Monitors Widescreen monitors query

B

Boot_Comp

Adept
If we get a widescreen monitor but out Integrated Graphics controller or Graphics cards do not support wide mode will we still be able to use these monitors somehow in the normal mode (maybe with the extra 'wide' area displaying a black area or some other way)?
Forgive my ignorance here haven't seen or used a wide screen as yet. :)
 
^ your query is perfectly sensible.

Your graphics chipset driver thats installed should support wide screen resolutions for a better performance. If this is not possible, there are two possibilities -

1. What you said, like it might show the non wide screen resolution and blackout the rest. This is possible in very few monitors AFAIK. And this is a feature in some expensive LCD displays. But not available in all.

2. The non widescreen resolution something like 1024x768 will be scaled to the whole screen. Basically everything will be stretched to fit the wider screen. A circle in regular resolution will look elliptical / oval. You might not like such a situation, but if you have a old graphics card/system this is what you most probably will get.
 
Boot_Comp said:
If we get a widescreen monitor but out Integrated Graphics controller or Graphics cards do not support wide mode will we still be able to use these monitors somehow in the normal mode (maybe with the extra 'wide' area displaying a black area or some other way)?

Forgive my ignorance here haven't seen or used a wide screen as yet. :)
Click to expand...

Yes you guessed it right.

But I believe there is no branded mobo with onboard gfx chip that does not support widescreen resolution unless we are talking about mobos based on Intel's 8XX chipsets.

Widescreens are mainstream nowadays.
 
The G965 didn't support widescreen, last I checked (I have one). I've ranted about this at length but I don't see anything has been done to fix it.

Intel drivers only allow you to set resolutions that the VBIOS detect from the monitor at switch-on, and there is no way to access those tables and info. Some hardcore registry/BIOS tweaking is required.

The only way to set the resolutions is by updating the BIOS and checking if it works.

Not sure about 945/946, those are older chipsets.

NV/ATI chipsets have never had this issue, and are flexible to the point of letting you select resolutions outside the monitor's capabilities.
 
I am in the process of doing away with my very old rig (no wide support) and was thinking of starting out with new DELL Widescreen monitor first, so I was wondering if I could get that alone and the rest of the stuff later (by Feb maybe).

From you replies it looks like this should be possible.
Thanks folks.
 
^ IMO thats the last thing to think about. If you are building a new rig, concentrate on the core parts first. Once you have all those you can get a monitor according to your budget.

It worked out well for my rig. This was the first time I got parts one by one. Though it took time, im totally satisfied with the choices I made (Thanks to TE :)).
 
sangram said:
The G965 didn't support widescreen, last I checked (I have one). I've ranted about this at length but I don't see anything has been done to fix it.

Intel drivers only allow you to set resolutions that the VBIOS detect from the monitor at switch-on, and there is no way to access those tables and info. Some hardcore registry/BIOS tweaking is required.

The only way to set the resolutions is by updating the BIOS and checking if it works.

Not sure about 945/946, those are older chipsets.

NV/ATI chipsets have never had this issue, and are flexible to the point of letting you select resolutions outside the monitor's capabilities.
Click to expand...

I faced the same problem with my intel 845glad, much older than your 965 but surprisingly it works with wide screen, I discovered this when my original XP CD (5yrs old) went bad, I had to load it with another one which has XP-sp2 integrated & since then my old 845 supports my 20inch wide screen perfectly.

Try with a latest XP install CD it should work with wide screen, else use powerstrip to mod your graphic driver.
 
Powerstrip is not compatible with Intel chipsets. Not that I didn't try. It really doesn't work.

I'm actually running the GTS on this board, so don't have occasion to use the integrated graphics (thank God).

This is an acknowledged issue on this chipset. There is no known fix, not even on the Intel Developer board (there is, but it's a pretty complex one, and it didn't work for me). The new BIOS may have corrected it, but I haven't checked.
 
sangram said:
I'm actually running the GTS on this board, so don't have occasion to use the integrated graphics (thank God).

This is an acknowledged issue on this chipset. There is no known fix, not even on the Intel Developer board (there is, but it's a pretty complex one, and it didn't work for me). The new BIOS may have corrected it, but I haven't checked.
Click to expand...

