// Internet Duct Tape

Stupid Windows Features – Monitor Display Turns Sideways or Upside Down

Posted in Microsoft Windows XP and Vista, Popular Posts, Technology by engtech on August 01, 2006

Windows XP weird screen orientationThe Ctrl-Alt-Direction key sequence is supposed to be used for changing your workspace. On my computer at work it changes the screen orientation.

Ctrl-Alt-Up – right side up

Ctrl-Alt-Right - 90 degrees

Ctrl-Alt-Down – 180 degrees

Ctrl-Alt-Left – 270 degrees
(If that doesn’t work, try Ctrl-Shift-R)

This is a feature in Windows XP Tablet PC Edition. Which makes sense. But it looks like ATI Intel copied the keystroke for the same “feature” in their video card drivers. I can’t think of a good reason why I would need an always-on keystroke for this on a desktop PC.

When creating a keystroke-mapped feature that only 1% of your customers will want to use and the other 99%[1] are going to be confused by, put in a menu option to disable it and have it disabled by default.

To fix the issue press Ctrl-Alt-Up. To permanently fix the problem go to:

Start >> Control Panel >> Display >> Settings >> Advanced

Where it is after that it dependent upon your video card.

Intel Xtreme Graphics monitor displayed on side

[1] Fictitious numbers to illustrate the point.

More Stupid Windows Features

370 comments

370 Responses

Subscribe to comments with RSS.

  1. Hugo said, on August 03, 2006 at 9:56 pm

    I found out about that feature when my 6-year-old told me “Dad, there’s something wrong with the computer!” He got carried away playing a game using the keyboard as a piano, and voilà! I freaked out a bit, then used Google with my head at a right angle to find the cure…

  2. David Lynch said, on August 04, 2006 at 2:15 am

    The software for my new LCD monitor (a LG 1981Q) does this as well. It binds Ctrl+Shift+R to “rotate the display 90 degrees to the right”.

    This really threw me off the first time I tried to force-refresh a page in Firefox.

  3. engtech said, on August 08, 2006 at 2:36 am

    It happened to me at work when I was using Ctrl-Alt to switch from VM-Ware to Windows. Someone saw me fiddling with it and told me how to fix it. It’s happened to everyone by accident.

  4. random said, on August 08, 2006 at 6:21 pm

    Someone in my office looked this up and tried it on their teams PCs at work. Theirs inverted, three did nothing then 1 shut down without saving anything. She stopped after that.

  5. Victor said, on August 09, 2006 at 1:55 am

    i almost broke my computer with a bat when the screen fliped backwords i went to do some cheat codes on 1602 A.D. and the screen fliped i thought that it was a virus thanx

  6. Pretty said, on August 09, 2006 at 8:05 pm

    I was struggling with this . My friend did a google search and he found this page and solved the issue.

  7. simon said, on August 10, 2006 at 4:07 pm

    You saved my skin well done I was worried I had a virus but when I read this page…fantastic!!! it worked what a naff feature, why don’t they do something more useful!

  8. Paul said, on August 11, 2006 at 7:34 pm

    If does not work, it could be the video driver. Go into properties for the video card, and have it update the drivers. It my case Windows identified a driver that it said was a closer match to the video card — I installed that, restarted, and the video was no longer inverted.

  9. Srinivas Tenneti said, on August 15, 2006 at 9:43 am

    This is great. My 4 yr old son accidently did this and I was wondering what to do. Thanks to this link and it helped. I have Samsung LCD monitor

  10. Amit patel said, on August 19, 2006 at 3:57 am

    Same thing here i was shocked when this happend and i called my friend to search google for this problem and got your site.
    Damn this is a horrifying option man :(

  11. stressed at work said, on August 21, 2006 at 3:16 pm

    Ok, its fun…. but how do you get it back when Ctrl-Alt-Direction key dose nothing, and the advanced tab in display is blanked out??????

    I’ve tried updating the drivers, updating windows, but nothing works….

    If this keeps up I think I’m just going to turn the monitor over.

    Anyone??

  12. Vicki said, on August 27, 2006 at 12:39 am

    My 10 year old boy was looking at a games cheat page when the display turned “ITSELF” on its head, saying that the computer had got “ITSELF” a virus.
    I was able to turn the monitor on its head then put a search in on goggle and found you.
    Many thanks, from myself and the young man who is now allowed back on the games cheat site.

  13. maggie said, on August 28, 2006 at 8:08 pm

    thanks. I got same problem and Google it, found this page.it works.

  14. jodi said, on August 29, 2006 at 1:04 pm

    thank you so much… your page layout helped the neck strain….lol…. no more computer for the toddlers

  15. Walter said, on August 29, 2006 at 5:52 pm

    Hi, Just 2 minutes ago a HR person ask me to help him to solve this problem. Fortunally I found this page fast, otherwise would be hard to solve.

    Thank

  16. Christine said, on August 29, 2006 at 11:59 pm

    This happened to me this morning when I hit ctrl+alt+p to start up paint shop pro. Paint Shop Pro did start up but not before my display turned 90 degrees counter-clockwise. I had to poke around a bit before I found that I could right-click on the desktop and there was a menu item called “Graphics Options” leading to “Rotation” with an option to turn it back to normal. This is on a Dell notebook running WinXP Home Edition, mind you. Could be different with other manufacturers or versions of XP, for all I know. I think Microsoft thinks it’s funny to do this to its users.

  17. Tom said, on August 31, 2006 at 4:33 pm

    Thanks, this note solved the problem on our family laptop.

    My wife was sitting in a recliner with the laptop on her lap. She leaned over to pickup up a piece of paper on the floor, and when she sat back up the screen had flipped. After several hours of frustration, I found your note and the problem was solved.

    Thanks again.

  18. Rochelle said, on September 04, 2006 at 8:44 pm

    Marvelous. Thanks to you and to Christine for her information. I was just about to start editing four hours of video when a program stalled.

    I thought I was invoking Windows Task Manager (ctl+alt+del), but my fingers slipped – I knew not how – and whoops! the screen had slipped counterclockwise. As I was waiting to be connected to a support company that was about to charge me an outrageous sum, I Googled the problem and found you all.

    If there were a goddess of geeks, I’d offer sacrifice at her temple. Otherwise, I’m bookmarking this site forever.

    Thanks again.

  19. engtech said, on September 04, 2006 at 9:16 pm

    Thanks for all the kind comments. I’m glad I could help this many people.

  20. Ian said, on September 09, 2006 at 4:28 am

    We had this issue tonight. Tried to use alt+ctrl+del, when the monitor went sideways. I called Dell’s tech support to try and get some help, to no avail. I was so frustrated that I had my laptop sideays on my lap and I finally searched Google. This was the first result, thankfully.

  21. Karen said, on September 13, 2006 at 5:41 pm

    This happened to a co-worker so I looked at it a bit, walked away and googled the problem on my own computer. When I was able to walk back in a few minutes later and solve the problem with a couple key strokes my co-workers were very impressed. I always mention google but they never think to do it themselves. Job security for me! Thanks for the info and for making me look intelligent.

  22. kyle said, on September 17, 2006 at 10:16 pm

    just wanted to say thanks, my mom was trying to hit ctrl alt del and hit an arrow key by accident and called me frantic, google brought me here, problem solved.

  23. Kim said, on September 20, 2006 at 1:49 pm

    Thanks for this. Felt sure I had a virus and have spent hours with my head on one side running scans and downloading virus updates. If only I had known it was so simple …

  24. techdiva said, on September 22, 2006 at 12:32 am

    HAHAHA! Funny Microsoft,How may of yall did it take to think that one up and why? I was at work reaching for something above my cubicle. Whammo the screen get cockeyed. Heres the funny part, had to call pc support, thats the chain of course in a cooperate building, all the heads together didnt figure it out. Had to email my supervisor she thought it was halarious. i GOOGLED AND HERE WE ARE RIGHT SIDE UP …. lol tech support go figure !!!!

  25. chopstks said, on September 22, 2006 at 7:45 pm

    I was at work and a colleague complained to me that her display has turned 90 degrees counter-clockwise. This was something new to me, a 20 years experience system administrator. I almost went for a monitor replacement and then I got this on google search. Thanks for sharing the info.

  26. Eddie said, on September 23, 2006 at 2:47 pm

    Nice one … my Team Leader leant on his keyboard and the screen flipped…I found this site and fixed it……he wants me to tell him how I done it …… but I’m not ….only I have the power

  27. Edna said, on September 24, 2006 at 4:50 pm

    I left my computer for a few min. to go get something. When I came back, to my surprise the fish in my screen saver was swimming from top to bottom. I got in touch with tech.support for 2 hrs. with 4 different techs. still sideways. I called my sister, she looked up google and called me back with the answer. Problem solved

  28. Michelle said, on October 05, 2006 at 8:06 am

    After an hour of trying to solve this problem on a laptop, to which NONE of the choices listed here worked for the settings. I finally found the answer CTRL – SHIFT – R ! For some reason the settings and the lack of a graphics card made this the answer! Good luck!

  29. engtech said, on October 05, 2006 at 9:13 am

    Thanks Michelle. I’ve editted the post to mention trying Ctrl-Shift-R.

  30. Tim said, on October 05, 2006 at 3:44 pm

    Good grief. Just done this while playing, except I have a dual monitor setting – and only one monitor is affected (the other using an older card). Now that’s confusing.

  31. Sue said, on October 10, 2006 at 12:34 am

    My 8-month old did it while sitting on Daddy’s lap and pounding the keyboard. I could reproduce the effect, but the only cure that worked on the laptop was to do a system restore. At the start button, I clicked on help and support, then searched for system restore. It was quick, easy and effective. The hot keys to turn the page only work once (to turn the page), but do not work again to fix it.

  32. mr.c said, on October 10, 2006 at 10:59 pm

    thank you this will help in the office for practical jokes!!!

  33. Pamela said, on October 14, 2006 at 11:28 pm

    Thank you for putting up this website! I accidentally turned my windows upside down and there was NO information about the ctrl-Alt-Up down or sideways feature mentioned anywhere. I was two seconds away from paying Microsoft to tell me what to do. How embarassing that would have been! This would be a great practical joke to play on someone (now that I know how to correct it for them! hehe)

  34. Melissa said, on October 15, 2006 at 8:12 pm

    I have four monitors set up on one PC. One of the users turned only one of his monitors sideways.We have tried all of these combinations of keys and nothing works. Is there some kind of trick to it?

  35. John said, on October 15, 2006 at 10:41 pm

    THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! for sharing – my 3 year old did it to me and I knew it had to be a feature – I was close to getting into the Intel card settings – but couldn’t figure it out – this info was great! I love the internet and knowledge sharing

  36. Sue said, on October 21, 2006 at 8:54 pm

    My son-in-law just called to say that my grandson had been on their brand new laptop (bought today!) and had flipped it 90 degrees, I’d never heard of this happening before but thanks to your wonderful advice I was able to call him back immediately. Thank you so much!

  37. caleb said, on October 23, 2006 at 11:41 am

    Hey, i just had my computer screen turned sideways and i thought i got a virus or somethin, i even did a virus scan, then i went 2 google and saw your page. Thanks, it really helped me out

  38. Diane said, on October 28, 2006 at 1:21 am

    Phew am I pleased I found out how to sort this sideways thing out. How can small children wreak havoc so quickly?

  39. Mike said, on October 30, 2006 at 7:00 pm

    Interesting info, however when I hit Ctrl plus any arrow key, the monitor rotates (i.e. down flips the screen, right makes the top of the monitor be at 3 o’clock, left makes the top of the monitor be at 9 o’clock).

