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As soon I open PowerPoint 2010 on my Windows XP desktop (does not matter if I open it directly or by double-clicking on a PowerPoint file), the entire screen starts flashing/flickering between normal and a solid black screen for a second or two. Then it stays solid black. If you leave it in this state it will eventually return normal, but only for a second or so before it goes back to being completely black. The only way to get out of this is to press Alt + F4. I do not have this problem if I use PowerPoint 2003, and I still have the problem if I open PowerPoint 2010 in Safe Mode.

Drew Chapin
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1 Answers1

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Solution #1

Go to the manufacturer's web-site of your graphics card, and download the latest driver that is available for your card. See the post titled How can I detect the model of my graphics card? if you do not know how to determine what make & model of graphics card you have.

Solution #2

If you have already tried upgrading your driver, or for whatever reason you cannot upgrade to a newer driver. Then you can work around the issue by turning ON the Disable hardware graphics acceleration option in PowerPoint 2010 under File > Options > Advanced > Display. However, since you can't open PowerPoint normally, or via Safe Mode then you will have to do it via a registry setting.

  1. Click on Start > Run and type regedit and press Enter or click on the OK button. This will open the Windows Registry Editor.
  2. Navigate down the tree on the left as follows: Computer > HKEY_CURRENT_USER > Software > Microsoft > Office > 14.0 > Gfx.
  3. Look on the right hand side for an entry named DisableHardware, if you do not see it, then right click on a blank area or on the Gfx tree node and click on New > DWORD (32-bit) Value and name it DisableHardware.
  4. Double click on DisabledHardware or right click on it and select Modify...
  5. In the Edit DWORD (32-bit) Value dialog that comes up, enter a one (1) for the Value data field and click on OK.
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Drew Chapin
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