I am running Windows XP Pro with a Nvidia Geforce 2 Ultra (latest
drivers installed) on an IBM T85D flat panel monitor.  My desktop
display is normally a bit dark so I resolved the problem by turning up
the brightness and gamma a bit in the color correction tab of the
advanced display settings & I checked off the box that says "always
use these settings at start."  This worked perfectly for nearly a
year.  The only time I ever needed to reset them would be after
installing new video drivers.  However, recently, whenever I leave the
system idle for long enough for the the WinXP logon screen to appear, the
brightness and gamma settings are reset.  This doesn't happen when I
log off or restart the computer, only when it returns to the log on
screen after being idle.  It is very annoying as I need to go into my
desktop properties and re-adjust the brightness and gamma each time I
leave the computer alone for too long.  How do I fix this?  Please
help.  Thanks!

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Request for Question Clarification by seizer-ga on 20 Aug 2002 12:17 PDT

Could you try disabling the nVidia Driver Helper Service by going to
Start / Control Panel / Performance and Maintenance / Administrative
Tools / Services, does this fix it? I have a friend who had a similar
problem, and this was his solution.

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Clarification of Question by phantazem-ga on 20 Aug 2002 14:55 PDT

Wow!  It worked, but that leads me to a few more questions.  What is
the purpose of the nVidia Driver Helper Service and will I have any
problems or performance changes because I have turned it off?  Also,
the Driver Helper Service says that its startup is automatic.  How do
I change this so it stays off?  Finally, what caused this problem to
start so suddenly - is my Driver Helper Service corrupt? If so, can it
be repaired/replaced?  Thanks!

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Clarification of Question by phantazem-ga on 20 Aug 2002 14:57 PDT

Never mind about how to change the startup from automatic.  I figured that out.

Hi there! As your problem is now fixed, I am posting this as an
official answer. I'm glad I could help out - nothing annoys me more
than having my delicately tuned desktop savaged by badly written
software.

As far as the purpose of the nVidia Driver Helper Service, it doesn't
seem to be known anywhere. The suggestion is that it just stores
settings, but in your case, it didn't seem to be doing too well! In
discussions on the various newsgroups (starting at
http://groups.google.com) there have been many many issues with it
since around November last year. As far as performance or stability is
concerned, there have been no reports that I can find which suggest
any problems - in fact, most people report that WindowsXP speeds up
when you disable the service. If some problem does crop up, you can
simply turn the service back on again by going to the Admin Tools
again.

Check here (apologies for the long link) for a little more
information:

http://groups.google.co.uk/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&th=c6d7772288a53102&seekm=uggIDo0rBHA.2112%40tkmsftngp05&frame=off

As to what caused this problem: if you recently updated the drivers,
then that will most likely be the cause - this bug appears to be a new
one, and no doubt nVidia will fix it soon.

If you need further clarification, then feel free to ask. Otherwise,
happy gaming (or DVD watching, or video editing, or whatever you
like!)

-- seizer-ga

Search strategy: searching Google and Newsgroups for "color correction
problem", "nvidia color correction", "nvidia service problem"

Fantastic job! I had been unable to find a solution to my problem
anywhere and you handed it me in less than 10 minutes after I posted
the question!  IT people I know just shrugged their shoulders, not
knowing where to look first.  Nothing came up after searching
Microsoft knowledgebase, and I couldn't even get a response on
Microsoft Newsgroups!  Payment well deserved.  Thanks Seizer & thanks
Google!