My brother was playing a computer game earlier, and it froze. When it did, these pixelated colored vertical bars appeared on my monitor, and they haven't disappeared since. They change color depending on the color of the background. I snapped a crappy picture with my phone, but you should get the idea. I've had this monitor since I got the computer in 2002, so I'm wondering if maybe it's just nearing the end of its life expectancy. I tried degaussing and even competely resetting the monitor but it didn't do anything.
Lately when viewing websites the display on my monitor sometimes turns green. This monitor is extremely old (not even a flat screen) but I'm using it until I have no choice since it was a free gift. Turning it off and on usually fixes it for me, but if doing so is not working for you I'd say the monitor is shot. My suggestion would be to invest in a new one.
It may be your graphics card. On one of our computers we had a similar issue, and it turned out the graphics card was shot. I especially wouldnt be suprised if this was the case since your bro was playing a computer game when it happened.
From what it looks like, I think your monitor is finally giving out. 5 years can be a good deal of time for a monitor, and sometimes they just kind of go out like that. Like Derek said, I would invest in getting a new monitor.
I'd try a different monitor first to see if it's the graphics card. Usually, when monitors do that, the entire screen turns that hue, not just parts of it, so I think it may be the gfx card
I agree with Todd, he has a very valid point. If it was a tube going in your monitor, your entire screen would turn that hue and not produce stripes. Borrow a buddy's monitor and see.
Well, I turned my computer off and let the monitor sit for a few hours, and right now it's back to normal, so I'll see if the problem even comes back. You do have a point about the graphics card though, mine's pretty out of date anyway (the only time I've ever gotten a BSOD was from a graphics card error when playing a high-res computer game).
Next time that happens, take a screenshot. If the screenshot is normal, then it's your monitor, otherwise... ...it's your graphics card taking a shit. Happened to me a while back, after playing CS Source.
Well, it's back again, here's a screenshot (big picture so I didn't do IMG tags): http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b168/bulletsforthebeautiful/misc stuff/screenshot.jpg Obviously I can't tell if the screenshot looks fucked up because my view is already fucked up to begin with.
Kinds grainy (which may be a result of saving as jpeg, instead of bmp or png), and a slight tint, but no yellow bars.
Well, assuming it's my graphics card, is there any way to potentially FIX this, or am I just gonna have to get a new one? *Edit* HAHA I'M A GENIUS! I reinstalled my graphics card drivers and it completely fixed the problem...or at least I think it did. *crosses fingers*
Well, no more than 5 minutes after I made the post saying the problem was fixed, my graphics card literally took a shit on me. It would lock up as soon as I got to the Windows log on screen. So I have a shiny new 256 MB ATI Diamond Stealth with Radeon 9250 now! Everything seems fairly normal, although there seems to be a bit of monitor lag when I'm scrolling up and down a page. I haven't restarted or anything yet though and the new card is in a PCI slot that had never been used before. And a note to self: Never let 5 years of dust build up inside your computer again.
Worse, I think I found dust bunnies on crack. Installing the drivers for this new graphics card was a pain in the ass. I tried installing the drivers, but it told me I needed .NET Framework 2.0 first. Went to install that, and it told me I needed to update my Windows Installer. So I had to do 3 things, then backtrack and redo each one.