    This is in a computer lab where all the computers are ghosted so they should be the same. Any suggestions how to disable this? Is this spyware of some sort perhaps?

  40. engtech said, on October 31, 2006 at 8:55 am

    Not spyware. It’s a feature of either Windows or the video card. In your case the control sequence is Control-Arrow key.

    Most IT people don’t even know it exists, so I’m not surprised they left it turned on in the Ghosted installed. Same thing happened at my work.

  41. Spencer said, on November 08, 2006 at 10:01 pm

    This happened to me on my brand new comp during a planned long day of World of Worldcraft!! but thanks to yall I was able to fix my problem

  42. Kalvin said, on November 11, 2006 at 11:34 pm

    I used this website really helped me a lot , congratulations to th person who create this website, I think it had saved to many lifes and avoid lots of headaches.

  43. MLS said, on November 12, 2006 at 1:33 am

    Unending Gratitude & Thanks Engtech, Wonderful Wizard of Computers! Your cue on monitor display orientation helped me through a throughly frightening moment. I decided I wanted to use an “em dash” in Word. I used the short-cut insertion of the special character: 3 key simple keystrokes: [control]+[alt]+ {- (minus key on the numeric keypad)]. I missed as I was looking at the screen not the keypad. Aiieeee! Instant panic and confusion. The screen blacked out for a second or so and then blinked over sideways. Thanks again!

  44. engtech said, on November 12, 2006 at 6:24 am

    Thanks guys. It’s nice to hear so this post helped so many people.

  45. mary said, on November 13, 2006 at 8:35 pm

    Thank you so much. My husband was on the computer this morning when he “claims” our kitten, Dirty Harry Potter, stepped across the keyboard and all of a suddent, the display flipped 90 degrees. I searched everywhere for an answer. Finally (after 2 hours), it occurred to me to google the problem and yours was the first site I came across. I’m so happy. I had to flip the monitor around and hold it up with a book. DHP is banned from our office.

  46. engtech said, on November 13, 2006 at 8:47 pm

    Dirty Harry Potter is the best name ever.

    You better watch out that he doesn’t try to “make your day” and turn you into a frog.

  47. Margaret said, on November 15, 2006 at 2:53 am

    I hope the genius who created this “function” reads these messages of frustration — I wasted almost two hours at work today because logging into the network I accidentally hit Ctrl Alt up arrow on a Dell kb where these two keys are only 1/2 inch apart!

    Thank god for google and sites like this where I found the fix after working for an hour with my monitor physically turned upside down so I could see my desktop!

    Our tech guy was about to buy me a new video card.

  48. mayj said, on November 18, 2006 at 7:16 pm

    Ctrl-Alt-Up works like a treat on Dell 19″ monitor, Windows XP Home. The screen display was twisted by 90 degrees by a 3-year old girl! Thanks for the information. This website is now book marked.

  49. Cathy D. said, on November 18, 2006 at 10:43 pm

    Thank you SOOOOO much!!! We didn’t know what had happened…and had just placed a service call with our network administrator…thought it was a virus…thank HEAVENS you had posted the solution!!! We are ‘right-side-up’ again…will say a special prayer for you!!!

  50. Mort Triffid said, on November 20, 2006 at 1:15 am

    Thanks so much for posting this. The combination of a mother, her laptop and a Jack Russell terrier resulted in a sideways screen.

  51. Rachel Harbord said, on November 26, 2006 at 1:18 am

    Thank you engtech – my 2 year old managed to flip the screen while playing a teletubbies game (she was aiming for the space bar)luckily a good friend googled the problem and it was solved quickly!

  52. crazycatlady said, on November 27, 2006 at 4:39 am

    I have tried all of the above answers (ctrl alt up arrow, ctrl shift
    R, and several others) and nothing has worked. Please help! We are
    running windows XP. Thanks!

  53. crazycatlady said, on November 27, 2006 at 5:01 am

    nevermind, after pushing the buttons and pushing the buttons (and a
    lot of yelling) it finally worked! Thanks!

  54. Gerald said, on November 28, 2006 at 6:05 am

    Wanna know what’s fun? If you rotate the screen on a Dell Latitude D610, it blue-screens. (At least, on mine it does.)

  55. Crazy gamers said, on November 29, 2006 at 5:42 am

    My friend and I were playing Marvel vs. Capcom when both of us button mashed the whole keyboard. The screen turned upside down, sideways, and back and forth but we, like craazy gamers, kept on playing. Unfortunately, I had to write my report and had to google your site. Thanks, now I can go back to playing video game.

  56. Jamie said, on November 29, 2006 at 8:04 am

    Thank-you so much for this information!!! I was in tears when my screen mysteriously flipped upside down! I figured it was a horrible virus. The day just couldn’t get worse. I turned my screen on its head so I could google search it and found you guys. I laughed hysterically when I found this site. Thank-you soo much!!! – Jamie

  57. casper said, on December 06, 2006 at 10:06 am

    Thank You so much for posting this. After I tried everything I googled and found this. I had hit a few buttons when I was trying to unfreeze the comp and wouldn’t you know my world turned side-ways (on the monitor that is)

    Thanks So much again.

  58. Joe F. said, on December 07, 2006 at 1:43 am

    Obviously, not a ONE of you (including the author) has ever had to connect your laptop to a data projector (you know, those things that replaced the slide projector and the overhead projector?). If you either 1) ceiling-mount or 2) wall-mount a projector, you no longer must attach it with its feet pointing towards the floor, since LAPTOPS CAN NOW ROTATE THEIR DISPLAY OUTPUTS, USING A SIMPLE KEYSTROKE.

    The “genius who created this function” did it to make the presenter’s life (someone who actually uses a laptop for what it was designed for) easier. It was also included in newer desktops for the same exact reason.

    Before going on a bender complaining about a function you don’t have a clue about, try to discover WHY that feature was included. You just might be surprised.

  59. Carson said, on December 07, 2006 at 3:28 am

    For those people who are trying the fix but say it isn’t working for them, just be sure you are using the correct arrows. Depending whether you have your NUMLOCK switched on or off (according to whether you want to use your numbers pad for arithmetic or not), those keys might or might not do the job.

    You need to use the arrow keys in the middle section of your keyboard, which always function as arrows.

    Thanks for the info, Joe. Probably would be a good idea for it to come disabled by default, anyway. That would add about half a minute, one time only.

  60. engtech said, on December 07, 2006 at 7:51 am

    For the amount of people getting hit by this, it should be either disabled by default or a harder keystroke to execute.

    It’s a useful feature in some cases, but for the majority of users it’s an annoyance that can be tucked away rather than a global keystroke.

  61. macbikegeek said, on December 07, 2006 at 9:10 pm

    Yet another thank you for this posting! My sister’s cat, Precious, managed to find the key combination while walking across the key board and my sister called in a panic trying to get the screen image righted. I suggested she turn the laptop sideways but for some reason she didn’t like that idea. Google brought me to your post. I was rewarded by a scream of joy over the phone when Ctrl-Alt-Up did its magic! Intel graphics driver is my suspected culprit here.

  62. stupid likes stupid said, on December 08, 2006 at 2:21 am

    I stumbled on the magic combination by accident at work. At first I was upset but now I actually quite like having my screen on its side. It makes editing text much easier. I think I will keep this “stupid windows feature”…

  63. Joe F. said, on December 08, 2006 at 8:20 am

    MEA CULPA

    In my initial response, I came across to everyone as rather abrasive/abusive. Now I could go on and on, attributing it to lack of sleep, or long hours getting a big project ready at work, or the upcoming holidays, etc., but that isn’t quite sufficient. Actually, that would just be a big cop-out.

    The owner of this blog expressed an opinion that he is (rightly) entitled to regarding a feature that comes standard in newer PC’s and laptops. Several others of you have also had the “joy” of experiencing this “feature,” and came here because you were either let here by a friend or your favorite search engine. As it was, this blog’s URL was posted as the solution to a listserv that I am a member of, and that is how I came here. My response, while TECHNICALLY correct, was unfortunately delivered at the end of a flamethrower. For that, I apologize, to both the owner of this blog, and those of you who were offended by it’s tone. I neglected to remember the entire point of an exchange such as this: the free flow of information. I also neglected the cardinal rule: not everyone has the same experiences as you do. I, having been exposed to features like this since my Mac II with TrueVision NuVista cards days almost 20 years ago (which, if I may be permitted to wax nostalgic for one brief moment, could produce a MIRROR image for rear-projection devices, which, like so many other technologies, have fallen by the wayside), ASSUMED that by now everyone else using a PC would be even dimly aware of. When I did, I made an ASS out of myself.

    Suffice to say, while I may not agree that the feature should be disabled by default, I will say that the owner of this blog is entitled to express his opinion that it should be disabled by default. I hope that we can both agree that the documentation surrounding this feature is positively abysmal, and could stand significant improvement, so that topics like these don’t spring up in the first place. For that, I would wholeheartedly support any effort to let the manufacturers know that they need to tell us users about all the stuff they are packing into our computers, so we don’t get nasty surprises like this one.

  64. engtech said, on December 08, 2006 at 9:24 am

    Thanks for the apology. To paraphrase Joel, “it makes complete sense until you find yourself explaining to your aunt why her screen turned upside down when the cat stepped on the keyboard.”

  65. Tomb said, on December 16, 2006 at 2:13 am

    haha, this happened to me yesturday when i was on my mom’s computer. i was like OH MY GOD! cept it was totally upside down and backwards, i was freaking out and had to search it up while looking at it upside down

  66. ITChik said, on December 16, 2006 at 4:14 am

    engtech, thanks so much for this! I was able to help a family member who had inadvertently flipped the screen while living her “Second Life”. It’s people like you (and Google) who help me to look like the genius my Mensa card says I am!

  67. Letti said, on December 18, 2006 at 7:59 am

    Hi, thanks for the article. My bro in law had this happen to him and your instructions helped him not get a crick in his neck :)

  68. Chuck said, on December 22, 2006 at 6:51 am

    Wow, this article was a big help. I was really freaked for a while there–thought I broke Dad’s new laptop.

  69. Kiko said, on December 26, 2006 at 12:24 pm

    I was seriously thinking about having to go buy another computer. I thought it caught some type of virus. Thank you so so so so so much.

  70. John W. Luckenbaugh said, on December 28, 2006 at 3:07 am

    I have a “USB” to vga adapter for duel monitors. Is there a way to rotate 2nd monitor to portrait and 1st in landscape.

    I’m running “Windows 2000″

    Thank You,
    John

  71. Deb said, on December 31, 2006 at 8:30 am

    Well my culprit was the cat walking across the keyboard. Thank goodness I found this post, try figuring out what keys a cat pressed!!

  72. Marimuthu said, on January 02, 2007 at 7:42 am

    hey the same happened to me. While i was working on my laptop my kid of 1.5yrs old, sitting on my lap, started pressing all the keys and then the monitor display rotated. Initially i could fix this problem using Fn+F7 key, but again few months later my kid sat on the keyboard and i couldnt fix it with the above operation.
    however upon google search, this site helped me turnig back the display to its normal function mode.

    thank you,
    Muthu

  73. Liz said, on January 03, 2007 at 1:11 am

    Thanks! I’m a teacher and one of the students must have found this out and thought it would be funny to freak out the teacher. The tech “expert” guy reformated the harddrive and reloaded everything last time it happened,meanwhile it took all of 30 seconds for me to find your sight and fix it. I can’t wait to tell him.

