driver software starting with Windows if it's software package cannot be avoided.

I did install the Dell monitor drivers, but I didn't install the Dell Monitor Manager. I don't know if the monitor drivers are any better or different that what Windows 7 has, but with them the system knows it's a 3014 as opposed to "generic plug-and-play". And they apparently weren't causing any problems.

Getting rid of Catalyst Control Center initially didn't do anything. Once I clobbered (as near as I can tell) all the graphics drivers and reinstalling just the latest one, WITHOUT the Catalyst Control Center appears to have worked. I'm not getting the bizarre border and windows can be resized and/or dragged without incident.

I AM still getting popups in odd places, but that may just be a leftover of the previous behavior that will go away as I drag them to where I want them to be.