So, I finally got a widescreen monitor for my PC. I figured out that I had to create a custom resolution in the GeForce control panel to set the desktop to the native 1680x1050 resolution of my monitor.
Now, some games (Battlefield 2 in particular) don’t support true 16:9 aspect ratios. There’s a hack you can run, but it cuts the top and bottom of the screen off when running at 16:9 resolutions.
Is there an easy way to get “black bars” on the side of the screen so you can view 4:3 games correctly? No matter what resolution I pick, it always stretches it across the screen…
I don’t have an nVidia card, so I don’t know the exact place. But somewhere in the nVidia control panel for the display adapter, there should be an option whether to stretch images, stretch them but preserve aspect ratio or keep them in their original resolution (i.e. black bars all around if the monitor’s resolution is larger).
If your monitor doesn’t support full, 1:1 pixel mapping and aspect adjustments (mine doesn’t) then you’ll have to live with a stretched or cropped image when playing 4:3 games on a 16:9 display (16:10 in my case).
Check out this thread in the hardware section for more info.
I finally got non-wide resolutions working on my 8800GTS+Acer 2216Wsd.
I had to switch off the modern control panel, and revert to classic NVidia
controls, the type that integrates into display preferences. Look for the registry
hack which re-enables the FUNCTIONAL control panel.
With that installed, you will discover NVidia’s programmers are complete morons
(no surprise). There will be a special section for LCDs now, where you can
select one of four behaviours. Your NVidia documentation may say there is
a different number, but ignore that. Don’t click apply, just OK, after making
any changes; there’s a bug that sometimes resets the setting on apply.
Also, many LCD monitors have their own settings menu where you can switch from 16:9 to 4:3. I used to do this on my Dell 2405 with Battlefield because I didn’t like the stretching.
Games that don’t support non-standard aspect ratios are trite. It’s as easy as having a non-const FOV variable and an interface that will either grow/shrink without stretching, or dock the left to the left and the right to the right.
I’ve never been able to get the bars on my monitor…even with my nvidia drivers fully updated. I can’t find the option…it just doesn’t appear. Annoys me.
Interestingly, though, the stretching on older games that occurs when I’m using Gametap looks just fine. It’s like they adjusted them for my monitor. Some older games look stretched though, but it’s not nearly as bad with video games as it is with real video, IMO. It’s just harder to notice in most cases.
To sum up the answer to your basic question though, what you are playing with when you hack something like BF2 to run at wide screen is the in game FOV (field of view.) As far as I know they probably can’t modify that into BF2, it’s hard coded (just like in WoW as well.) You gain resolution on the side, but lose it top to bottom. The FOV never changed. Newer games modify this though, and you’ll find more and more games supporting wide screen if you look toward newer titles.
As for the black bars, that’s a product of your driver. A picture here says a thousand words though:
What you want sounds like the Centered Output setting.
That’s exactly what I’m looking for. However, I have no idea how you got to that control panel. I’ve been all over the Nvidia control panel, and couldn’t find it. I also can’t figure out how to turn “classic” mode on in my Nvidia drivers since I upgraded to an 8800…
Fixed aspect ratio scaling also works really well, at least on my system. Centered Output will take the exact resolution you specified and stick it in the middle of the screen, probably letterboxing on all 4 sides to do it. Fixed aspect ratio scaling will scale the image up so that at least one of the horizontal/vertical is scaled to fit the display while the other dimension is scaled to the same ratio.
I had that tab in XP and also have a version of it in Vista (in Vista it is called “Change Flat Panel Scaling”). Not that this helps you in any way, but uh, I can verify it does exist given proper drivers and enough looking through the different control panel options.
Hmmm. Do you have to re-install the Nvidia drivers after installing your new monitor? It may open more options when it sees you have an LCD as opposed to CRT?
are you plugged in via dvi or vga? the scaling options only appear if you have dvi.
it should be noted, after switching from a 7950gt to x1950xt that ati drivers do NOT have ‘scaled to fill with aspect ratio preserved’ – it has ‘fill’ and ‘1:1 centered’ only. what a fucking travesty.
ati catalyst drivers are ugly, clumsy and relying on .net framework, inexplicable stop loading/crashing all the time. i would have thought they they fixed this since my last ati experience 2 years ago with x800xl cards.
Woah…I figured it out, flyinj. First, go to manage custom timings, which should be in your regular (non nview…just nvidia) control panel, under display. Make sure that you are NOT treating your LCD like an HDTV. This will enable options that just weren’t there when that box was checked for me.
