Don't you guys just love my little drills?
I have a system in the shop, XP Home. The volume icon shows up in the lower right hand corner of the screen. Single click, the little volume control pops up. Groovy. Double-click the icon to bring up the advanced volume control panel, and poof, the window shows up in the task bar. But look! It's not on the screen anywhere! Right click the window in the task bar and say "Move" and the cursor jumps up to the upper left hand corner of the screen, but there's nothing there. I've run several utilities and the only thing I've found that offers a hint is a little program that gives specifics of open programs. The volume control sows as the window is hidden. I can't figure out how or where that particular "setting" would be located.
So, any ideas?
By the way, so far I've:
Uninstalled the sound card and drivers and reinstalled.
Run Window Watcher (http://www.karenware.com/powertools.asp) (some nice little apps there for you geekazoids)
Run RegmonNt
Run a couple of registry repair programs (as Regmon returned some errors in association with the advanced volume control) but still nothin'.

The floor is open....

Have you ever hooked up a second monitor? Some programs remember and when you disable the second monitor it still tries to open in that space.

yup, tried that too.

How about from the control panel?
mmsys.cpl <--- try this in the run box.
Is the sndvol32.exe file in the windows system32 folder?

[This message has been edited by Jake_Dragon (edited 08-12-2006).]

That just brings up the sound properties dialog sheet. If I click on the advanced tab, I get the advance volume control panel in the task bar, but it won't appear onscreen. Same as if I double-click the sound icon in the lower right corner of the screen. Baffling, huh?
All good ideas though. Any others?

quote Originally posted by Jake_Dragon: Have you ever hooked up a second monitor? Some programs remember and when you disable the second monitor it still tries to open in that space.

How about different resolutions? Same issue.

Taijiguy, can you post a screen shot of the problem? That might help.

Not a lot to see:



You can see that the volume control shows up in the taskbar, but nothin you do will actually make it appear on the screen. This is the advanced volume control, that would have all of the various inputs listed, such as line in, mic, etc.

What if you open the mmsys.cpl
Clicn the advanced button

Just a shot in the dark but have you tried running spybot or ad-aware and maybe a virus scaN?

First, click on the volume control in the task bar to make sure it has focus (even though it won't come up on screen) - that way Windows shouldn't treat it as minimized. (or right click on it and click on "Restore")
Right click on a blank area of the task bar, then click Cascade Windows (or one of the Tile Windows options)
See if that arranges it on your desktop.

It sounds like the window has been moved off screen.

Just a little tip that might work: change your screen resolution to the highest you can, then see if you can see the window.

Chances are its in the upper left corner.

If it's not that... I'm stumped and would recommend a system restore, lol.

Thanks for all the replies guys. Tried all that stuff along the way, even tried a system repair installation, still nadda. No idea what the probelm was. The kid who owned it was buggin' the crap out of me, calling me a couple times a day, I fiannly just told him to come and get it. I *would* have loved to know what the probelm was though.

Right now I'm dealing with an lsass.exe error. Google searches comes up as it being a virus, but I've run a couple of different utilities, and nothing shows up. <shrug>

reformat, it works wonders.

Is it isass.exe or lsass.exe? isass.exe is associated with sasser and lsass.exe is a windows process.


Note: The lsass.exe file is located in the C:\Windows\System32 folder. In other cases, lsass.exe is a virus, spyware, trojan or worm!


Is your computer completely updated and what is the exact error you are getting?

[This message has been edited by muert0 (edited 08-14-2006).]

Just an idea, but what if you tried selecting a higher screen resolution? It sounds as if the previous user might have been running a higher res and the volume properties are off of your viewable screen area. This has been one thing that has bugged the hell out of me since windows inception. I once accidently dragged one of my toolbars off screen in 3DSMax and had to do a complete reinsall of the program to get it to reappear. GRRR.

Darn, I should have thought of this earlier. there is a registry editer out there, I believe it is called regseeker, and it has an option in there to reset all window properties and such, so they would open up back in the fresh from factory condition. It probably would have worked. oh well.