ok, i've found some code which seems to work nicely for resizing the "workarea".....

'example (you could put this anywhere, i'm using it on form load)
Call ChangeWorkArea(0, Screen.Height / Screen.TwipsPerPixelY, 0, Screen.Width / Screen.TwipsPerPixelX)


'the rest here in a module
Public Const SPI_SetWorkArea = 47
Public Const SPI_GetWorkArea = 48

Public Declare Function SystemParametersInfo Lib "user32" Alias "SystemParametersInfoA" (ByVal uAction As Long, ByVal uParam As Long, ByRef lpvParam As Any, ByVal fuWinIni As Long) As Long

Public Type tCoord2D
left As Long
top As Long
right As Long
bottom As Long
End Type


Public Function ChangeWorkArea(top As Integer, bottom As Integer, left As Integer, right As Integer)
Dim Rect As tCoord2D

Rect.top = top
Rect.left = left
Rect.right = right
Rect.bottom = bottom
SystemParametersInfo SPI_SetWorkArea, 0, Rect, 0
End Function