I've been looking for a nice LCD monitor recently, (my 19" CRT is just too much of a hassle to carry around), and I came across the Dell 2405FPW. With 12ms response time, it seemed like this could be the item I save up for over the next few months, but one question I had was about the widescreen, and how that worked when using anything fullscreen. For instance, in game settings, if I were to set it to 1024x768, or 1280x1024, or even 1600x1200... Would there be black bars on the side, so the image was a 4:3 ratio, like it was intended to be? Or would it be stretched out? If it's stretched out, then I wouldn't want to get it, so this is a big deciding factor. Anyone have a widescreen lcd that can shed some light on this?
Slightly off topic but is that display just a rebadged Viewsonic screen? Or have dell just ripped off the stand design? Its basically the same as my Viewsonic VP171s :| I always wondered that about the widescreen panels too... let me know on the answer as my dads been thinking about one for his computer!
Hm, I dunno what you're talking about, with the stands being the same... That doesn't look like the stand for the Dell...
I think it'll have black bars down the side,i think i read somewhere it might take a bit of editing config files though.
Well, some games (the hl2 set first off) have a widescreen setting -- it basically makes your entire game screen have a wider view, not just stretches it out. Otherwise I believe it would add black bars. OT -- bennifer...bit of a duck fan are we? Your av, your entire desktop...
I guess that part looks the same, but that looks the same in almost all monitors with height adjustment. The actual base of it, with the feet, that looks different.
like Zephyr said Most games have widescreen resolutions. but if you set it for like 1600x1200 i believe it will be all over to one side. but you can just adjust the screen so that its in the middle.
i think so too, because i was playing battle field on my friend's sony laptop, widescren, and it put black bars.
here is the bottom when it comes to widescreen screens and gaming. Sometimes the game will support weird resolutions. Take my laptop for example it's native res is 1280x800. so most games don't support it. But you can find a couple that do i think UT2K4 does. Also you could choose a resolution thats close. Thirdly you could edit the games config files and finally you could tell the driver to strech the video to the edges, i think it's in there for nvidia, i just can remember. But ultimately it's a tradeoff for using a wide screen. Or you could buy to 15" panels and run a 30" wide monitor using spanning some games support that as well. Anyway enough of my ramblings, i hope this helps. Cheers.
I have the Dell 2005FPW Most games will support wide screen with no problems. Bu there are a few that dont like it so i play them at 1280x1024. The monitor has a mode that lets the aspect ratio of 4:3 be used so that the picture does not get streched. if you want i can take a few pics to show what i mean.
Ok some pics This is the game at 1680x1050 (native res) This is the game at 1280x1024 using the Aspect Mode That is 1280x1024 using Fill mode. As you can see, the fill mode streches the image to fill the remainder of the screen. If you look at the first pic and then the 3rd, the truck looks wider in the 3rd because it is streched. Puting the monitor in aspect mode fixes that.
I got it cheap with a dell discount code just before the xmas. It was going for $639.20 with free shipping. Before the discount it was $799 plus shipping. Today you can get it for: $636.65 without a discount
Holy cow!! That's cheaper than I expected. The 21" Viewsonic I want is that much. What's the viewable amount when not in widescreen mode? Like, how much space do the black bars take off of a 1280 x 1024 image? My 26" LCD TV has an itty bitty image in 4:3 mode, so I end up stretching the screen to fit, is that doable with this monitor? The stands might be made by Ergotron (it's called the Neo-Flex). I noticed that the description stated the monitor could rotate to landscape or portait mode and turn all around. My Ergotron stand does that, and I know they OEM them to some companies with different designs.
If you look in Pic 2, its 1280x1024 in Aspect mode and in Pic 3 its in the "stretch mode". That should give you a idea of the space lost. Yes the monitor can go into portrate mode, but ive never been able to get the screen's image to rotate.
