Widescreen Gaming Forum

I just got a 22" samsung widescreen monitor and I'm having trouble getting it to do any widescreen resolutions other than 1680 x 1050. It'll do 4:3 aspect ratio resolutions fine, but it won't give me any other widescreen resolution.

This is a problem for me since I want to play TF2 in a lesser resolution in order to increase my frames per second. I'd really like to get 1280 x 800, but I'll settle for 1440 x 900. Right now all I can get is 1680x1050.

Monitor: Samsung 22" widescreen (226CW), using dvi cable
Card: Nvidia 8800 gt 512 megs
Operating system: Windows XP SP2.

I've tried using powerstrip, and the "custom timing" button is greyed out.

I've tried using nvidia forceware drivers and using the custom resolutions option, but every resolution I enter, when I go to test it, it says "test failed."

I'm using the latest nvidia drivers and I have installed the manufacturer's monitor drivers.

I've tried hacking my nvidia inf files, but it does have 1280x800 listed as a resolution in nv4_disp.inf. I've tried modifying my monitor's inf file, but when I tried to tell it it's max resolution was 1280x800, and rebooted, it went into 800x600 4:3 mode instead.

I've tried telling my nvidia card to not scale, and to show resolutions not supported by my monitor. I still can't see other widescreen resolutions.

In Tf2, the 16:9 aspect ratio option is greyed out, and when I choose 16:10, all I can see is 1680x1050 as a resolution. 4:3 lists several resolutions.

Please, anyone have any advice? I'm on the verge of dumping the monitor and going back to a standard 4:3 monitor, just because I cannot get a framerate over 20 in tf2 when in widescreen mode. The card is fairly good, but the resolution just kills my fps.

Thank you so much for your time.

So currently you can't run TF2 in 1440x900. Can you run your desktop in 1440x900?

Odd that you get such low framerates on TF2 with that video card.. what's your cpu? If it's anyting half-decent I'd guess the resolution thing isn;t your only problem.

Oh and I've no real advise for the res problem... I assume you've tried manuall altering the config files?

http://www.widescreengamingforum.com/node/6998

Did you try following that to the letter ?
I had troubles with it always saying test failed until doing exactly what was detailed in that thread and got every resolution i could dream up working perfectly.

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I'm also using a 8800gt, but have the 2253bw - I am using a DVI cable.

I was able to add the custom 16:10 (1280x800 & 1440x900) resolutions. The problem was that unlike the tutorial states (I did try to follow it to the letter!), I had to first click 'Treat as HDTV' on the Custom Resolutions screen in order to start adding custom resolutions. This works, and I now see the new resolutions available in my games (TF2, CoD4, Crysis etc).

But now I have another problem: these resolutions look terrible in games. I suspect it's a scaling issue, but none of the scaling options I've tried seem to correct it. 1680x1050 is strikingly clear and beautiful, but I want to squeeze as many fps out of the card as possible with all effects cranked, so I'd like to try both of my lower resolutions. Only when I do, the image quality goes to hell - it's glaringly blurry, and the loss in picture definition simply isn't acceptable.

Is this because I'm having to choose the 'Treat as HDTV' option to add the new resolutions? Has anyone else struggled with the same issue with other Samsung WS models and managed to tweak the custom resolutions in order to retain the clarity of the Native ones?

I'd really appreciate any help or advice!

ed. Thought I should add that turning Scaling off works, but I'm trying to find a way to stay full screen without sacrificing the rendering quality. Is this just picture quality trade-off that WS users have to live with? I am totally new to WS gaming and love it so far!

Scaling will definitely result in a quality loss (unless it's a whole number ratio). Just think of the horizontal component for a second, your video card has to figure out how to make 1440 pixels in the source image fill 1680 pixels on your monitor.

It's kind of like if you have 5 plates and 3 marshmellows, but every plate needs a marshmellow on it, and they need to be the same size. You could cut 2 marshmellows in half, but then you have 4 plates with 1/2 mashmellows and one with a whole one, they wouldn't look the same size. No you'd have precisely portion them out, cut a little bit of each one, and combine then and then stretch what's left so they all look the same size. Needless to say the appearance of your marshmellows are going to be a bit compromised.

This is what scaling does, the plates are the pixels on your display, the marshmellows are the pixels in the game. 1440 pixels don't fit evenly into 1680. So the pixels need to be stretched, blended together, etc. And that's just thinking about with one dimension, this has got to stretch and blend in two dimensions. So yes, scaling will make things blurry.

It's kind of like if you have 5 plates and 3 marshmellows, but every plate needs a marshmellow on it, and they need to be the same size.

I checked out at marshmellows.

Mmmm...marshmellows.

It's kind of like if you have 5 plates and 3 marshmellows, but every plate needs a marshmellow on it, and they need to be the same size.

I checked out at marshmellows.

Mmmm...marshmellows.

Hehe, I like silly analogies.

Makes sense - I was hoping that there were scaling tricks that would mitigate it more than what I've seen so far, but oh well. Thanks for the explanation!

Some monitors/scaling engines are better then others, but, at least I have, you'll always be able to notice a scaled vs native res. image.