19" LCD monitor advice sought?

[eluminator]

The standard 17 and 19 inch LCD monitors are 1280 x 1024. I guess some monitors can handle being set to something else, but I don't do it.

You can make thing on these monitor be bigger without changing the "resolution".

Go to the window where you change the resolution. Then click Advanced. The DPI setting will probably be "normal". Change it to "large". If that doesn't make you happy, you can click "custom". There you have a large number of choices from tiny to huge.

When you click Apply, it will try to scare you by saying you will need to install new fonts. Ignore that. Later it will apologize and say the fonts are already installed.

It will also say you need to re-boot for the change to go into effect. That's partly true, but some things like windows explorer and the start menu will change as soon as you close the window. I guess you have to re-start Windows Explorer to see the change.

 

[javafool]

The standard 17 and 19 inch LCD monitors are 1280 x 1024. I guess some monitors can handle being set to something else, but I don't do it.

You can make thing on these monitor be bigger without changing the "resolution".

Go to the window where you change the resolution. Then click Advanced. The DPI setting will probably be "normal". Change it to "large". If that doesn't make you happy, you can click "custom". There you have a large number of choices from tiny to huge.

When you click Apply, it will try to scare you by saying you will need to install new fonts. Ignore that. Later it will apologize and say the fonts are already installed.

It will also say you need to re-boot for the change to go into effect. That's partly true, but some things like windows explorer and the start menu will change as soon as you close the window. I guess you have to re-start Windows Explorer to see the change.

I tried this again yesterday and it worked, partially. Some of the text resized just fine and some of the internet (CPF) text did not. So I had a combination of teeney text and some that read like it should.

So I reset the resolution to 1024 x 768 and 1280 x 720 and all is fine. It is not blurred of fuzzy, all is quite legible. If you have other suggestions I would appreciate hearing them.

 

[eluminator]

I tried this again yesterday and it worked, partially. Some of the text resized just fine and some of the internet (CPF) text did not. So I had a combination of teeney text and some that read like it should.

So I reset the resolution to 1024 x 768 and 1280 x 720 and all is fine. It is not blurred of fuzzy, all is quite legible. If you have other suggestions I would appreciate hearing them.

I have lot's of suggestions and each is guaranteed to be as useful as my first one.

I.E.7 has a zoom button on the lower right of the window. This seems like a winner, but there are always pitfalls I suppose.

Another thing to try is to set the browser to ignore font sizes on web pages. With I.E, you do this by clicking on Tools > Internet Options > Accessibility.

Then you can set the text size by clicking on "View" on the menu bar, and then clicking on "Text Size".

I.E.7 hides the menu bar by default but you can change that by clicking on Tools > Menu Bar.

 

[geepondy]

I have done quite a bit of reading this week (www.anandtech.com has very good user forums) and today went to Compusa to check out the Samsung 971P. I can say in my eyes, it outclassed the competition although at a steep $370 price point. It had a gorgeous display but so I thought did others including an Acer wide screen I looked at. But the big differentiator for the Samsung was the wide viewing angle. The Acer I thought looked nice dead on, very quickly washed out at very small viewing angles that were not dead on, not really better then most laptops I have seen. But the Samsung had a very wide usable viewing angle very much like a CRT.

 

[bill_n_opus]

I have done quite a bit of reading this week (www.anandtech.com has very good user forums) and ...

Was that suggestion from me?

 

[javafool]

I have lot's of suggestions and each is guaranteed to be as useful as my first one.

I.E.7 has a zoom button on the lower right of the window. This seems like a winner, but there are always pitfalls I suppose.

Another thing to try is to set the browser to ignore font sizes on web pages. With I.E, you do this by clicking on Tools > Internet Options > Accessibility.

Then you can set the text size by clicking on "View" on the menu bar, and then clicking on "Text Size".

I.E.7 hides the menu bar by default but you can change that by clicking on Tools > Menu Bar.

It may not sound like it, but I really am looking for help. It is my ignorance that is holding me back here.

The zoom button is good, but when the font sizes are *that* much different, the teeny becomes legible and the medium becomes HUGE with different font sizes on one screen.

There is no ignore font sizes on web pages in the Tools > Internet Options > Accessibility on my latset copy of IE7.

Next guaranteed useful suggestion please.

 

[Secur1]

I have a Samsung 930BF and the only side it lets me down is the contrast by being only 700:1 which means it doesn't disply true black hence all the rest of the colours just don't come up to par with my Iiyama 19" CRT.

So no matter which brand you decide to buy you have to look for the following

1) At least 1000:1 contrast ratio
2) Wide screen monitors have allowness for higher resolutions, so that's also a big plus.
3) Viewing angle, the bigger the better, otherwise if you look at the screen in any angle besides straight forward, it will look darker.
4) Even tho responce time isn't an issue anymore, make sure it's under 8sec black to black, not grey to grey or any other type of measurement.

I hope this helps in you to make up your mind.

 

[geepondy]

Yes, it would be Bill. I apologize for not giving credit where credit is due. It's just that I have been reading and posting on three different forums so I kind of lost track of the specifics on who said what. Anyhow, anand was by far the best forum (plus a nice guide to choosing an LCD monitor) so thank you very much for the suggestion. I feel pretty strongly I'm probably going to suck up the price and get the 971P. Most likely I will not buy another for at least a few years so I want to get the best possible at least in my eyes.

Was that suggestion from me?

Originally Posted by geepondy
I have done quite a bit of reading this week (www.anandtech.com has very good user forums) and ...

 

[eluminator]

Javafool,

I could mention what I do, but it may not help you. It doesn't make the text bigger but it's easier on my eyes.

I use ClearType. I guess this doesn't help if you don't use the monitor's native resolution. It makes small text easier for me to read. You can set it from the Appearance window by clicking Effects.

I get rid of the ubiquitous bright white background. First I change it in XP by going to the Appearance tab and clicking Advanced > Window Text > color 1 > Other. I use a pale cyan or pale yellow. Then I run I.E. and click Tools > Internet Options > Accessibility and check the box for "Ignore colors specified on web pages"

 

[javafool]

Thanks eluminator, I will give that a try.