  74. Ed Blomberg said, on January 03, 2007 at 11:27 pm

    Thanks. We run three stores and one called to say his monitor was sideways. I thought virus, then monitor malfunction. I googled “windows display rotated” and this site was the top on the list. I almost disabled the hot keys, then thought this would be a simple way to “lock” the desktop. It’s really hard to do much when it’s upside down. Plus it adds job security.

    Ed

  75. ASHISH ABHYANKAR said, on January 07, 2007 at 10:35 am

    The Ctrl+Alt+Direction key to turn the screen left-right-up-down only works with intel genuine motherborad…
    - what about others??(ASUS)
    - do u have any solution for that??

  76. Vinay Jhari said, on January 08, 2007 at 10:00 pm

    Thanks to this post – my issue got solved. My daughter decided to use the keyboard as a piano in a rush to see her favorite Baby Einstein videos and rotated the screen.

  77. mohan said, on January 09, 2007 at 9:38 am

    thanks..

    my friend got same problem ..

    with the help of your site ..

    we solved it

  78. Terry said, on January 12, 2007 at 9:32 pm

    As all the others said before, thanks a bunch for this. My wife called me in a panic from her office and in 2 seconds Google brought me here. They think I’m a genius, and I let them… :)

  79. Eric said, on January 13, 2007 at 2:59 am

    Thanks for the help. Best part was my screen was oriented so I saw the sideways instructions at the top rightside up. :P

  80. Ken said, on January 13, 2007 at 3:31 am

    Your information is very useful that save my a lot of trouble. Thank you very much.

  81. belinda said, on January 13, 2007 at 5:15 am

    I discovered this when I installed ACDSee Photo Manager and I wanted to rotate a picture. The keyboard shortcut is Ctrl + Alt + right or left arrow. When I did that it turned the display sideways and then crashed with the “blue screen”. Restarted the PC and it started with the display sideways still, scary, and then crashed again. Even more scary. But I used System Restore to get it back to how it was. Then I found this site and now understand a little of what’s going on and have disabled the hotkeys and the rotation – no more crashing. Don’t know why it crashes my machine though – it’s a Dell Latitued D505 laptop. I noticed it crashed someone else’s Dell notebook too.

  82. Trafo said, on January 13, 2007 at 8:23 pm

    OMG, same s*it happened here, my boss was freakin’ out :) LOL never seen this feature before. Funny…. BTW thx 4 the article.

  83. AKHIL said, on January 14, 2007 at 11:31 am

    Thanx! i tried Cntrl+Alt+up lotta times, then i thought of finding some permamanent solution to this NONSENSE..THANX a ton for your very helful solution…
    I wish we all could work together to help people in resolving these kinda bugs…

  84. Heather said, on January 14, 2007 at 11:50 pm

    Bless your heart. This problem stumped the computer geeks in our family until their mom did a quick google search and found your solution. Thanks!

  85. engtech said, on January 15, 2007 at 12:34 am

    Ha, I love the thought of a “stop touching the computer mom, you’ll break it” kid having to acknowledge that his mom googled the answer before he did. :)

  86. wrqwr said, on January 19, 2007 at 11:17 pm

    Thank you, I was playing a game using these keys and suddenly my display went upside down and I didn’t know what was wrong.

    Wow, that’s so stupid of Intel.

  87. eze said, on January 20, 2007 at 3:06 am

    i turned my computer to 0 degrees and now its okay except there’s a black column to the left side of the monitor.
    How can i get rid of that?

  88. Amneh said, on January 21, 2007 at 12:28 pm

    my cat got on my laptop and had somehow turned the screen sideways.. I was so confused at first but i went and searched on google and found this site, THANK YOU!

  89. Ron said, on January 22, 2007 at 12:18 am

    I guess I’m the only guy who found this web site because I wanted to flip my video output 90 degree’s

  90. engtech said, on January 22, 2007 at 12:34 am

    Yeah :)

  91. Randy said, on January 22, 2007 at 2:31 am

    Hi All… Thank you for this post… and all the comments. It looks like they have helped out a lot of people. My sister called me very late at night with this problem of hers. Unfortunately, none of these solutions worked. So I kept searching. She has a regular desktop computer… and interestingly, I discovered she has a different “right click” menu for the desktop than I’m accustomed to seeing. This was the fix that worked for her…

    Right click on desktop
    Select “Graphics Options”
    Select “Graphics Properties”
    Select “Rotation” tab
    Deselect “Enable Rotation”

    Cheers from Bedford, PA.

  92. Randy said, on January 22, 2007 at 2:43 am

    Hi Again… I double checked the posts (after I posted) and I guess I overlooked Christine’s post (oops) because my sister doesn’t have a Dell notebook… and like I mentioned, I was unfamiliar with those options on a “right click” menu. But, hey… the solution was worth repeating since it’s only one post of many.

  93. vanessa said, on January 22, 2007 at 3:06 am

    Thank God! You saved my sanity and protected the computer privilges of my 7 year old who created this mess. I would like to talk to the therapist of the developer at Micrsoft who created this nasty feature.

  94. WaReZrFr33 said, on January 22, 2007 at 4:23 pm

    Physically turning the monitor while changing the view back makes everything alot more easy

  95. Archana said, on January 26, 2007 at 6:28 pm

    Thanks alot.I very well knew that its a problem with some key combination, but wasnt able to solve it.
    I wasted almost 3 hrs speaking to the customer care and they finally asked me to drop it their center which would have cause some extra cost.How silly it sounds :)
    Then finally found this on google…Thanks again

  96. John said, on January 28, 2007 at 1:39 am

    Need more help – my 2 year old rotated the screen by playing around and I got it back after checking out your comments. However now when I type some of the letters don’t come out as they should – mainly the top line – eg U comes out as 4, I as 5 etc. Did he also press something else by ‘accident’ or is it something more serious?? Please help!! (by the way it is on a laptop running Windows XP)

  97. engtech said, on January 28, 2007 at 2:11 am

    @john: Try rebooting.

    She probably set the keyboard to another setting… not sure what the key sequence is for that.

  98. John said, on January 28, 2007 at 2:29 am

    Unfortunately neither re-booting nor doing a system restore to yesterday have made any difference. Any other thoughts….

  99. engtech said, on January 28, 2007 at 3:18 am

    Here’s a list of all the Windows keyboard shortcuts… she must have hit one of them: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/301583

    Looking through the list I didn’t see anything that jumped out at me, unless this is a side effect of an accessibility setting I haven’t heard of? What *really* surprises me is that it stays active during a reboot. Most things you activate by pressing keys on the keyboard should go away with a reboot.

    Did she get into the Control Panel?

    In the Control Panel, take a look at Accessibility Options and maybe Keyboard?

    —

    Some good advice for most of the people who have come to this post (although it’s too late now)… Windowskey-L will lock your keyboard if you have a Windows password setup. Good habit for when you are away from the keyboard around kids or cats.

  100. Ruthie said, on January 28, 2007 at 8:42 pm

    Thanks so much! My daughter started banging on the keyboard and the screen flipped sideways grrr..

  101. Mushtaq said, on January 31, 2007 at 8:39 am

    Hi:

    Thank you for this article. I came across this problem today when my one year old baby was playing with my desktop keyboard. I tried to get solution from microsft site but couldn’t resolve it. this article helped me in resolving issue of moving workspace upside down.
    Thanks
    Mushtaq
    Oracle Apps Consultant
    Toronto

  102. Erik Kowal said, on January 31, 2007 at 3:18 pm

    Regarding John’s posting of 2007/01/28, Left Alt + Shift is Windows’ default combination for changing the keyboard language. If that doesn’t work (and assuming this is the root cause of his problem), the relevant key combination can be found (and changed, if desired) in Windows’ keyboard settings. This is accessible in XP via Control Panel > Regional and Language Options > Languages > Text Services and Input Languages.

    Beyond this, these posts are proof that giving pets/toddlers/children access to computers used by adults is as wise as encouraging 18-wheelers and cyclists to share the same highway.

  103. engtech said, on January 31, 2007 at 6:21 pm

    Thanks Erik.

    I don’t know why they didn’t list that one in the Windows XP Keyboard shortcuts.

    And yes, kids/pets and keyboards are a bad mix.

    That’s why you should set up a Windows password and use Windowskey-L whenever you walk away from the keyboard.

  104. Scott said, on February 03, 2007 at 7:04 pm

    You ROCK! thanks for the for the helpful info!

  105. silkyd said, on February 11, 2007 at 4:09 pm

    Thanks god you had put up this page! I too thought I had a virus. I especially like the sideways instructions what a relief. The machine is now proofed against boyfriedn doing it again. And kitten, etc.

  106. Drew said, on February 16, 2007 at 12:45 am

    This is a very useful web page. It was the first thing Google found for me when I searched for a solution.

  107. jay said, on February 21, 2007 at 9:29 am

    Dude,u made my day.My friend got this problem and we tried hard to revert to original display restarting,cheking for viruses and all…till i googled your page.thanx a ton

  108. Raf said, on February 22, 2007 at 6:47 pm

    You need to publish your page upside down, so that people that get pranked like me can more easily read about the fix!

    Thanks!

  109. m0r1arty said, on February 26, 2007 at 6:50 pm

    Thanks for the info, got an email from someone – I suggested they play with the monitor keys – no luck.

    Googled here and can now report that it works a treat.

    Cheers again

    -m0r

  110. joseph said, on March 01, 2007 at 10:22 pm

    I found out that i could fix the secondary monitor display on toshiba tablet pc which had rotated 90 degrees by going into windows /control panel /display properties/ setting option and clicking on the secondary monitor icon and making it that temporarily the primary monitor display and then the screen resolution could be changed from 768 x 1024 (portrait) to 1024 x 768 (landscape). Then I could change the external display monitor back from primary monitor to secondary monitor with the rotation problem fixed.

  111. Marcia said, on March 03, 2007 at 5:48 am

    Thanks for the tips, I am presently typing with my monitor at 90 degrees. it flips when you select 90, 180 and 270 using the ctrl+alt and the arrows. BUT it is not going back to normal when I select normal using the intel(r) Extreme Graphics option, any other suggestions???

  112. Marcia said, on March 03, 2007 at 5:49 am

    Thanks for the tips, I am presently typing with my monitor at 90 degrees. it flips when you select 90, 180 and 270 using the ctrl+alt and the arrows. BUT it is not going back to normal when I select normal using the intel(r) Extreme Graphics option, any other suggestions??? it is not going back to 0 degrees, help me please.

  113. JoelM said, on March 06, 2007 at 12:08 am

    Thanks for publishing the fix, I thought we had a virus at work. :)

  114. Ryan Lee said, on March 06, 2007 at 9:06 pm

    My co-worker needed to Ctrl-Alt-Del a process and accidentally fat-fingered the 90 degrees keystroke. I searched on google and this page came up as the first result. You saved us a day of headaches!

    Thanks!!

  115. RandomWalk said, on March 07, 2007 at 11:45 pm

    Thanks

  116. Suzy said, on March 08, 2007 at 1:11 am

    Is there a way to flip these screens sideways other then the Win XP or having a intel video card?
    I was thinking about playing a trick for April Fools at work?
    Anyone? Help? That would be great
    Thanks

  117. Niladri Mukherjee said, on March 09, 2007 at 6:52 pm

    Hi
    Accidentally pressed some keys and next thing I see is that my display has done a 90 degree rotation. Calling my tech support was no help. I was panicking on how to get this resolved on a Friday evening! Ultimately with a crick in the neck I checked on google and this was the first result.

