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PowerPoint displays a presentation in B/W, won't show it in color

Problem

When you open presentations in PowerPoint, they display in shades of gray rather than in color.

Solution

Are you in B/W View?

If some presentatations appear in color and some don't, the ones that don't are probably set to Black and White view.
To put a little color back into your life:

You'll need to do this for each presentation that appears in shades of gray.

Check your Windows Accessibility settings

If all of your presentations appear in shades of gray or b/w and so do your other Windows programs and Windows itself, it's probably the result of a Windows Accessibility setting. Here's what to do:

That will turn the High Contrast mode off but we recommend one further step. Chances are that you got into High Contrast mode in the first place by accidentally pressing the shortcut key combination that triggers it. To turn off the shortcut:

Your presentation (and other programs) should now appear in glorious color.

Note: You may have turned on the High Contrast settings accidentally. By default, Windows XP, for example, enables Alt + Left Shift + PrintScreen as a hotkey to toggle High Contrast on and off. It'd be easy to hit the Left Shift as well as the other keys while making a screenshot. If you think this may have happened, press Alt + Left Shift + PrintScreen again to see if it toggles back to normal display settings.


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PowerPoint displays a presentation in B/W, won't show it in color
http://www.pptfaq.com/FAQ00607_PowerPoint_displays_a_presentation_in_B-W-_won-t_show_it_in_color.htm
Last update 07 June, 2011
Created: