Reader, subscriber and friend Walter Scott wrote to ask:
Terry, my new laptop is widescreen.If I connect it to the Clickers (non-widescreen) projector the laptop automatically sets itself for a non wide screen resolution. The signal going to the projector is fine,
and on the laptop screen the standard screen display is nicely centered
on the wide lcd, with black areas on the left and right. This is cool.But on Karen’s widescreen laptop, this does not happen. She has to
manually set her resolution for something like 1024 x 768. At that point
the image on the projector is fine, but on her lcd, the standard size
image is stretched out to fill the lcd, and looks pretty awful.I’m curious what your laptop does?
Walter M. Scott, III
Senior Control Systems Engineer, Retired
Digital Video Conversions & Services
http://smengineers.net
Different video cards, or in this case, different embedded video "cards" in our notebooks, handle the capabilities of monitors and projectors differently.
While monitors have grown quite advanced in resolutions, LCD/DLP projectors are still in their infancy. One of the finest resolutions available on LCD and DLP projectors these days (at least at affordable prices) is 1024×768.
When I connect my notebook to a projector that does 1024×768, my notebook (a Dell Inspiron 8600) automatically resets its resolution to 1024×768 AND STRETCHES the image on my widescreen LCD.
I get used to it. However, if I was demonstrating graphics, though, it would drive me crazy.
By the way,
- if you have icons on your desktop, the automatic resizing may move them around. If you don’t do anything to them, when you disconnect from projector and then boot again at home, the icons should be in their normal places.
- I have found, however, that if I move an icon, it will lock-in the 1024×768 icon rearrangement, and I’ll have to manually clean it up when I get home.
This happens because Windows “remembers” (in the Registry) the settings of the Windows Desktop — and saves those settings when you make any change.
and