    Thanks for your very helpful page.
    Ciao

  118. GrayArcadian said, on March 10, 2007 at 12:26 am

    It was so much fun searching for your webpage upsidedown on my laptop. My cat activates a lot of random features in search of lap time, but this one was incredibly annoying. Don’t these guys have cats, kids, or the decency to put this in the “help,” section?

    In the meantime, thank you. I have bookmarked your site and appreciate the assistance.

  119. Ryan A said, on March 11, 2007 at 4:16 am

    Thanks a lot. You saved a laptop from a 50ft freefall out the nearest window.

  120. tim said, on March 17, 2007 at 1:25 am

    Thanks!
    My friend Eric phoned me asking what to do, and to avoid him getting netache I checked out your rather easy but surprisingly not-easy-to-find solution. It worked, and the cries of “Oh-la-la! il est brillant cet anglais!” were a joy to hear. Merci beaucoup!
    Tim

  121. Sean O'Hanlon said, on March 22, 2007 at 11:52 pm

    Hi

    I got XP Media Sideways

    Unfortunately didnt Google
    Came the long way around via Microsoft

    But got there !

    Brilliant

  122. bec said, on March 24, 2007 at 11:20 am

    lol! I googled “laptop sideways,” thinking I wouldn’t find the solution, but here I am!
    cheers, I thought I had a virus!
    This happened to me after playing one of those old school character games (jazz jackrabbit… woo!)
    DEFINATELY a stupid feature, why would I need it on a lappy? So I can read it like a BOOK?

  123. Liz said, on March 27, 2007 at 7:20 am

    Thank you to the wondeful people that posted the answer to this! I was about to go mad….

  124. slogans7 said, on March 28, 2007 at 2:10 am

    Check out the shortcut keys for iTunes! To mute a song, you press – wait for it – CTRL-ALT-Down Arrow!

  125. Ashley said, on March 31, 2007 at 5:10 pm

    The keys to flip the screen upside down do not work for my computer and I wanted to fool someone on April Fools…. How do I get them to work???? HELP!

  126. John said, on April 01, 2007 at 1:26 am

    I’ve got the same problem as John has – as in U comes out as 4, I as 5 etc. It must have something to do with the ‘Fn’ key as if this is kept pressed when typing there is no problem. Any ideas?? Please??

  127. John said, on April 01, 2007 at 1:38 am

    Just found the answer to my question – the numlock function had been switched on

  128. Paul said, on April 02, 2007 at 10:53 am

    Thanks for the info. I dropped a notepad on the keypad and the orientation changed to portrait – thanks for the notes on how to change it back.
    Paul

  129. Sean said, on April 03, 2007 at 6:36 pm

    !!uoy knahT

  130. kevin said, on April 04, 2007 at 4:01 am

    thank you! thank you! I thought that I was going to go insane looking at this crazy sideways screen. If only I had thought to google the problem first, before anti-virus scans, rebooting, and hours of misery.

    kevin

  131. jeffrey vane said, on April 07, 2007 at 3:49 am

    My autistic 2 year did this and it took me a while to figure out how he did it. He’s a savant!

  132. Tri Phan said, on April 09, 2007 at 1:31 pm

    I just had friends over with their 3 toddlers and they were playing on my wife’s laptop and as kids do I guess they pressed some weird combination that resulted in the display being displayed inverted. Had to try moving the mouse cursor and typing upside down. Totally weird experience. The internet to the rescue again….

  133. Gene said, on April 12, 2007 at 6:45 am

    I had my head tossed for almost and hour tryingt o figure how to rotate my screen when my 7 year old neice accidently changed the setting. Then I thought after I woke a friend from bed at 9:30pm to ask for help. ( but he was too sleepy to help) I decided to ask “google for help. I am so releived now can go to sleep worry free. Thanks a million.

  134. Carolyn said, on April 21, 2007 at 3:23 am

    Thank you so much! My eight year old spilled apple cider on the keyboard and while we were wiping it up, the diplay flipped sideways! Ahhhh! I was afraid we’d have to tell Daddy! But a quick (sideways) google search found your page and we quickly solved the problem. You saved us!

  135. Richard E said, on April 21, 2007 at 7:38 am

    I’m glad I googled ‘rotated windows display’ on my computer after just a little bit of messing around on my wife’s laptop.
    Found this posting right away, before we ended up trying reinstalling windows etc.
    Another reason to prefer Linux…
    PS
    My desktop is in a rolltop desk and I lower it when I leave it on so the cats don’t play on the keyboard.
    Thanks for the tip!

  136. cameron said, on April 24, 2007 at 1:06 am

    Many thanks. Something wierd happened tonight, logging on to MSN started a chain of actions that couldnt be stopped, including applications being put on the desktop. Plus the screen rotated. Your fix sorted things out.
    Zone alarm AV said it had deleted the virus; but after re-istalling MSN te problem is still there. At least the screen is the right way round though……

  137. Ariana said, on April 26, 2007 at 12:57 am

    This really helped me and my neck!!!!!!!!1 thanks for being so smart!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  138. simon galbraith said, on April 26, 2007 at 1:19 pm

    Exhalent have spent over a hour with the touch pad on my laptop going sideways. Don’t let a two year old use your machine.

  139. Ian said, on April 29, 2007 at 11:38 pm

    thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou
    After three and a half hours of working with my monitor balanced on it’s side I finally thought about looking online and found you. You’re a legend. Did I say thankyou?

  140. jj said, on April 30, 2007 at 6:51 pm

    My boyfriend was besides himself!!! Thank you!

  141. Are Bloggers Being Gamed? - Fixing the Technorati Favorites Feature « //engtech said, on May 01, 2007 at 8:56 am

    [...] I have called the 57,000 people who reached my blog to find help with this Windows feature stupid cheaters for using the feature in way other than the spirit of how it was intended? [...]

  142. Cindy said, on May 02, 2007 at 6:34 pm

    During a very loud thunderstorm last night, I was typing away on my laptop when my very wimpy 100lb german shepherd came over distressed over the storm. She proceeded to press her muzzle onto my keyboard and the next thing i know, my screen is bouncing around and then stops upside down. I was freaked for a moment before I thought of searching online for the remedy. THANK YOU so much for posting this blog!!!

    I’m still baffled on how her chin hit just the “right” keystrokes!

  143. KK said, on May 03, 2007 at 2:20 am

    I just luv u for this info!
    Has been pain im my a** for weeks..

  144. Artour said, on May 03, 2007 at 1:12 pm

    Hey, thanks a lot for this, I thought I deleted some system file and was close to despair!

  145. Help: Upside down screen! - YD Dive Forums & Scuba Community said, on May 07, 2007 at 2:16 am

    [...] just had a look and I can’t see that option either. Try here for an answer. Ctrl-Alt-Up – right side up Ctrl-Alt-Right – 90 degrees Ctrl-Alt-Down – 180 [...]

  146. James Carson said, on May 09, 2007 at 3:54 am

    I actually work at Xpient Solutions fixing fast service restaurant hardware and software. I came across an issue where someones backoffice computer was turned sideways. So i did a little googleing and found out a shortcut for it. Thanks google…good times.

  147. Anonymous said, on May 11, 2007 at 2:27 am

    Thanks! This has been bugging me so much!

  148. David said, on May 17, 2007 at 7:22 am

    Thank you for being on the net for solving problems.

  149. flipped screen said, on September 28, 2007 at 10:57 am

    [...] Go to the site below, it explains how to do it Stupid Windows Features – Monitor Display Turns Sideways or Upside Down Internet Duct Tape [...]

  150. richter» Blog Archive » Keyboard Shortcuts Gone Bad said, on October 23, 2007 at 1:30 pm

    [...] doing. And in this case it wasn’t good. I thought my term was bad, but it wasn’t. The first Google result was exactly what I was looking [...]

  151. WHAT THE HELL DID i DO?? - Page 2 - kittyradio.com said, on November 30, 2007 at 1:39 am

    [...] computer doesn’t say options graphiques. this doesn’t work either: Stupid Windows Features – Monitor Display Turns Sideways or Upside Down // Internet Duct Tape __________________ the u.s. vs. john lennon @ ping [...]

  152. grant said, on January 15, 2008 at 6:02 am

    happened to me years ago,simply did a system restore to get it right again,then googled how to fix it next time,mine also involved a child under 6

  153. Kaushik said, on February 02, 2008 at 9:01 am

    Thank you very much for posting this message! You provided an easy solution to a nagging problem that could have been a lot more frustrating. You solved the problem in less than 60 secs. Kudos!

  154. Jean said, on February 02, 2008 at 2:14 pm

    Thanks for your helpful hint. On my computer, it does not work, but it worked in my son’s in Europe. I assume that hotkeys must involve some interactions between Windows and the moniror driver.
    Anyway you do a great job.
    Congratulations
    Jean

  155. Lisa said, on February 02, 2008 at 10:27 pm

    Thank you so much for posting this solution!
    My 9-year old daughter was using my new laptop when she said “something happened” and the display turned sideways! A quick google search and voila–problem solved, thank goodness!

  156. clare said, on February 05, 2008 at 8:03 am

    WOW WHAT A RELIEF.. I HAVE BEEN SAT HERE FOR OVER AN HOUR TRYING TO WORK OUT HOW TO GET MY DISPLAY THE RIGHT WAY! MY LITTLE GIRL WHO’S 2 THOUGHT SHE WOULD HAVE AGO ON MY COMPUTER AND DIDNT HAVE A CLUE WHAT SHE PRESSED.. MY NECK IS KILLING ME NOW.. THANK YOU SO SO MUCH! X

  157. Is it stupid Windows features? « 両方失敗と成功は人生の経験だ。。 said, on February 09, 2008 at 9:43 pm

    [...] Site that help me fix the problem Keyboard shortcut [...]

  158. another victim said, on February 10, 2008 at 2:14 pm

    Thank you so much. I pushed this keystroke by mistake and had no idea how to go back.
    You saved my day.

  159. Debby said, on February 12, 2008 at 2:52 pm

    I was working in Photoshop and ctrl+alt will copy a selection. I didn’t want to drag as I just wanted to bump something over a few pixels so I was going to use the direction buttons. Crap! Thanks for solving this for me! How evil is Microsoft?

  160. PLEASE HELP said, on February 14, 2008 at 9:17 pm

    Ya this is all good and fun but i got no fun my laptop wont work with it the graphics function only has flip laptop up how do i add a hotkey????

    please email me at ahidhiahimhi@gmail.com as i will not ceck back here

  161. George Marcell said, on February 20, 2008 at 8:50 am

    No matter what system or software you use there are always bugs, the designer release them too earlier mainly because of cost issues and lost revenue the longer they leave it, we are all their free testers who put up with these bugs.

  162. Amy said, on February 22, 2008 at 8:04 am

    Thank you so very much for the help! I accidentally spilled a drink on my computer and flipped it to get the liquid out, then rubbed the keys a lot. When I re-flipped it, the screen was all wonked out.

    I followed your tips and things are right as rain again! THANKS!

  163. Saq said, on February 25, 2008 at 10:04 pm

    I just got this problem on my laptop. I was thinking that it is a virus for sure. But just managed to type few words in google.

    Thank you very much.

  164. Jaime said, on February 27, 2008 at 11:12 pm

    Thank you for making me look Smart. A freind of mine had visitors over and somehow the kids manged to get the screen sideways. My freind tried fixing it and figured the problem was with the monitor. He purchased another monitor and still had the problem. Next he called several computer experts and was told that he had a virus. 5 day later he called me and I did a quick google search and found your fix. Someone in Intel must have a warped sense of humor.

  165. someone said, on February 29, 2008 at 6:43 am

    I am having a problem with this and everything i try and also the solutions on this website don’t help.

  166. Jessica Ardolino said, on March 01, 2008 at 11:26 am

    My cats big butt sat on my laptop and changed the screen. All of windows “help” option were bulll….I quickly typed in “windows xp sideways screen” and wallah it is fixed. This secured my decision to purchase a mac.

  167. CANDACE said, on March 06, 2008 at 9:38 pm

    YES! I DID IT AND ITS CONTROL + SHIFT +R = PROBLEM SOLVED! JUST DO IT AS MANY TIMES AS NEEDED TILL ITS RIGHT SIDE UP!

  168. dave Madrid said, on March 18, 2008 at 11:17 pm

    Another Helpdesk is thanking this site for a quick fix to a users problem. Thanks a million!!

  169. Nini said, on March 24, 2008 at 5:55 pm

    thank you so much!!!!!! i was using my mums computer at work and i lent over to get some papers and must of leaned on the keyboard!!!! luckily mum didnt see it and, thanks to you, i was able to fix it quickly with no problems!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  170. Dan said, on March 24, 2008 at 11:01 pm

    Thank you so much, this tip saved my family’s sanity from the roving fingers of a wayward 1 year old.

  171. Phil said, on March 25, 2008 at 5:21 am

    The cat sat on the keyboard. This is not a modern day update of the old early reader text; it’s how we came to discover this rather useless feature. Thanks for the fix.

  172. Megan said, on March 26, 2008 at 9:01 pm

    I thought that I had messed something up by playing MapleStory for 5 hours straight. >.<
    Thanks for the help. I was so close to throwing my laptop out the window.

  173. Bilco said, on March 29, 2008 at 5:44 am

    WOW April fools day here I come

  174. Daneya said, on April 01, 2008 at 12:25 pm

    Thank You SOOOOOOOO much. I’m guessing while I was asleep my cat just happened to hit the right keys to turn it sideways. lol I really appreciate the help though. thank you again.

  175. Michael J. Weed said, on April 06, 2008 at 3:11 am

    First time I turned on that terminal in months. I actually tried quite a few combos like alt up, ctrl up. Your little note (no. 1 on google) made my day.

    I’m so glad I normally use linux :)

  176. Negar said, on April 10, 2008 at 3:18 am

    THANK YOU SO MUCH

  177. Jacqueline said, on April 10, 2008 at 8:20 am

    My friend called me saying that whenever she played Maple Story, her screen turned 90 degrees clockwise when she exited the program. After much frustration, I found this web page and solved the problem. It turns out, Maple Story just happens to frequently require the use of Ctrl, Alt, and direction keys to move around and kill small snails, mushrooms, and pigs. ^^

  178. Fledgeling said, on April 10, 2008 at 2:10 pm

    I am so glad I found the solution when I googled it. Your site was the first one on the list. I was worried that I wouldn’t find the solution to something as silly as ‘Help, my windows display is upside down’. Am very thankful that I did and my laptop is ok now.

  179. daniella said, on April 11, 2008 at 8:48 am

    Engtech has exactly the right picture for what happened to me last night. My cat walked over key board and there i was with upside down screen ,also enlarged fonts and a completely mad mouse- reacted to cat?
    Thanks to a good friend who googled and found this page i can actually now write and thank you,
    daniella

  180. Marcus said, on April 13, 2008 at 5:50 am

    Thanks – I’ve been trying to work out how to do this so that I can use a widescreen LCD monitor as a vertical portrait monitor for art work. My old Radius CRT monitor swivelled and had drivers that did this automatically, for some reason they didn’t build that into the new one.

  181. Alt+Save with the Gadgetress » Blog Archive » Learn to type sideways - OCRegister.com said, on April 16, 2008 at 3:00 pm

    [...] I remembered it existed. I resorted to Google to find the cure and stumbled upon Eric T’s Internet Duct Tape, a tech blog. His post has 174 comments and quite a few are from people mention their kid did [...]

  182. darren said, on April 18, 2008 at 3:14 am

    I found your website when my mother inlaws lap top screen kept turning its self upside down,and decided to ask on ask.com what i could do and they gave me you many thanks!

  183. don said, on April 23, 2008 at 7:41 am

    Many thanks to Google and this site for the help – I was about to throw my monitor out of the window until I found the answers here.

    THANK YOU!

  184. Paul said, on April 23, 2008 at 3:51 pm

    This website should be flipped. I think most people landing on this page probly would see it right side up.

    Cheers!

  185. braga said, on April 26, 2008 at 9:51 am

    hey i dont no why but my computer dosnt have graphic options when i right click on desktop and the arrow keys dont work some one plz help

  186. tk kess said, on May 02, 2008 at 9:32 pm

    What’s even dumber than this feature is the fact that I couldn’t find the solution using Microsoft Help, I spent a few frustrating minutes plodding along until I gave up and did the right thing and found this page. thanks

  187. engtech said, on May 03, 2008 at 10:21 am

    @ tk kess:

    I don’t think I’ve ever found a solution using Microsoft Help.

  188. Lawrie Jay said, on May 04, 2008 at 3:49 am

    Thanks to your website I managed to solve the problem of hot keys and now I am a happy bunny.

    Shall recommend all my computer freaks of your website.

    Thank you once again

  189. Oh my god... said, on May 04, 2008 at 4:37 pm

    I was dealing with a virus or something like it. Then, when I was pressing ctrl-alt-delete, the display turned upside down! I guess I accidentally pressed a key… Boy I was scared. thanks a lot

  190. Jordan said, on May 08, 2008 at 3:25 pm

    Thanks for the help – I wasted 20 minutes on the Microsoft help site, googled it, and found your page with the solution in ten seconds flat.

    That’s worth kicking Bill Gates in the nuts over, frankly…

    Thanks again.

  191. buckin said, on May 10, 2008 at 2:12 pm

    yeah my kids did this and i whooped her ass with the paddle but was some windows bullshit lol

  192. Luap said, on May 12, 2008 at 5:15 pm

    My wife was sat on the john using my $2,300 work laptop, when the cat jumped onto the computer and changed the display sideways. Finding the fix on your site was fast and easy. Thanks.

  193. jd said, on May 19, 2008 at 1:15 pm

    I figured it out on Windows Vista:
    1. Go to the Desktop
    2. Right click
    3. Click on Graphics Properties
    4. Click on Display Settings tab (left of window)
    5. Change the Rotation back to 0 degrees (right of window)

    I hope this works for you if you’re on a laptop with Windows Vista like I am.
    -Joel D.

  194. Peggy FLL said, on May 19, 2008 at 9:26 pm

    My friend had the problem of the screen orientation. He called me and I used ‘Dogpile’ to find the solution and your site came up as number 2. Thanks

  195. megs said, on May 21, 2008 at 6:13 am

    Thanks goodness for this website! Have just been searching the “help” function of windows (with my neck at right angles) to no avail, I have a dell inspiron 1300 and while initially CTRL-ALT-ARROWS changed it between 90-270deg round (but not back to normal) eventually that stopped working, and rt-clicking desktop for graphics option was what finally got it back to normal :)

  196. karen said, on May 21, 2008 at 7:27 am

    Thank you! This just saved us hours of frustration..

  197. Ashley said, on May 22, 2008 at 10:52 pm

    This feature makes absolutely no sense! I almost had a heart attack when it happen to me. Just like everyone else I, or rather my boyfriend, had to “google” the problem to find out the answer. Why in the world did they add this feature. Good grief!!!

  198. engtech said, on May 26, 2008 at 9:46 am

    @ Ashley:

    As one of the previous commenters set, this feature is for when you hook up an external projector.

    No idea why it is a default setting on desktop PCs though.

  199. Eric said, on May 28, 2008 at 9:12 am

    Thank God for this site and Google. Having 50 stations to tend to did not leave me with much time to fiddle with the one which had “suddenly” flipped. (Yeah – user later admitted she ‘might have done something’ :)

    This site is definitely going to be bookmarked on my machine!

  200. HeavensAngel said, on June 03, 2008 at 8:03 am

    brillant info to correct my upside down monitor picture by pressing the ctrl/alt + the up arrow key- worked extremly well + now i am the right way up. Easily done wen u leave a 1yr old in front of the keyboard- cheers mate, ur a star in ma eyes.

  201. Andy said, on June 04, 2008 at 7:00 am

    Nice one!

    I’m a teacher and when we pack away at the end of a lesson the computers are often in strange states as kids find new and amusing ways to keep us occupied in our ‘free’ time.

    Their prank entertained us, but not nearly as much as reading the posts on this page!

    Thank you – One and All! :o)

  202. pip said, on June 10, 2008 at 9:09 pm

    Hi,

    Lucky to find this page while trying to help a colleague whose daughter ‘played’ with his PC and the screen ended up sideways. Thanks for the info on the cure !

  203. Cristina said, on June 16, 2008 at 5:03 am

    Thank you so much for posting this. I almost twisted my neck trying to find the solution in windows help and I found nothing, not even when i searched the word “shortcuts”. Thank god for google. This is a really really stupid shortcut.

  204. Manda said, on June 20, 2008 at 12:45 pm

    Thank you! I have Fat Finger Syndrome and usually hit more keys than I want. I’m so glad I Googled the problem before contacting my IT people!

  205. Tori said, on June 21, 2008 at 10:12 pm

    I was on my brothers laptop while he was out of town…and this happened i was freaking out..thanks so much for this website!

  206. Liz said, on June 25, 2008 at 11:42 pm

    18 mo. toddler was the culprit. Thank God for Google – which led me to this page.

  207. Sadie Baby said, on June 29, 2008 at 8:32 pm

    A co worker of mine always walks by my computer everyday and while I’m working he will turn my monitor off… So guess what I did, lol. I actually restared it and turned his screen upside down so when logs in tomorrow he comes in tomorrow he’ll have to figure out how to fix it… Don’t worry, I work in tech support. If he doesn’t know how to someone will show him how/ do it for him. He’s going to be sooooo mad. But how irritating is it when the shoe is on the other foot and someone now decides to do something to your computer, lol.

  208. Dan said, on July 15, 2008 at 5:55 pm

    Wow, I ran across this site by chance.

    I figured my screen was just acting up and I didn’t have the money to replace it, so for the last year or so I’ve had my screen upside-down!

    To fix it, I just flipped the monitor over which wasn’t a big deal, but now I can flip it back I suppose!

    Thanks!

  209. Dan said, on July 15, 2008 at 5:58 pm

    Okay, well I flipped it back over but now after using the screen the other way for so long it seems to be sitting too high. Also, my desk is a different color where the screen was sitting, so I just put it back upside-down.

    Good tip though! Thanks for the site.

  210. Phil said, on July 16, 2008 at 6:41 am

    Manage to “Flip Things” working with a paper file nestling on the keyboard. I didn’t have a clue how to fix it. Thanks to Google and your site though. I couldn’t have worked too long with the screen balanced upside down.
    I already have my first victim in the office identified for this little trick!!!

  211. dave said, on July 16, 2008 at 1:50 pm

    wow this website helped me

  212. Lenny said, on July 19, 2008 at 8:23 pm

    This works fantastically as an office prank too. My colleague actually spent a month with his monitor upside-down to temporarily resolve this issue. hah hah

  213. tanya bilsbury said, on July 20, 2008 at 2:38 pm

    Thank you for having this page! I have been trying to type upside down!

