One morning, I woke up with optimism in my heart and a burning desire to open Excel. Instead of a blissful spreadsheet experience, I was greeted by the legendary “Black Screen of I-Guess-You’re-Working-in-the-Dark-Now” immediately after signing into Windows 11. My desktop wallpaper? Gone. Taskbar? Invisible. Only my cursor, floating aimlessly, probably looking for a new owner.
The Usual Suspects
Naturally, I googled “Windows black screen after login” and was introduced to every usual suspect in town:
Ctrl+Shift+Esc to open Task Manager
Success! CTRL+ALT+DEL brought up the screen, Task Manager opened, but Explorer.exe wasn’t running. Classic.
Run “explorer.exe” manually
I could launch explorer.exe, and sometimes my desktop would flash into existence for 3 seconds before evaporating. Like a Windows version of a magic trick-presto, then gone.
Safe Mode boot
Everyone’s favorite troubleshooting step. I booted into Safe Mode, and everything worked. Boot back normally, return to darkness, as the prophecy foretold.
Latest GPU drivers
Reinstalled NVIDIA drivers, just in case my RTX was on strike. No difference. At this point, I was starting to suspect my computer caught impostor syndrome and wanted to cosplay as a monitor.
Windows Updates
Checked for updates, installed everything, and, you guessed it: the black screen was still going strong.
The Road Less Travelled: The Dumb Solution
While contemplating my life choices and how much money I’ve spent on Windows, I finally remembered I’d set up a second monitor last week but had since moved my laptop back to my desk, docked, and shut the lid. Out of sheer exasperation, I yanked out the HDMI cable I had lazily left dangling from my last dual-monitor setup.
The moment I did this, my desktop popped up. Taskbar, icons, the works. Turns out, Windows was channeling all its creative energy into displaying my entire user interface on a “ghost” secondary display that no longer existed, leaving my laptop screen in solitary confinement with the cursor. Thanks for that, “Extend these displays” setting!
Tips for the Next Unwitting Victim:
- Check Display Settings (with keyboard only!):
Press Win+P and use the arrow keys to cycle display modes (Duplicate, Extend, PC screen only). Try ‘PC screen only’ and see if your desktop reappears.
- If you’ve ever plugged into another monitor or TV, especially while the lid was closed, Windows might have gotten confused and is displaying everything where you can’t see it.
- Unplug all external monitors, adapters, or docking stations. Then, reboot with only your main screen.
- If you’re stuck at a black screen, open Task Manager, run “ms-settings:display”, and adjust your current display settings blind (good luck).
Moral of the story: Windows assumes you’ve never changed your setup and likes to hide your desktop if you have. Don’t underestimate the power of unplugging (or plugging in) random cables before you spend hours reinstalling drivers and threatening to switch to Linux.