It indeed is an acknowledge issue even with my intel 845 mobo but now it works fine, I did not update any bios I accidentally discovered this when I installed XP-SP2(integrated) it wont work if u install SP2 separately.

Try it & you might get wide screen capability.

I dont understand what is GTS?

if you are not using on board integrated graphic then you dont have this limitation, so I am confused as to what u mean.
 
sangram said:
The G965 didn't support widescreen, last I checked (I have one). I've ranted about this at length but I don't see anything has been done to fix it.

Intel drivers only allow you to set resolutions that the VBIOS detect from the monitor at switch-on, and there is no way to access those tables and info. Some hardcore registry/BIOS tweaking is required.

The only way to set the resolutions is by updating the BIOS and checking if it works.

Not sure about 945/946, those are older chipsets.

NV/ATI chipsets have never had this issue, and are flexible to the point of letting you select resolutions outside the monitor's capabilities.
Click to expand...

I have DG965RY mobo and viewsonic 17" with 1440X900 res and I get out of box support for widescreen. I have not tweaked/changed bios in any way

is my case a special one?
 
morgoth said:
I have DG965RY mobo and viewsonic 17" with 1440X900 res and I get out of box support for widescreen. I have not tweaked/changed bios in any way

is my case a special one?
Click to expand...

That confirms that it works, did you install XP SP2 integrated?
 
GTS = in my signature, the graphics card. I'm not using integrated graphics - though I do try it from time to time. My copy of XP is the original (pre SP1) and I apply service packs manually.

My case may be special, though the Developer board did state this was an issue, and unfixable except through the VBIOS (which comes with a BIOS update. As long as it works, it's good I guess.

It technically should work - a lot of laptops use Intel chipsets, and also have widescreen displays, so there's no reason it shouldn't work. The problem is not capability but coding - the drivers don't use the monitor EDID for setting resolutions, nor do they allow the user to set custom resolutions. Only the VBIOS can tell the drivers the resolution to use.

It's possible they updated the VBIOS by default on the later boards, or the monitor (mine) and the VBIOS don't talk very well to each other over the analog connection. In any case, I have never managed to see a 1680x resolution (I've seen a 1440 though, in one of the later updates, but it's useless to me) in the drivers.
 
The latter has HDMI and a DCR of 2000:1, supposedly better than the former.

As for DCR, here: Ref: Wiki.

Dynamic contrast ratio
A notable recent development in the LCD technology is the so called "dynamic contrast" (DC). When there is a need to display a dark image, the display would underpower the backlight lamp (or decrease the aperture of the projector's lens using an iris), but will proportionately amplify the transmission through the LCD panel. This gives the benefit of realizing the potential static contrast ratio of the LCD panel in dark scenes, when the image is watched in a dark room. The drawback is that if a dark scene does contain small areas of superbright light, they may be sacrificed and blown out.

The trick for the display is to determine how much of the highlights may be unnoticeably blown out in a given image under the given ambient lighting conditions.

Brightness, as it is most often used in marketing literature, refers to the emitted luminous intensity on screen measured in candela per square metre (cd/m2). The higher the number, the brighter the screen.

It is also common to market only the dynamic contrast ratio capability of a display (when it is better than its static contrast ratio), which should not be directly compared to the static contrast ratio. A plasma display with a static 5000:1 contrast ratio will show superior contrast to an LCD display with 5000:1 dynamic and 1000:1 static contrast ratio when the input signal contains full range of brightnesses from 0 to 100% simultaneously. However they will be on par when input signal ranges only from 0 to 20% brightness.
 
The Static CR does not seem to be mentioned anywhere for the SP2208WFP.
Any idea what its value is?
Also are these glossy screens?
I'm not sure about this but I think glossy coating would mean the screens are more reflective, right? (I think this wouldn't be very good for reading/viewing etc.)
 
morgoth said:
I have DG965RY mobo and viewsonic 17" with 1440X900 res and I get out of box support for widescreen. I have not tweaked/changed bios in any way
is my case a special one?
Click to expand...

Even I have a 965G motherboard and using the integrated Intel X3000 gfx and 1440*900 resolutions works perfectly.
 
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