  214. baz said, on July 22, 2008 at 7:24 pm

    yeah an actual lifesaver! had an assignment in the next day when this happened – thank god some1 had something on the net! theres NOTHING in windows help about it not even in the hotkey overview

  215. suzanne said, on July 22, 2008 at 7:36 pm

    tried to do ctrl, alt and arrow to fix my flipped screen this did not work i have a dell inspiron B130. help. please.

  216. J. McNulty said, on July 23, 2008 at 10:09 pm

    Thanks for the additional information about this “feature.”
    I’m a middle school computer teacher and I learned about upside down screens from a mischievous 7th grader. It’s all on my website, as is a reference to this blog.

  217. Jon said, on July 24, 2008 at 5:27 pm

    I was sitting here wondering if someone had (in a flash of brilliance) decided to remove the keystroke from Eclipse (a widely used software development environment) for duplicating the current line (Ctrl Alt Up) and was completely confused as to why my screen was flashing without doing anything.

    Thanks to google for finding this page.

    Thanks to you for typing it up.

    Your percentages might’ve been made up, but I think they’re very generous. I’d figure that maybe even 0.01% of the users out there would even use — or want — this enabled by default.

  218. nemy said, on July 28, 2008 at 7:10 pm

    Wow thank you so much i dont what i would do without this help. i was leaning on my keyboard coz i was reaching out for something..next thing i knew my screen was upside down. PHEW thank You Sooo MUCCHH!!

  219. Lily said, on July 28, 2008 at 7:42 pm

    Thanks for the “Ctr-Alt-Up Arrow” quick fix instructions; it fixed the my screen orientation issue!

    I was pressing “Ctr+Arrow” to jump across words as per normal but obviously hit an additional button somewhere. Then, all of a sudden, the screen orientation kept changing when all I wanted to do was to jump words. It was driving me nuts! So thanks again.

    L.

  220. Maria said, on July 29, 2008 at 8:44 pm

    Thank you for this! My co-worker unwittingly flipped the display of someone else’s computer here at work and we were trying to figure out how to bring it back to the right orientation. Good I thought of googling it and was directed to this page.

    Many thanks!

  221. miranda said, on July 30, 2008 at 1:15 pm

    your site came up as the top hit on google for “windows display turned” or something similar. i work help desk for a health company and we get a lot of random calls. you saved my ass on this one. thanks!!

  222. Jodie said, on July 30, 2008 at 7:02 pm

    Bless you :) I was sorting through a mountain of paperwork, leaning on my keyboard by accident and must have hit the right combo to flip the screen. Which then inverted my mouse movement! I had to turn that sideways to surf and find this fab page. What a silly thing to have on a video card! :D

    Thank you!

  223. pooja said, on August 02, 2008 at 2:43 am

    i accidently typed ctrl+alt+arrow key..and lol screen turned upside down.
    googled right der wid screen downside n read this page.

    thanx

  224. Betty said, on August 03, 2008 at 1:14 pm

    I did everything you mentioned and still nothing happened.Then I decided to try it when I was going into another page! WALA! it worked thanks again as in Hawaii we say (Mahalo)Thank-u

  225. Sarah said, on August 04, 2008 at 3:44 pm

    Thanks soo much. My computer went sideways

  226. Marty Weiss said, on August 13, 2008 at 3:27 pm

    Thank you, thank you, thank you! I was on the Reuters website when the screen froze, then turned 90 degrees sideways after I pressed Ctrl-Alt-Delete! I Googled the problem, and your site came up first, with the quick solution (Ctrl-Alt-Up). Blessings in Yeshua (Jesus) from a Messianic Jew (Isaiah 53).

  227. kity said, on August 20, 2008 at 5:25 pm

    sweet..thanks. The cat flipped mine. Thanks for the directions to get it back.

  228. Samson said, on August 21, 2008 at 11:42 am

    I use this all the time now because my screen rotates love it.

  229. sensualassassin said, on August 22, 2008 at 7:11 pm

    leaned over the keyboard… screen flipped..
    at the time was S0 sure my game cheats had a virus…
    now am relieved to know that my boobs are just talented like that… glad i could read upside down and your site was first in go0gle…
    thanks

  230. wildchild915 said, on August 25, 2008 at 1:43 am

    Nice trick, However, if you are running dual monitors it is a mystery to fix both.

  231. reva said, on August 29, 2008 at 2:23 am

    Thank you.

  232. Srikanth said, on August 30, 2008 at 1:43 pm

    Thank you for giving valuble information

  233. Help said, on August 31, 2008 at 9:00 am

    [...] I’ve jst found this link…. hope it helps.. Stupid Windows Features – Monitor Display Turns Sideways or Upside Down // Internet Duct Tape [...]

  234. Carl said, on September 05, 2008 at 3:07 pm

    This stupid thing happened when my cat jumped on
    my keyboard…
    THANKS !!!!

  235. Krupa said, on September 06, 2008 at 9:46 am

    I almost freaked and tried to call friends, lo and behold no one picked up. Thanks to this site I googled the problem sideways and my notebook is restored. I am grateful…phew!!!

  236. Barbara said, on September 06, 2008 at 4:32 pm

    Thanks for the tips. The screen on my husbands Dell notebook was displaying sideways. He tried to fix it, my nephew tried to fix it, my brother-in-law tried to fix it, I tried to fix it–I did the only smart thing–I looked up the problem through the Google website, and was directed to your website. Thanks. I couldn’t have done it without you. Oh, and by the way, my problem didn’t have anything to do with a cat!

  237. Namrata Ketkar said, on September 08, 2008 at 7:17 am

    hi…i would like to thnx million to ths site for helping me out. My screen went upside down n i thought it was an computer crash and never be fixed. i Shut down my lappy twicw but thn also wasnt working …..finally i searched on google and i found ths……………finally i fixed the problem…thn k very very much……….

  238. Khaled said, on September 08, 2008 at 11:43 pm

    Oh man, was I about to break my laptop or what! I dont know how the heck my screen flipped upside down, but I sure flipped when I saw that happen.. My laptop is my life… As soon as I found your tip I used it and every thing is A OK.. thanks :)

  239. Jackie said, on September 09, 2008 at 11:38 am

    Thank goodness for ask.com – my neck was getting sore!!

  240. shamira said, on September 11, 2008 at 8:59 am

    We found this out when my adorable, computer addict 7 month old baby somehow succeeded in stricking this key combination…

    luckily we avoided a nick ache becuase our other computer was free to Google…

  241. shamira said, on September 11, 2008 at 8:59 am

    We found this out when my adorable, computer addict 7 month old baby somehow succeeded in stricking this key combination…

    luckily we avoided a neck-ache becuase our other computer was free to Google…

  242. Gwen said, on September 20, 2008 at 5:57 am

    Thank you. Thank you.. Thank You!

  243. Robin said, on September 21, 2008 at 12:47 am

    HAHA thanks a bunch, my boy friend sat on his wireless keyboard. Somehow, his butt was able to hit the keys…. Now that we found out how to “crack the code” he’s on his mom’s laptop doing it as a joke! HAHA

  244. The Vindictive Notes Admin « SvenM said, on September 24, 2008 at 7:15 am

    [...] actually made me smile. A while ago we were playing a trick with a new guy by flipping the screen of his laptop upside down. I know this is very innocent but the poor guy didn’t know what was [...]

  245. sarah said, on September 24, 2008 at 10:19 pm

    this just happened to me on my toshiba satellite. i guess i’ll be more careful when the dog starts hitting things on my keyboard!

  246. ben rutledge said, on September 27, 2008 at 10:23 am

    thanyou soooooo much I thought I had a virus, works great thanyou very much

  247. wingster said, on September 29, 2008 at 10:28 am

    Just another addition to the several years of thanks… I’m one day off a key deadline and just didn’t need to be viewing the screen sideways. AAagh. THANK YOU!

  248. rosh said, on September 30, 2008 at 12:59 pm

    How do we tilt the window display right by 90* on window 2000 professional ?

    Rosh

  249. lywixkn wfdz said, on October 02, 2008 at 10:16 am

    wnogzvmt ksidqgytj wtkfvpe ezlhwdp apzhmlxun idjcybhf hknocmft

  250. Claire said, on October 07, 2008 at 5:27 am

    I did this to some friends at work about 18months ago, my toddler just did it to my laptop – only i couldn’t remember how to fix it!!! Not so funny when the boot is on the other foot!! LOL Thanks for helping me fix it! X

  251. dan said, on October 15, 2008 at 1:08 am

    Thanks so much, perfect fix for an imperfect OS. ;)

  252. Crystal said, on October 16, 2008 at 1:47 pm

    What’s even funnier is that my husband works for Dell. When an employee of Dell does not log off, then other employees of Dell go to your computer, change your background to something funny, flip your screen upside down, and then lock the computer. You then have to log in with it up-side down or sideways BEFORE you can fix it. If you ask me, I think it’s humerous. Scared the bajesus out of me when I did it on accident on an HP laptop, but I think it’s something everyone should experience. The marvel of a PC…

  253. Jason said, on October 17, 2008 at 6:08 pm

    Thanks man, you just saved me from hours of confusion. Good thing google has you indexed.

  254. Rico said, on October 19, 2008 at 1:25 pm

    It’s useful to flip the screen sometimes.
    A few of my games mess with my screen and rotate it so its nice to be able to do a quick fix and just rotate it back.

  255. Billy said, on October 22, 2008 at 4:17 am

    I just realize some fiew days ago,each time i open my explorer the font size on any web size has become bigger than usul.Do youknow how to solve this problem.

  256. Angie said, on October 24, 2008 at 9:39 pm

    OMG you saved me from getting grounded, thanks so much!!!

  257. PT said, on October 26, 2008 at 8:40 pm

    Thank you so much!!

  258. Jay said, on October 27, 2008 at 8:41 pm

    I have been having mine sideways about every day. I know how to fix it but its backwards!

  259. daphne liu said, on November 01, 2008 at 11:19 am

    thanks for the help. my 2 year old did this to my computer and i didnt know what to do until i saw this

  260. Lara said, on November 01, 2008 at 12:00 pm

    Thank you!!!!

  261. vah baggins said, on November 17, 2008 at 3:19 pm

    Munno Punno the computer minister could not sort this problem out n thanks to this website me who knows nufin sorted it!! vah is going to call his first son bilbor baggins

  262. Help me PLEASE. upside down writing - Gnutella Forums said, on November 22, 2008 at 7:55 pm

    [...] no good try this link (all my windows are upside down) Here is another link that might help you (monitor display turns sideways or upside down) __________________ Limewire links: (If LW will not connect) (connection problems) (system [...]

  263. Andy said, on December 03, 2008 at 11:22 am

    thank you very much
    cheers
    Andy

  264. Angela said, on December 03, 2008 at 12:42 pm

    Thank you! This just happened to a lady I worked with. Everyone tried to help her including our tech desk for our company. NO ONE could figure it out. I thought to Google it…and this page came up. Thank you for fixing this little bit of chaos.

  265. comptech said, on December 09, 2008 at 2:57 am

    Thanks for the support engine of google site…

  266. Katie said, on December 10, 2008 at 6:24 am

    Thanks so much! Ctrl-Alt-Direction key, as suggested on other sites, did not work at all, but Ctrl-Shift-R worked a treat! Panic over.

  267. creepy guy said, on December 10, 2008 at 5:29 pm

    my computer isn’t doing a thing no matter what I try. Is it on XP

  268. creepy guy said, on December 10, 2008 at 5:30 pm

    ?

  269. A Concerned Citizen said, on December 11, 2008 at 11:37 am

    Just turn your monitor on its side. Duh.

  270. adam said, on December 15, 2008 at 6:53 pm

    i can now make my techers nuts (well those that i havnt already) ;-)

  271. Tara said, on December 18, 2008 at 5:37 pm

    OMG! This screwed me up bad! Was holding my baby with one hand and typing with the other and suddenly my screen flipped! Thank God I can read sideways, and Ask.com brought me here!

  272. Dani said, on December 19, 2008 at 12:35 pm

    Wow,I totally freaked out when I saw it.It was completely turned around!My little brother had been hitting the keys and must have hit that series of buttons that caused it.When I fixed it,I turned and yelled to my sleeping dad 6 feet away,”I FIXED IT!I DID!”.It was so funny whan I saw his face!

    Thanks!

  273. Nate said, on December 19, 2008 at 4:15 pm

    This function is for new monitors that can be rotated and/or mounted upside down. If you work with spreadsheets all day long, you can look at more lines at once if you rotate 90 or 270 degrees. This function was intended to be a convenience and not a nuisance.

    It’s nice for viewing larger hi-res images too. You can see more of the image at one time. Not that I would know, but it’s good for viewing adult sites.

  274. Nay said, on December 20, 2008 at 4:44 pm

    Thanks for this post. I just had to walk my friend’s brother through correcting this. Thank goodness for search engines. He said he slept on his keyboard and woke up to find the screen sideways. I figured he triggered a hot key, but walking him through accessing the display properties was frustrating. I do enough of this at my job during the week. Give me break.

  275. Steve said, on December 21, 2008 at 12:03 pm

    My cat sat on the keyboard (which she does if the fire is not on and she wants warmth) and when I looked at the screen, it was upside down. My wife found this histerical. Thanks for writing this web page!

  276. Linda said, on December 21, 2008 at 9:04 pm

    Thank you so much for having this web page

  277. Anonymous said, on December 28, 2008 at 12:11 am

    i was playing maplestory and the screen was wrong and i was about to tell me dad and get in big trouble.then my brother got to this website and fixed the screen

  278. Wairimu said, on January 01, 2009 at 10:37 am

    Thanks for this page, my sreen was upside down after Kids played games on it, but after following your instructions here, my problem is solved. Keep up the good work.

  279. godzillajones said, on January 03, 2009 at 4:34 am

    ty very much my gfs comp did this while she was playing a game i appreciate the info being sideways to as it was a pain in the ass to deal with like this thanks again

  280. Declan ONeill said, on January 08, 2009 at 11:04 pm

    Thank you so much for this link, and for having the solution image facing the correct direction.

  281. Kosh said, on January 09, 2009 at 1:02 am

    My cat found this feature when she walked over the keyboard. After the shock I just tilted the external display of my laptop sideways because that’s actually more suitable orientation for viewing documents! :)

  282. Christian said, on January 10, 2009 at 8:00 pm

    lol. Thanks.

  283. Lara said, on January 12, 2009 at 5:36 pm

    This feature is usefull for offices that mount the thinner monitors on the side of the wall of under a desk, which broadens your market up from 1%…

  284. Areev said, on January 13, 2009 at 1:03 am

    Hi Guys,

    my issue is

    1 : Customer reported that when he close the laptop screen and work on external display it turn to 180 direction
    2 : When I open the laptop screen again the screen come back to normal.

    User using external monitor attach to laptop.When he connect it and closed his laptop lid, the external monitor will turn 180 degree.
    But when he open laptop lid, external monitor will turn to normal

    Kindly assist

  285. Rosanna said, on January 17, 2009 at 2:51 pm

    hahha i found out this annoying problem when my fat cat climbed all over my keyboard and then the screen suddenly flipped upside down :S
    so thankyou for this website it helped me solve the problem :) xx

  286. Win32 API call to rotate the Windows Desktop? | keyongtech said, on January 18, 2009 at 12:18 pm

    [...] before, but maybe some one here tried to rotate the screen before by signaling the drivers,… http://internetducttape.com/2006/08/…r-upside-down/ Mostly there can be hotkeys configured for this on the graphics applet for the graphics adapter [...]

  287. Anna said, on January 21, 2009 at 4:24 pm

    Thank you so much. My 3 year old turned my screen sideways and your information saved the day!!!!

  288. samar said, on January 23, 2009 at 7:56 pm

    hi i tried all of these thing but my display icon are still upside down what shall i do even the alt ctrl doesnt work.help

  289. nick said, on January 23, 2009 at 8:50 pm

    this just made my life SO much better. i was ready to throw this thing out the window!

  290. Hero said, on January 23, 2009 at 10:01 pm

    I came to this site trying to find out a solution for this problem. But it wasn’t my problem, was a problem of a girl I know.

    Thanks for the right answer. I am now a hero. Good site.

  291. Maria said, on January 24, 2009 at 6:52 pm

    Thank you! And I especially appreciate the window turned sideways so I could read the instructions for how to fix it… :)

  292. Yolanda said, on January 29, 2009 at 11:27 pm

    thanx very much i accidently flipped my aunts computer upside down n thought i had fucked up their computer. My cousin n i were flippin out but cracking up at the same time. Luckily i was ablt to fix it b4 anyone told me anything.This is a great site.

  293. Arush said, on January 31, 2009 at 2:34 am

    I found that feature when i was 8 months old. thn I made my father search in google to fix this isssue…It was quite a fun…

  294. Deborah said, on February 01, 2009 at 1:29 pm

    My friends six year old flipped my daughters screen sideways. I didn’t know what was going on! Thanks for the info.

  295. Jose Maria said, on February 02, 2009 at 9:38 am

    Thank you very much! Im at work right now and somehow I managed to flip the screen by leaning on the keyboard.

    I had to laugh when saw your instructons placed verticaly since thats the way I saw them!!!

    Ive seen so many comments, wow, Im not alone!

    And yes, STUPID WINDOWS FEATURE!

  296. Imran said, on February 04, 2009 at 1:00 pm

    My friend had this problem! Thanks for this link it worked for us!

    One more thing My friend locked computer and we were really nervious and we were trying keys when computer was locked!

    But then he unlocked computer, it worked!

    Remember! Before try unlock your computer

  297. connor said, on February 04, 2009 at 1:39 pm

    thanks m8 easy and clear

  298. Ola hassan said, on February 06, 2009 at 11:59 am

    After several hours of reserach and trials. I checked google and I came across this page, and I was able to resolve in a matter of minutes.
    It certainly very helpful. Thank You
    Why did I not try google first !!!

  299. Angel said, on February 06, 2009 at 7:22 pm

    my cat laid on my wife laptop while on the bed ( dont ask why i dont now she just like lay in odd spots???), i kicked her off and went to sleep. i awoke to SIDE WAYS SCREEN! i spent 2min looking at settings, i google it found the page and fixed it thanks….lol damn cat!

  300. Mew said, on February 07, 2009 at 6:39 pm

    At work the school got New Dell Pc’s the kids found it but some told us how they did the upside down change so we went in and turned it off no more problems. The kids would use this as a trick to stop the next school exam taking place in the room.

    School Tech :)

  301. me said, on February 09, 2009 at 12:09 am

    knocked the keyboard, and pressed a variety of keys, screen then flipped, googled this page with head tilted….thanks work nows

  302. Lisa said, on February 17, 2009 at 6:02 pm

    Whoever posted this page – YOU ARE MY HERO. I was getting seasick.

  303. Tuan Nguyen said, on February 18, 2009 at 5:19 am

    that’s stupid thinking, correct !

  304. Tuan Nguyen said, on February 18, 2009 at 5:19 am

    I am sick with features

  305. Lakshmi said, on February 18, 2009 at 9:22 am

    I was struggling with this tilted display for more than 2 hours now, somehow the normal position did not get restored, so finally decided to google, found this site, changed my settings, added a new function key and it is work…

    Thanks a ton!! :-)

  306. dontbm said, on February 18, 2009 at 11:44 pm

    What a great site. Saved me many hours of frustration. Duct tape is boss.
    Thanks so much.

  307. NarutoFan said, on February 19, 2009 at 11:54 am

    Thanks alot, It happend to a computer at school but i duno how they fixed it.
    I held my monitor upside down with my hand the found this page with my left. Thanks again =]

  308. pop26 said, on February 19, 2009 at 3:47 pm

    As information, had this happen today, for a Gateway computer purchased at Costco in
    2007, running Windows XP – Media Center, the solution was control-shift-R

  309. Michelle said, on February 23, 2009 at 12:22 am

    OH MY God Thankyou!! I was soooo frustrated and tried everything I could possibly think of until I thought, Why don’t I just google it?? THANK YOU!!!! My problem was solved, whew, what a relief!!

  310. Savannah said, on February 24, 2009 at 7:49 pm

    Thank you! I love how the instruction were sideways so I could read it.

  311. Angela said, on February 28, 2009 at 9:55 pm

    My chihuahua flipped my screen!! Thank god I’m not crazy. Apppreciate the help!

  312. Cindy said, on March 04, 2009 at 10:41 pm

    Ctrl Alt Up Arrow worked and fixed the screen to be right side up after my 12-year-old somehow up-ended it doing homework. Could not figure it out for hours.

    This side was a life-saver. Thanks so much!

  313. Sumone said, on March 05, 2009 at 5:18 pm

    Thanl you sooooooooooooooooooooo much for this. On my computer i was going to end a non responsive game and then wadam the screen turns and I go Wtf is this.I was about to call dell thank you so much. Ad tell those dumb people at windows to take this feature out !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  314. Meh said, on March 05, 2009 at 5:51 pm

    I just spent three hours last night with my laptop flipped over and typing upside down to find pictures to complete my art homework. Thank you windows for making my life hell.

  316. Felix said, on March 09, 2009 at 11:10 am

    Outstanding, thanks for the solution. Looking down through the many, many people you have helped with this since 2006, you have banked up a whopping monster load of karma bucks, bless you. Even though the solution is old, it’s still valid for Vista, in my case.

    My daughter’s Vista laptop did this. Apparently lots of people’s kids have, but she’s 28. On the other hand, SHE has a 2-year-old who may have contributed to the problem…

    Thanks again!! Felix

  317. kish said, on March 11, 2009 at 3:20 am

    Thanks alot man…I was like what happen to my screeen!! lol thanks alot

  318. Mike said, on March 13, 2009 at 1:46 am

    Holy craps thanks alot i was watching tv resting my elbow on the corner of my keypad i looked over and my screen was sideways n i was like WTF? n then its super confusing cause im us the touchpad n stuff thank god for this website n google or id be lost lol

  319. Fred said, on March 13, 2009 at 6:49 am

    It is a useful function if you can physically rotate your monitor 90deg. Especially useful if you have a modern widescreen monitor, as you can view A4 pages portrait full size the way they are meant to be viewed.

  320. lol, love the sideways instructions said, on March 17, 2009 at 7:29 pm

    Thank you. I figured out pretty quickly what had happened, but no idea why or how to fix it.

  321. deisy said, on March 18, 2009 at 1:02 am

    OMG. THANK YOOOU ! MY HEAD HURTS NOW

  322. Caro said, on March 19, 2009 at 7:10 am

    Have to add to the long list of thanks…. My keyboard got knocked to the floor. When I picked it up the screen image was flipped thro 90 degrees.

