# When I "print screen" it only captures about 1/3 of the screen. Make it stop. **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 13, 2014, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680 "2014-06-13T03:32:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Renee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/renee/32/287_2.png) [@Renee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Renee)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/1 "2014-06-13T03:32:58Z")
I have a Dell something or other, windows 8 (ugh), with a big screen. However, I can’t get it to take a screenshot of the entire screen, just a small section in the middle. What’s up with that? How do I make it stop? ---
**Author:** ![zweisamkeit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zweisamkeit/32/4360_2.png) [@zweisamkeit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zweisamkeit)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/2 "2014-06-13T03:49:02Z")
What are you doing, specifically, to take the screenshot? PrtScn by itself, win+PrtScn, alt+PrtScn? Also, has it worked fine in the past and only became weird recently, or has it never worked right? ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/3 "2014-06-13T03:51:22Z")
How exactly are you doing the print screen? Print Screen alone should capture the entire screen, copied to the clipboard (you can paste it into paint to save it). Alt + Print Screen should only capture the active window (again, copied to clipboard). Window Key + Print Screen should capture the entire screen and will save it as a PNG in your pictures folder in addition to copying it to the clipboard (this feature was added for Windows 8 - it’s not in earlier versions). Do any of these options work as advertised? ---
**Author:** ![Renee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/renee/32/287_2.png) [@Renee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Renee)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/4 "2014-06-13T04:00:14Z")
Ok, interesting. I was just hitting prtscrn while in Picasa (which I use for my photo management) and it only does partial screen shots. But then if I go to paint and paste (which I’ve never tried) it shows me the whole screen shot. So maybe some sort of picasa strangeness. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 6:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/5 "2014-06-13T06:02:05Z")
I did a little poking around on google. It looks like picasa can have problems with screen settings that are anything other than normal, like if you set the text size to 150%. Setting these back to normal will allow picasa to take proper screen shots. But then if you’ve increased the text size it’s probably because you had a hard time reading 100% size text on your video resolution, so that solution seems a bit less than useful to me. Better to just use the windows screen shot capability in that case. I don’t know if there’s an update to picasa that may fix this for you or not. ---
**Author:** ![Chief\_Pedant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@Chief\_Pedant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chief_Pedant)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 10:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/6 "2014-06-13T10:55:13Z")
Don’t forget the Snipping Tool if you want better control over how much of the screen you are copying. ---
**Author:** ![xizor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xizor/32/102_2.png) [@xizor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xizor)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/7 "2014-06-13T13:11:31Z")
> [@Chief\_Pedant](#): > > Don’t forget the Snipping Tool if you want better control over how much of the screen you are copying. I concur. Once I found this built-in Windows feature I never went back. ---
**Author:** ![Inna\_Minnit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Inna\_Minnit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inna_Minnit)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/8 "2014-06-13T13:24:41Z")
> [@Chief\_Pedant](#): > > Don’t forget the Snipping Tool if you want better control over how much of the screen you are copying. Please to explain. ---
**Author:** ![Thin\_Ice](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/aeb1de/32.png) [@Thin\_Ice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thin_Ice)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/9 "2014-06-13T13:25:51Z")
I have an HP running Win8.1 and the Window key+prt sc works but it also creates a folder named Screenshots to put the pic in. ---
**Author:** ![yojimbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yojimbo/32/232_2.png) [@yojimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yojimbo)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/10 "2014-06-13T15:55:56Z")
> [@Inna\_Minnit](#): > > Please to explain. Click on your Start button and in the search area start typing snipping tool. You will see it as a program. Launch it. It’s a very simple tool for capturing sections of your screen. ---
**Author:** ![Renee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/renee/32/287_2.png) [@Renee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Renee)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/11 "2014-06-13T17:23:51Z")
Cool! Thanks! And yeah, I have my font set bigger, because it’s teensy at normal size. Good that there’s a work around. ---
**Author:** ![Inna\_Minnit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Inna\_Minnit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inna_Minnit)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/12 "2014-06-13T19:19:00Z")
> [@yojimbo](#): > > Click on your Start button and in the search area start typing snipping tool. You will see it as a program. Launch it. It’s a very simple tool for capturing sections of your screen. Thanks I will check it out. ---
**Author:** ![Daylate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9dc877/32.png) [@Daylate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daylate)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2014, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-i-print-screen-it-only-captures-about-1-3-of-the-screen-make-it-stop/690680/13 "2014-06-14T03:09:41Z")
I never bother to use PrntScrn any longer. Download Screen Hunter, a small\*\*\* free\*\*\* program that lets you capture any or all of a screen into a jpeg file. Works like a charm, and very easy to use.