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Whether it’s a presentation or a cosy movie night: It can happen that the beamer is not recognised by the computer or laptop. In this practical tip, we will show you what this can be due to.
Beamer is not recognised – Reason 1: Cable defective
- Possibly the connection cable to the beamer has a cable break. You can test this if you still have a second (working) cable available
- You can avoid cable breakage by not placing heavy objects on the cable and by not kinking it. Cables are relatively flexible, but only up to a point.
Beamer is not recognised – Reason 2: Driver/additional software not installed
- Although many projectors work through plug-and-play, it can sometimes happen that certain projectors need additional software in order to be recognised or in order for certain functions to be used
- You can easily find this out by typing the product name of the projector and “driver” into Google search. Alternatively, you can look in the Device Manager to see if a device is still missing a driver.
Beamer is not recognised – reason 3: screen must be switched
Probably the most common problem. However, it is relatively easy to fix under Windows. If you press the Windows key and “P”, an overview appears where you can set how the picture is shown. You have the choice between:
- “Screen PC only”: This will only show the picture on the PC/laptop.
- “Duplicate”: Exactly the same image as on the PC is projected by the beamer.
- “Expand”: The beamer then behaves like a second screen so that you can use multi-monitor functions.
- “Second screen only”: This shows only the image from the beamer while the screen on the PC is blank. You should not activate this function if no projector is connected, as it then becomes a little more complicated to switch the mode back to normal.
- “Second screen only”.
