Missing Taskbar I just bought a new monitor, but when I plug it in, I dont have a taskbar. My taskbar is visible with the old monitor. I tried lowering my resolution and restarting explorer and as well as Ctrl+Esc. Nothing works.

Your taskbar may have been unlocked and moved to the top of your desktop. I'll continue under that assumption.

1. Right-click on your taskbar. If checked, un-check 'Lock the Taskbar'. Otherwise, skip to Step 3.
2. Left-click on your taskbar and drag it to the bottom of your desktop. This is the original position of the taskbar.
3. Right-click on your taskbar. Check 'Lock the Taskbar'. (OPTIONAL)
   

Missing icon from taskbar
1. If you have uninstall your Audio drivers from your system the volume icon will not show in the taskbar. You have to reinstall the audio drivers to restore the volume icon back to the taskbar

2. If the your volume icon is missing from the taskbar and you did not uninstall the audio drivers, then go to Start -> Control Panel -> Sounds,Speech, and Audio Devices -> Sounds and Audio Devices ->"Place volume icon in the taskbar" box -> Uncheck & check -> Apply & OK and your volume is restore at the taskbar. (Reboot if necessary)

Hope it helps.

Gvie you a screenshot guide manual:
Customizing the Taskbar Step 1: Overview

To set taskbar options, right-click the taskbar and choose Properties to access the Taskbar and Start Menu Properties window. There are several options available. Step 2: Auto Hide

Checking the Auto hide box will cause the taskbar to move out of sight when not in use. Then when you move the mouse pointer over the taskbar location, the taskbar will reappear. Step 3: Always on Top

Checking the Always on top box will cause the taskbar to be visible even when you have maximized application windows on the screen. Step 4: Show Clock

Click the Show clock box to display the clock on the taskbar. It will appear in the bottom right corner of your screen when this option is checked.
Power and Gateway battery life knowledge and tips.
>> orginal from http://support.gateway.com/s/tutorials/Tu_850630.shtml

Bring up the task manager. Click [File] then "New Task(Run)". Type "cmd" into the text field and press Enter. This will open the command prompt.

When you say "after u start the computer" you mean before you log in? The taskbar never shows up until you're logged in, so that's the way it's supposed to work.

If you've logged in and you still can't see the taskbar, it's possible that you've configured the taskbar to "auto-hide." To see if that's what's happening, move the mouse all the way to the bottom of the screen, and the taskbar should pop into view. Unless you've moved the taskbar to the top or side - check by moving the mouse all the way to each edge of the screen until you see the taskbar.

Once you see the taskbar, you can right-click either on the "Start" button or on the clock at the opposite end of the taskbar, and select "Properties" from the menu to turn off auto-hide (if you want to - some people like it once they're used to it). If you want to turn it off, pick the "Taskbar" tab on the Properties dialog, and uncheck the "auto-hide the taskbar" checkbox. Then click OK, and the taskbar should stay visible.

Hope this helps.

This happens because you have set your Taskbar to Autohide mode.

Do the following steps:

1. Move the mouse to the bottom of screen and let the task bar come up
2. Right click on task bar
3. Click on properties
4. On the Task bar Tab Unchek Auto-hide the task bar
5. Click Apply
6. Press OK

Thats it

If you move the mouse pointer to the very bottom of the screen, the taskbar should pop up as it does when you press the Windows Button, but without Start. If you want to keep it up, right click on the taskbar and select "Properties" In the new window, "Unselect" "Autohide" and the taskbar will stay up.

The taskbar is always running in Windows Vista. Unlike Windows XP, it can't be unlocked and hidden unless the 'auto-hide' feature is turned on. If 'auto-hide' is on, simply run your cursor along the bottom edge of the screen and the taskbar should pop-up.

To disable auto-hide, after moving your cursor to bring up the taskbar, right click the taskbar and click properties. Then under the Taskbar tab, uncheck auto-hide.

If auto-hide is off, it may indicate that explorer.exe is not running/has crashed. In order to restart explorer.exe you can either
1) Restart
2) Press CTRL+Shift+Escape, File -> New Task and then type in explorer.exe and run

Probably your infected. to fix the problem u can visit kelly's korner and copy all the text and then go to notepad and paste the text and then save it as "taskbar.reg" and then after saving it run it. it will prompt you if u want to add the registry information and you say yes. see if that fix's the problem. if u dont know how to open notepad without the startmenu u can try pressing windows key+r and type "notepad" and press ok. remember to save it as a .reg file.