Screen orientation

PDAs that use touch screens have a very thin membrane over the screen itself that responds to pressure. If this membrane becomes damaged, which it sounds like what has happened, then you're more than likely going to need to have it replaced. You can try doing it yourself, but it's WAY up on the difficulty factor because of the complexity of the connection to the circuit board on the Vx.
To determine if your unit is, in fact, actually damaged, you should first make sure that you've syncronized the unit (which may not be possible if you don't have it set to automatically activate HotSync when the device is attached) then do a "hard reset" to restore it to the factory default. To do this, hold the reset button while simultaneously holding the power button for, at least, three seconds. You will get a message asking you to press up on the control pad to reset to factory defaults. Once the unit is reset, try the screen again... touching even the outer areas to see if there's any response. If it reacts, or beeps at all, then it may be an issue of recalibrating (using the "Digitizer") once it's fully reset. If not, it will need repair/replacement.