How To: Game With Black Bars (non-widescreen)?

FirstMM · Post by **FirstMM** » 12 Nov 2003, 20:13

Try this...

right click on the desktop
select properties (the same section as updating your screensaver or desktop)
select settings --> advanced --> displays
above the picture of the notebook click on panel and deselect "scale image to panel size" and click okay.

I tried this on Thief 2 because it was stretching all over the place and it worked.

FirstMM · Post by **FirstMM** » 12 Nov 2003, 20:16

ah, right -- read the posting from the beginning again :oops:

Been testing it some more and it doesn't work at all -- I just got lucky with the resolution... :?

kushalc · Post by **kushalc** » 13 Nov 2003, 04:57

yup
tats what usually happens...
at 1024 x 768 the screen becomes the right aspect ratio but its soo small its unplayable.

Post by **skipclarke** » 24 Nov 2003, 17:24

I think this is what you are looking for. robN8R (who I think is on here as well) posted it on the zd7000 forums

If you want the system to stretch your game to fit the widescreen "Use Display Adapter Scaling" under DisplayProperties/Settings/Advanced/GeForceFXGo5600/FlatPanelDisplay. If you don't want the system to stretch the game select "Use Centered Output". If you want the aspect ratio to remain fixed and have the system scale up to fit as much as possible on the screen, chose "Use Fixed Aspect Ratio Scaling".

I have seen a few complaints about the widescreen stretching. This should help resolve this. Although I like the widescreen stretch, I'm afraid it might ruin my game when I switch back to a normal monitor. Not that I had such a great game to begin with. hehe

Even if we don't come up with the solutions ourselves, we scour the net looking for them. :D

Hopefully you have a GeForce-based chipset, so this will work for you. If not, you might now be able to contact ATI asking about "Fixed Aspect Ratio Scaling" and have them know what you're talking about.

umbra · Post by **umbra** » 25 Nov 2003, 02:31

I assume you've also tried setting the game options to display it at 1152x864 or 1280x960 or 1280x1024? All of those resolutions should work on your 1680x1050 display, theoretically.

Unless the vid card guys specifically code their drivers to do the stretching you're talking about, there's not going to be any way to get a 1050px high display. The 4:3 ratio would mean it would be 1400x1050, and I've just never seen a game display that.

I'd say your best bet would be to go for 1280x960 or x1024 and just live the with extra pixels around.

Possibly if you buy pizza for everyone at ATI they'll code some new drivers for you, though.

barbengogo · Post by **barbengogo** » 15 Dec 2003, 04:29

If understand well you fdon t like the stretched aspect.If you use all the height of you screen you ll get that stretched feeling anyway.I have a 1440-900.If i want to reproduce the 4:3 ratio using all the height of my monitor, I would have to use 900 pixels of height, and (900x4)/3=1200 of width out of the 1440 available.
If your using more pixels than the original resolution, although ratio is respected, you ll have a blurry strange image i presume, since pixels of the monitor are not resizeable...
Wasn t very clear, some will get the idea...

MateoTTR · Post by **MateoTTR** » 04 Feb 2004, 16:10

I think the fixed aspect ratio scaling truly is an issue for the ati mobility 9600 pro...
Games are going to be more and more demanding and it would be useful to have the card computing only a 1024*728 image that is afterwards upsampled and interpolated to fit the screen (keeping the aspect ratio, that is a 1200*900 image if you have a native 1440*900), because, ok, you can always find hacks and tweaks to make the game engine display a widescreen image 1440*900, but it hurts performance a lot and games are goinf to run less and less smoothly.
I think it is important to make the game engien generate a lower res image that is afterwards scaled to fit the screen otherwise we won't have far cry or other new games coming running well in wide screen.

quietas · Post by **quietas** » 04 Feb 2004, 16:46

I've tried this a few times on various games. I have yet to figure out a way where on my 1680x1050 screen I'd get a true 4:3 ratio. It either streches, or with the scaling setting it displays at 1024x768 or whatever 4x3 ratio with black bars on al 4 sides.

I know with DVD's players, WinDVD in particular, they scale for 4:3 fullscreen and give you the bars on the sides if you have a widescreen display. I wonder if there is a way to get some sort of video wrapper to intercept the display and blow it up to a true 4:3 fullscreen with the black side bars.

puddy007 · Post by **puddy007** » 14 Feb 2004, 22:14

Ditto on the last post. I get black bars on all 4 sides (essentially a smaller screen) or I get a 1024x768 stretched to fit my widescreen which is capable of 1440x900 if I run it to fit screen.

Anybody have a solution yet?

dark prophet · Post by **dark prophet** » 17 Mar 2004, 01:21

Has anyone tried this with the mobility 9700??

whooshy · Post by **whooshy** » 02 Apr 2004, 21:17

So has anybody found a fix for the aspect stretching?

I'm playing some old games, more specifically, The Longest Journey.
Unfortunately, it seems stuck at a 640x480 resolution. My settings are set so that it does not stretch the window, and centers it at the middle with a very thick black border around it.

So is there any program that allows me to stretch the entire screen of the game, while keeping the 4:3 aspect ratio?

By the way, i have an X1010 with the ATI Mobility Radeon 9200 with the newest omega drivers

Post by **Paradigm Shifter** » 03 Apr 2004, 12:48

Not on ATi cards, unfortunately. :(

flashram · Post by **flashram** » 14 Jun 2004, 00:18

Nvidia cards support this. I can't get my notebook w/ Radeon 9600 to maintain the aspect ratio though. Very annoying.

Apparently it does work for some people:

http://dbierano.home.comcast.net/options.jpg

Post by **skipclarke** » 14 Jun 2004, 03:59

flashram,

glad to see you around here. :-) any idea what version of driver this person was using? the stretching thing is the one main reason I switched from the x1000 to the zd7000. if there is an ATI solution that provides for scaled stretching, I might switch back when i upgrade next time.

flashram · Post by **flashram** » 16 Jun 2004, 03:07

I've been around here for awhile, just haven't posted. :)

I believe they said Catalyst 4.5. However, no one else could get that option to show up. When I had my x1000 I had this option. The only thing I see in common is the higher resolution display, 1680x1050. I have a Gateway m505x right now with Radeon 9600 and 1280x800 resolution, and I cannot get the option to show up in the control panel. Maybe we need to start a poll to see who panel resolution panel people have and whether the option is available. What resolution was your x1000?

Post by **skipclarke** » 16 Jun 2004, 03:17

Mine was only the 1280x800 as well. I'm guessing you got that info from over at the x1000 forums. Would that be the place to run the poll?

Post by **Paradigm Shifter** » 17 Jun 2004, 12:53

I believe they said Catalyst 4.5. However, no one else could get that option to show up. When I had my x1000 I had this option.

Cat 4.5, eh? Guess I'll have to try Modded ATi stock drivers, then...

flashram · Post by **flashram** » 18 Jun 2004, 15:51

Mine was only the 1280x800 as well. I'm guessing you got that info from over at the x1000 forums. Would that be the place to run the poll?

The picture was from someone at the Rage3d forum. Here, Rage3d, x1000forum (or all) would be a good place for a poll.

lain · Post by **lain** » 14 Jul 2004, 22:29

bump, was this ever solved?

Post by **Paradigm Shifter** » 15 Jul 2004, 16:07

No, unfortunately, it wasn't. I tried the latest drivers (HP's own, modded ATi's and Omega drivers) and none of them made the option appear to 'scale with fixed aspect'... :(

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