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A New Bigger Monitor? Now What?

Written by: Dan Daily

Hi Gang!

Several folks have written saying they get scroll bars for side to side on their monitors. They write asking me if I could reformat the page so it will fit. Well gang, the page is supposed to fit, I format it to fit a 15" monitor. You may want to print this out gang, as you will be in Control Panel.

So Let's kick this puppy now!

The strange thing about this, is some of you have bigger monitors then I have! And still the pages didn't fit? The first thing I did was not even believe it. LOL But, of course, it was true.

The one thing all had in common was they all had upgraded their monitors with larger ones. Something I did many years ago, so I couldn't remember if I had changed anything. Well I did, so lets explore how to set up your systems for larger monitors. You're are going to thank me for this.

Ok, before we start, let's get our story's straight. I'm going to assume that you had either a 14 or 15 inch monitor, and upgraded to a 17, 19, or 21 or any monitor that's not doing it correctly.

What Is Resolution?

Let's take a trip to control panel shall we? Go to either "Start/Settings," or "My Computer/Control Panel" to get there. Click on the Display button, and the Settings tab; this is where we'll be for a while.

On this screen, you see a picture of a monitor with the words underneath "Display:" After which, is your monitor and video card it's hooked to. What's nice with Windows 9x, when you change monitors, this is automatically updated. No drivers to load. Pretty kewl. Next you see the "Colors" section, then the screen area box, and that's where we'll start.

Screen Area Box

This box, will have set on it what your monitor resolution is presently set at. Most commonly, if you had a small display, it's set for: 640 x 480 pixels. By clicking and holding on the slide bar, you can drag it over, and other resolutions will pop up. 800 x 600, 1024 x 768, etc etc, going on with all the settings your monitor is capable of doing. By changing this setting up the scale, you make everything much more detailed, but also smaller. Example: If you have a 15 inch monitor, it'll be set at 640 x 480. Now move the bar over to 800 x 600 and click apply, when Windows makes the switch, everything shrinks so far, you can barely read it. This is why the default is 640 x 480.

That said, if you have a 17 inch or above, it should be set at 800 x 600. Make it so, click on apply and let Windows make the changes. If you don't like it, you can always switch it right back the same way.

We're not done yet

The Colors Section

This section sets the amount of colors your screen will show: Chances are, it's already set at "16 bit High Color." If you click on the drop down menu, you'll see other choices as well. 16 color, 256 color, 24 bit true color, and 32 bit true color; depending again on what your monitor and video card can handle. 16 bit high, is pretty much the defacto setting today. Depending on your video card, you can switch to 24 or 32, but this can slow down your performance. My computer is set to 32 true color, but quite frankly: I don't notice any difference at all in clarity. Those of you with old machines set to 256 colors might want to try 16 bit, it may slow you down, but it's worth a try.

One Last Setting

OK, now that our resolution and colors are set, there is one more critical setting, and that's type size. This is the one that is usually overlooked. This is at the "Advanced" button. Click on it, and at the top you'll see the type size screen. If you had a 15 inch monitor, it's probably set at large. Change it to small. Now we're almost done.

How It Looks

Now that the settings are complete, you probably have a mish mash desktop. If so, now it's time to use the buttons on the front of the monitor to fill the screen. You remember, like you did when you first got the monitor. Either use the book that came with it, or, some monitors have actual buttons with legends on them to tell you what they do. Wish mine was like that. Others, like mine, use a menu button, and you scroll through the size menus and use + - keys to resize the screen.

Either way, time to size your screen up so it fills up the monitor. And Wow! What a difference eh? Now when you get on the Internet, you'll notice how almost every site on the net now fits you screen perfectly. And who do you have to thank? LOL

If all of this is done correctly, your Windows screens, your AOL screens, and your Icons will be almost exactly the same size they were on the little monitor, but now, much more will fit on the screen because of the larger size, which is why you bought it in the first place.

I hope this helps you on your road. Your Road?

Yes, Your Road To Computer Sanity

Danny

Remember When?

A computer was something on TV
From a science fiction show of note.
A window was something you hated to clean,
And ram was the cousin of a goat.

Meg was the name of my girlfriend,
And gig was a job for the nights.
Now they all mean different things,
And that really mega bytes.

An application was for employment.
A program was a TV show.
A cursor used profanity.
A keyboard was a piano.

Memory was something that you lost with age.
A CD was a bank account.
And if you had a 3 inch floppy,
You hoped nobody found out.

Compress was something you did to the garbage,
Not something you did to a file,
And if you unzipped anything in public,
You'd be in jail for a while.

Log on was adding wood to the fire.
Hard drive was a long trip on the road.
A mouse pad was where a mouse lived,
And a backup happened to your commode.

Cut you did with a pocket knife.
Paste you did with glue.
A web was a spider's home,
And a virus was the flu.

I guess I'll stick to my pen and paper,
And the memory in my head.
I hear nobody's been killed in a computer crash,
But when it happens they wish they were dead!