I signed onto my XP machine last weekend and the screen was sideways, with the top on the right side. i had never seen such a thing and wondered if any malware or virus could be the cause. I called my co-worker and certified Windows expert friend. He had never heard of this but said he would make some calls. I got off the phone and onto Google and hit pay dirt. I learned that with XP, Ctrl+Alt+ an arrow key, flips the screen any way you want it. I called my friend to let him know and asked if he thought it would work on Vista or 2000.

Now this is the part that has me really confused. It didn't work on a single machine at work, including the XP machines. I checked with a few others who run XP and no luck there either. So now I would like to know how many of you can flip your screens this way??? If you can, what OS do you use? Might this be a command that only works with specific video cards and/or drivers?
Joe

Joe i did try that with the Xp computer here also it did work as you described but really IMO i will like to give you a fair warning it can get pretty hard with some veido driver but other side effects i am not sure.

that something i know now but if someone else use the computer with the veido get on " sideway " it really can get someone else spooked up

Merci , Marc

Darn if it doesn't work. Kind of neat.

Windows XP, SP2

Sound like a good prank to play on co-workers. Not that I would be involved in any pranks. Wink.

If I recall you can also make the screen backward so you would need to look at it in a mirror to see it 'normal'.

Turning the scanning coils around the neck of the CRT, or swapping the connections to the horizontal coils to get a mirror image would be fun too, especially if somebody who knew about this key combination was trying to use it to "correct" the problem on a machine which doesn't support it!

This feature is probably based on the old word processors that used a monitor that more closely matched the page you were writing on. Now days with the flat monitors you are basically 4 screws from turning it 90 degrees. The mounting bracket has 4 holes in a square pattern. If my machine was rendering 8.5x11 documents all day long I would flip it.

Probably a handy thing for a FEW people. MS decided we all needed it.

I can't get it to work on any of my 3 XPSP2-Pro computers... I can do it manually through the display properties, but not with the shortcuts.

Is this for the Chinese market?

Interesting point, Alan!.
Oddly enough I can't get my laptop to do this, not that I'm going to lose any sleep over it.

I learned today that it is a function with Intel on-board graphics. There is a box deep inside the advanced properties where you can enable Hot Keys. If they are enabled, try Ctrl + Alt + F12. Otherwise: Display, Settings, Advanced, Intel(R)...Driver, Graphics Properties, Hot Keys.
Joe

Some monitors are designed to be rotated. No tools needed! The monitor on this computer can be rotated 90 degrees clockwise. This video card doesn't seem to support rotating the image, though.

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1758827,00.asp

That's my convertable tablet PC.

Thanks for the tip. (of course I'm on the wife's Mac, but I'm sure it works on mine.) I'll have to try it tomorrow. I've been looking for a way to hot key it without pulling the pen out.

I'll bet the feature has more to do with XP Tablet addition.