Black or White bars at top or bottom of screen

Question

Hi all, 

I am technician at an IT company and we are pulling out our hair over an issue with one of our clients using Google Calendar.

They are 2 users, both using different computers, both running the latest version of Windows 10 and Chrome.

The symptoms happen at different times on both machines. The symptoms can vary but are generally a form of bar on the top or bottom of the browser. They have to restart the computer for the issue to disappear. They can work around it by reducing the screen size from full screen, to something slightly smaller.

We have tried Firefox, Edge and Chrome Canary with same symptoms, updating all drivers, BIOS, re installation of the OS and still issues are occurring. We originally thought the issues were graphics related, but they seem to only be happening when in Google Calendar. Seems like an OS bug? 

We have also turns hardware acceleration off in the browsers.

I have included some screenshots as well. The black bars at the top began in Firefox on Google Calendar and have penetrated other windows that have been placed on top (Acrobat in this example). 

We are using an Intel NUC and a Laptop.

Any advise would be most appreciated.

Regards, Sam

Answer 1

Hello everyone,

You can use the shortcut CONTROL + SHIFT + WIN + B to reset the graphics adapter on affected machines. This will get rid of the white/black bars without navigating through menus. 

All the fixes I've seen (Intel graphics panel, reboot computer, change resolution, etc) just reset the graphics driver anyway. For example, when you change the resolution on a computer, the monitor(s) shuts off for a moment and then comes back up. This is because the graphics adapter reset.

I don't have a permanent fix unfortunately, but this is a quick band-aid fix that takes less than a second when you see this problem occurring. I've observed this problem over the last ~6 months and am disappointed that some of my organization's fully updated computers (Windows 10 1809 with all updates as of March 26th, 2019) still display this problem. 

Thanks.

Answer 2

Solved! After a few years of just accepting this problem, a tech guy at Best Buy found the answer. He worked on it for an hour or so and voila! In google chrome (chrome://extensions), he eliminated the extension on stock tracker program and the bar is now GONE! I had the same problem on my other computer so I made that change and it's gone! Hopefully, that or something similar will work for everyone else who has suffered with this problem. Good luck!

Answer 3

Hello everyone,

You can use the shortcut CONTROL + SHIFT + WIN + B to reset the graphics adapter on affected machines. This will get rid of the white/black bars without navigating through menus. 

Thanks JReid!  This has worked better than any work-around to date, except just never maximizing the window of several applications I use regularly.

Hey Microsoft...time to get this figured out!

Answer 4

Does anyone else have any suggestions or has experienced similar issues? 

I have experience similar issues when I work in "maximized" view - both with internet browsers (Chrome, Internet Explorer, Edge) as well as with File Explorer. Hasn't occurred with MS Office or Adobe products.  Below are screenshots of both a "maximized" and "restore down" view.  If I go to Display Settings, reset the resolution, then revert back, the issue goes away for a while, but has always returned.

Answer 5

Was getting this late last year and also assumed it was due to Adobe (as that was when I was seeing it most), however the Adobe forums seem to suggest it's a Windows issue (have also been seeing it in Chrome and other apps). The fix back then was to adjust your screen resolution down and then back again... seemed to fix it at least for awhile.

In saying that... about 7 or 8 weeks later it's returned for me, although where it was at the top of the screen earlier, now it's down the bottom. Again, modifying screen resolution then reverting to original setting has fixed it.

In case it helps anyone at MS, am using a NVIDIA Quadro P2000 with two monitors. Updating drivers last time didn't seem to make any difference.