Monitor resolution question?

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RealityClash

192 posts

Master Geek

#95093 27-Dec-2011 13:19

Hey guys,

Just wondering if anyone knows of a way to make a pc think that the monitors that are connected to it are capable of displaying higher resolutions than the monitor's actual native resolution? (If that makes sense)
The reason I'm wanting to know is because I currently have 3 LCD monitors hooked up to my PC. The center monitor has a native resolution of 1920x1080 while the two side monitors have resolutions of 1280x1024. I want to make my PC believe that the two side monitors can display a resolution of 1920x1080 as well. I'm hopeing that this is possible so that the extra pixels on each end of the two side monitors aren't actually displayed but just rendered so I'm able to use all three monitors for an Eyefinity setup.

Does anyone know of any software that would let me do this?

Thanks

tatbaird

142 posts

Master Geek

#561981 27-Dec-2011 21:05

As far as I know, if your two smaller monitors have "native" resolutions of (whatever X whatever), that's pretty much the maximum resolution you're going to get from them. I think eyfinity will reduce your bigger monitors resolution to match the smaller ones. Anyway, squeezing more pixels onto a smaller monitor would make it look pretty whack compared to the bigger one. Pixels per inch would be way different.

Good luck man.

RealityClash

192 posts

Master Geek

#561990 27-Dec-2011 21:57

I'm not trying to get the monitor to show 1920x1080 pixels. I still want them to show 1280x1024 pixels but i want my PC to render 1920x1080 pixels for each monitor and only have have the side monitors display part of the 1920x1080 pixels. This way all 3 monitors would be displaying their native resolutions as the extra pixels for each side monitor would just go unseen. This way my PC would render a 5760x1080 pixel image but the extra 640 pixels (1920-1280) at each end of the image as well as the 56 pixels (1080-1024) at the bottom edges of the image wouldn't be displayed.
I'm pretty sure this can be done as I remember doing something similar in the past with an older PC that was running Windows XP on a single monitor. I remember being able to set the display resolution to 2560x2048 even though the monitor could only display 1280x1024 pixels. It was just like the whole desktop had been zoomed in so not all of the wallpaper and toolbars etc were visible at once, hence, the monitor was still only displaying 1280x1024 pixels but 2560x2048 were being rendered by the computer and I just had to move the mouse to an edge of the monitor for the display to roll over to another part of the desktop.

insane

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#561993 27-Dec-2011 21:58

Most laptops support doing exactly that, just means you have to 'scroll' around to find the taskbar etc as the screen is obviously smaller than the number of pixels being displayed.

Try a program called Powerstrip, that usually allows all sorts of driver features to be unlocked.

Hammerer

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#562011 27-Dec-2011 22:47

RealityClash: I'm not trying to get the monitor to show 1920x1080 pixels. I still want them to show 1280x1024 pixels but i want my PC to render 1920x1080 pixels for each monitor and only have have the side monitors display part of the 1920x1080 pixels. This way all 3 monitors would be displaying their native resolutions as the extra pixels for each side monitor would just go unseen. This way my PC would render a 5760x1080 pixel image but the extra 640 pixels (1920-1280) at each end of the image as well as the 56 pixels (1080-1024) at the bottom edges of the image wouldn't be displayed.
I'm pretty sure this can be done as I remember doing something similar in the past with an older PC that was running Windows XP on a single monitor. I remember being able to set the display resolution to 2560x2048 even though the monitor could only display 1280x1024 pixels. It was just like the whole desktop had been zoomed in so not all of the wallpaper and toolbars etc were visible at once, hence, the monitor was still only displaying 1280x1024 pixels but 2560x2048 were being rendered by the computer and I just had to move the mouse to an edge of the monitor for the display to roll over to another part of the desktop.

You're talking about a virtual desktop http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_desktop#Windows. There's software to do it but most people got it as a feature of their video card. I'm pretty sure that the Catalyst control software doesn't provide an option to have different monitor resolutions for an Eyefinity 3x1 Display Group so a third-party product might do it but I'd be surprised.

Have you already tried it with Catalyst at the highest common resolution of 1280x1024? If you can't get that to work then trying for the higher resolution may be problematic anyway.

RealityClash

192 posts

Master Geek

#562123 28-Dec-2011 11:32

thanks insane, ill have a look at powerstrip tonight.
I can do eyefinity at 1280x1024 but because my centre monitor is widescreen it means the centre part of the image is stretched across the monitor.

RealityClash

192 posts

Master Geek

#563603 1-Jan-2012 22:06

I had a look at Powerstrip but I couldn't find any useful tools in it. Does anyone know of any virtual desktop software that would let me do what I'm trying to achieve?

insane

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#563621 1-Jan-2012 23:16

RealityClash: thanks insane, ill have a look at powerstrip tonight.
I can do eyefinity at 1280x1024 but because my centre monitor is widescreen it means the centre part of the image is stretched across the monitor.

With Powerstrip you are able to create custom resolutions, whether or not you can apply certain ones to different screens, I'm not sure, but I've done it using a single monitor some years ago.

Also check Ultramon out, think that might also be able to do different resolutions per monitor, although that may be a per application setting.

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RealityClash

192 posts

Master Geek

#563642 2-Jan-2012 03:22

Here's an image of what I'm trying to achieve.
http://imageshack.us/f/855/39244622.jpg/

So basically the three white boxes are the areas of the entire image that are actually displayed by my monitors, meaning that all three monitors are still displaying parts of the whole image at their native resolution while the two dark grey areas on the ends are areas of the image that are rendered for the two end monitors to display but aren't actually displayed by the end monitors.
This would mean that a 5760x1080 image is being rendered which would enable me to use Eyefinity but not all of that 5760x1080 image is actually being displayed by the monitors so that all three monitors are still only displaying images at their native resolution meaning no parts of the image would have to be stretched or warped compared to if i was to have all three monitors display a resolution of 1280x1024 each etc.
If you know whether powerstrip, ultramon or any other software is able to achieve this then please let me know and I would be really greatful if youd show me how to set the software up aswell :)
Thanks

Ragnor

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#564289 4-Jan-2012 11:55

RealityClash: Here's an image of what I'm trying to achieve.

http://imageshack.us/f/855/39244622.jpg/

...the two dark grey areas on the ends are areas of the image that are rendered for the two end monitors to display but aren't actually displayed by the end monitors.

Hmm...

Don't know of any software that does this.

Also practically every game and application would have stuff rendered in the grey areas that you'd like to be able to see and/or click on but wouldn't be able to see if you could do this.

Basically I think this setup would probably suck.