Camera AND Display sudden quality degradation

[LynnESC]

A couple of months ago, the camera on my All-in-One desktop suddenly went very fuzzy. It was not a gradual thing, but rather an overnight change from one Skype use to the next. It is not Skype, as I checked the camera by itself and it is very fuzzy. I checked drivers, did Windows diagnostics, all say that camera is working properly and driver is the most up-to-date. 

Now, just a few days ago, the display degraded. Color saturation is light and fonts are broken up a bit -- like in the old days of early computers. Again, I have done every diagnostic that Windows and HP offer, and everything is supposedly working correctly. Except that it isn't. Like the camera, the display changed literally between one day and the next.

Should also mention that this computer is slow as molasses, even though there is very little on it, I have stopped all apps from running in the background, done diagnostics and cleanup, etc. Am starting to think the whole computer is about to give up the ghost, even though it is only 2 years old and has had light use at most.

Have I missed anything I might check or try?

[Echo_Lake]

@LynnESC

Thank you for posting on the HP Support Community.

I see that your experiencing web camera and display quality related issue on HP 22-3130 Touch-smart All-in-One Desktop PC. I appreciate your efforts to try and resolve the issue. As you've performed relevant troubleshooting steps and issue persists, performing factory reset will fix issue:

Click here to initiate system recovery process.

Hope this helps! Keep me posted for further assistance.

If I have helped you resolve the issue, feel free to give me a virtual high-five by clicking the 'Thumbs Up' icon below, Followed by clicking on "Accept as solution" from the drop-down menu on the upper right corner,

Thank you for posting in the HP Support Forum.  Have a great day!

[LynnESC]

Thank you, Echo_Lake. I had been wondering if it would come to this but didn't want to go through everything it would entail. Do you think a system refresh instead of a whole factory reset might be worth a go? My biggest concern is losing all my iTunes playlists -- which may happen even with a refresh that preserves files. The music itself is safe, but I have found iTunes playlists to be specific to the device they are on and I don't know if these moves would make iTunes view it as a new device. I don't even want to think about the work involved in re-creating those playlists! But I'm afraid I am pretty much at that point and would like to do the least disruptive option first.

[Barachiel]

@LynnESC

It looks like you were interacting with @Echo_Lake, but he is out for the day & I'll be glad to help you out, 

I'm the Barachiel & I'm at your service.

Thank you for the replying,

Yes, you could try performing a system restore. Please take your time and get back to me with the results,

I'll be awaiting your response and would be glad to help.

Feel free to post your query for any other assistance as well,

It's been a pleasure interacting with you and I hope you have a good day ahead.

If you wish to show appreciation for my efforts, mark my post as Accepted Solution.

And click on the Purple Thumbs up icon at the bottom of my comment.

Regards, 

[LynnESC]

Thank you very much, Barachiel. I appreciate your help. I have managed to solve 1 of my 3 problems without a refresh or a restore, so I am still putting that off as last resort. My display problems were corrected when my friend showed me the "Adjust the appearance and performance of Windows" section of the control panel. It does not appear on any menu I ever found in the control panel or the display settings or the troubleshooters, so you have to know that it exists and exactly what it's called before you can find it! It doesn't even auto-fill in the search box until you are fairly far along in the typing. Dumb! 

Anyway, it would let me EITHER adjust appearance OR performance for best results, but I ended up selecting the option that lets Windows decide what's best for my computer and that seems to have solved my very poor display (especially fonts).

However, even though performance seems to be a bit better than it was, it is still far, far slower than is comfortable to work with. And the integrated HP camera is still quite fuzzy. But before I even consider a refresh I am working on getting my iTunes playlists exported to a safe parking space (at least I have found out how to do that now) and that will take some time. 

I am still hoping against hope not to have to do a refresh or [heaven forbid!] a reset.

[Echo_Lake]

@LynnESC

Thank you for posting back. 

Work on it as per your convenience and please feel free to contact us here anytime you need any further assistance.

Have a nice day ahead.