    Surely this useful feature could be accessed by a keystroke sequence that isn’t quite so easy to achieve accidentally by cat or infant or clumsiness? Joy of MS…

    hurray for the post, anyway! it came up top result in my google search so I was only out for the time it took to reboot, think, ” oh bother” and type sideways with a drunken mouse.

  323. methyl said, on March 20, 2009 at 10:30 am

    Thanks for this post. Glad to know we are not the first. ctrl/shift/up-arrow fixed our XP Pro.

  324. sese said, on March 22, 2009 at 9:46 am

    thank you! the image side up so cool

  325. Ricardo said, on March 22, 2009 at 7:21 pm

    Thank you very much. You made it very easy to follow. I HATE WINDOWS VISTA.

  326. Bill said, on March 23, 2009 at 10:11 am

    Have to add my thanks as well. The setting was on my Intel adapter and would flip the laptop but not the attached monitor. No easy way to see in Vista that this setting was activated.

  327. Ben said, on March 23, 2009 at 11:20 am

    Thanks for the info, although I’m not getting why everyone is hating on Microsoft about this. It’s a “feature” of Intel’s video card drivers and has nothing to do with Windows.

  328. Jennifer said, on March 24, 2009 at 6:47 pm

    thankyousomuch!
    OMG.
    my 2 year old sister randomly put her keyboard on my keyboard and it flipped.
    so i cried.
    LMFAO.
    but THANKYOUSOMUCH! for the help

  329. John said, on March 28, 2009 at 8:00 pm

    Thank you for your help.

  330. Tammy said, on March 29, 2009 at 7:36 pm

    Thank you soooo much! My toddler tampered with the laptop and the screen was completely upside down. I used my downstairs computer and did a quick search…YOUR code was exactly what I needed. Thanks a million!

  331. Rohan said, on March 30, 2009 at 12:34 pm

    Hi,
    My friend freaked out when this happened to her. She came over so we could remove the “virus” that turned the screen upside down. Google led me here and this saved the day :D.

    Thanks!
    Rohan

  332. chico said, on March 30, 2009 at 12:50 pm

    I primarily use my monitor sideways. It’s way better for reading comic scanlations and for most web sites. Less scrolling which means the battery in my mouse lasts longer. I also get more desk space and it’s a nice conversation piece.

  333. Roxanne said, on March 31, 2009 at 7:43 am

    Thanks! I plan on using this to play an April Fool’s Day prank on my husband.

  334. kate said, on April 04, 2009 at 12:13 pm

    Thanks so much! How do 2 year olds do these things? Kate x

  335. Khursiah said, on April 07, 2009 at 12:34 pm

    I thought I had to work with my laptop upside down until I had the sense to google and found your informative site. Thanks a lot! I love this feature and would try on my computer at work tomorrow to freak my friends LOL.

  336. Joeseph said, on April 07, 2009 at 2:55 pm

    LOL. Thanks! I left the room I was working in an my 3 year-old daughter flipped the screen. I googled the problem and it led me here. Iwas so frustrated I was about to smash my screen >: \

  337. Sally said, on April 07, 2009 at 2:56 pm

    Damn you Joe I finally found you and am going to make you pay!!!!!!!!

  338. Joeseph said, on April 07, 2009 at 2:57 pm

    Shit!!!

  339. Random Gamer said, on April 07, 2009 at 3:05 pm

    What the hell are ou guys going on about?

  340. pandora said, on April 09, 2009 at 1:24 pm

    ohhhh am so grateful to this website! i couldn’t stand waiting for my younger bro to fix it for me..someone called me at home and i pressed something on my key board that changed my screen display moving the right side up..
    but now i did it when i had to google the solution with a slanded head to left side loool

  341. Susanne said, on April 12, 2009 at 9:57 pm

    Thanks for showin me this I was using the Ctrl*Alt*Del and this stupid thing went sideways and I tried everything but throw it OFF a bridge….THANKS…

  342. aTom said, on April 13, 2009 at 5:51 am

    Thank you for this. My cat did his usual trick of trying to distract me as I work but, whilst lying on the keyboard, managed to turn the screen upside down. The probability of this happenning is extraordinarily low (I know) but I had no idea how he had done this. Thanks for the help with this – just lucky I have more than one computer so I could read the advice!

  343. Maegan N said, on April 13, 2009 at 5:53 pm

    OMG I’m soo thankful to you!! I was playing the sims 2, putting in a cheat code and all of a sudden my screen flipped!! I was freakin out! Like, how am I gonna explain this to my husband lol. We just bought a house and are on a tight budget as it is lol. Thanks soo much! Who in the world thought of this anyway? What is it used for anyway?!

  344. Dennis said, on April 13, 2009 at 9:53 pm

    Thank you, thank you, thank you!

  345. Mike said, on April 18, 2009 at 7:40 pm

    My 10-month old did it somehow, so i think he’s the youngest hellion on the list. Control+shift+up or R both do nothing. Any other thoughts?

  346. Frank Margo Chives said, on April 23, 2009 at 11:31 am

    DUDE! THAT WAS CRAZY. I’m so glad I found this site to fix it!
    BUT OHEMGEE!!! MY NECK HURTS!!!!

  347. Will Dunlop said, on April 25, 2009 at 2:15 am

    Thank you. I’m afraid I’ve haven’t got a six year old child to blame for turning my display sideways – it was my fault by over polishing the keyboard – next time I’ll just leave the biscuit crumbs and wine stains!!

  348. Mike said, on April 25, 2009 at 9:49 am

    I have worked as a system administrator for 10 years and I have only seen this problem once… when it happened to me yesterday. Thanks for the help!

  349. Shelize said, on April 29, 2009 at 7:28 pm

    Thanx for posting this. It was alot of help!
    :D

  350. me said, on May 01, 2009 at 8:58 pm

    It doesn’t work

  351. Fernando said, on May 02, 2009 at 1:15 pm

    dat is so stupid…. dang…

    i was like an hour with my laptop like dat… but i dont remember pressing does combinatios…

    i was hearing music and talkinn on da phone when itwent black and da screen flipped..

    omg…

    i had called friends.. called the company support line and they couldnt help. mee

    i dont know why they make dose dumb features,……..

    whs gonna be using a laptop with a screen sideways or upsidedown….

    ohhh yeah by da way i had to searrch da web with dat way.. my screen sideways to find da solution,,…..

  352. mamoomi said, on May 03, 2009 at 9:59 pm

    thanks so much for this tip! was changing the batts for my wireless keyboard when my screen flipped.. i thought my monitor suddenly went crazy! solved the problem in 2 mins hurrah for google and for this website!

  353. GOGOGOGOGO said, on May 04, 2009 at 8:51 am

    YOU ALL FAIL.

  354. Randy said, on June 10, 2009 at 8:43 am

    My main home computer is a Mac, and my primary computer at work is a Windows-based Dell. On my Mac, I’ve become accustomed to using various Ctrl-Command shortcut keys. As many of you probably know, the Command key typically occupies the same place as the Alt key on a Windows-based keyboard.

    Today, I was trying to highlight an entire line of text, and I forgot which keyboard I was using. Instead of Ctrl-Shift Left-Arrow, I hit Ctrl-Alt Left-Arrow, and I was met with a sideways screen. Luckily, I was able to figure out what I had done, and correct myself with no problem. I still had fun laughing at myself.

    But this was indeed a fun way to learn about weird Windows shortcut key combination. :-)

  355. Thoughts of THAT Mom said, on June 13, 2009 at 1:30 pm

    Thanks! You saved the day!

  356. Dids said, on July 11, 2009 at 11:36 pm

    This just happened to me minutes ago and I was shocked, thinking I had some sort of weird glitch. But then I tilted my head (and eventually even flipped the screen cus my neck was hurting xD) and of course i went to the great almighty answer providing machine named Google and tadaaa! I found the solution immediatly. I hadn’t even realized I had those hotkeys. Only knew about the F related ones.
    And gave a biiiig *rlly big* sigh of relief.
    This is feature kinda cool but also stupid. They should have done like you said and have it originally disabled instead of making people worry when they accidently push an arrow while pressing Ctrl+Alt.

    THANKS ;D
    Dids

  357. Jojo said, on September 21, 2009 at 7:31 pm

    There must be a way to disable this function permanently via script. We are in a school with networked computers and some of our students are doing this as a prank on our machines. We don’t want to go to each machine in the campus just to dothis Ctrl-Alt-keys orientation thing. There must be a way to do this via script so we can deploy this throughout the network.

    Stupid feature that intel included for the video card.

  358. phil said, on October 15, 2009 at 9:14 am

    bummer i let my grand son us my lab top and low and behold everything was upside down ,what is this ,i tryed everything i could think of then i found out abut this page click and everything was to normal frist time for this

  359. Fune said, on November 28, 2009 at 12:02 pm

    Once again the Samsung hdtv is one of the hottest gifts this Christmas, they’re selling out fast. I found mine at http://astore.amazon.com/50-inch-lg-hdtv-for-sale-20

  360. mark said, on December 06, 2009 at 9:26 pm

    my 8 month old flipped my screen. thanks for the answer.

  361. Lori Vannice said, on March 05, 2010 at 9:51 am

    [..] A bit unrelated, but I totally liked this site post [..]

  362. Jewell Routh said, on March 14, 2010 at 11:35 am

    Appreciating an article like this is really will make me happy. Spamming has really been an abuse, not only blaming the site quality but also wasting an article of such information, publishers are really happy when they get comments appreciating their hard work, But it hurts when its spammed just for promotion of a product but not the information.

  363. Jeri said, on May 02, 2010 at 2:57 pm

    This is my first “reply” blog. Thank you for teaching me such an easy fix. I thought I was going to have to live with my screen being in a book-like appearance. When my screen rotated in a book-like appearance, my touchpad did not coordinate with the side-ways screen. Up became left, etc., and it was like working in a mirror backwards. Thanks again, now I can look something else up.

  364. Jek said, on May 13, 2010 at 10:33 am

    Thanks for your ‘fix’, it did the trick. I decided to disable the graphics driver feature that allows this rediculous shortcut.

    Jek

  365. Michelle said, on August 13, 2010 at 7:12 pm

    Thank you so much for this explanation and “cure” for my orientation problem. My six year old leaned on the keyboard and suddenly my monitor shifted orientation. I was anticipating hours of searching for the right answer or a hefty PC consultant fee!

  366. CommanderM said, on September 23, 2010 at 4:13 pm

    THANKS!!! Gawd i’ve been looking for a solution… I fixed it on my B-Day :)

  367. Nance Davis said, on September 23, 2010 at 8:08 pm

    I hit some keys in the dark while playing a game and my screen went upside down, sideways, every way but straight. I downloaded Samsung manuel looking for a solution to no avail. Then, with a crook in my neck I searched on line, this being the first site I came to and the answer to my prayers. Ctrl-Alt up arrow worked perfectly. I can not thank you enough!!!

  368. Carol said, on October 19, 2010 at 4:54 pm

    Thought I was going to have to call support for this and spend time waiting in queue but your solution worked immediately. Glad I had the sense to google this and that you were kind enough to post this fix. Thank you!

  369. PRK Laser Eye Surgery · said, on November 04, 2010 at 9:56 am

    video games can be very addicting that is why sometimes i limit myself from playing too much of it ~

  370. Lingerie sets · said, on November 13, 2010 at 6:30 pm

    msot computer monitors these days are already using LCD technology and some are LED-LCD *`;


Comments are closed.

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 148 other followers

%d bloggers like this: