Dual Monitors With Odd Resolutions/Sizes

[way2lazy2care]

So I switched TVs recently and decided to use my old LCD tv as a second monitor for my PC, as I thought it would be useful.

The TV is larger than the monitor, but has a smaller resolution. When I try to align the monitors in the resolution settings I can't seem to find anything that will let me say, "This screen has a smaller resolution, but is much larger. Adjust the mouse position according to real life, not resolution please."

Is there a way to deal with this situation? I don't really want to kill the resolution on the smaller monitor.

Any thoughts?

 

[hang-the-9]

Not sure what you are trying to do, but just keep both monitors at their default resolutions, nothing bad will happen except the windows will change sizes when you move from screen to screen. If you want to avoid that, need to use the same monitors.

 

[dechy]

No can do aside from forcing same resolution. I have the same "issue" for 3 monitors:

Left = 1280x1024 19"
Center = 1920x1080 23" (3D/120Hz main)
Right = 1920x1200 24"

The 24" was my main, but when I tried a 120Hz (didn't buy for 3D) it blew me away... so using that as main even if I lost workspace.

But what happens when I leave them all at native resolutions, is that my cursors seems to "bump" on invisible walls when I switch from one monitor to the other in the OS, which is normal because the resolutions are completely different... even that "small" difference in 120pixels between the 23" & 24" was frustrating as hell as first.

Force all resolutions to be the same (you will hate not being in native resolutions, better to deal with the cursor issue) or buy all same resolution monitors/TVs is pretty much the only options.

 

[way2lazy2care]

My issue is that moving from the small monitor to the large monitor the cursor either jumps, or the cursor gets stuck on the bottom/top of the monitor because Windows thinks the larger resolution monitor is larger; even though in real life the smaller resolution one should be the monitor it gets stuck on.

Mostly I'm just wondering if there's a setting in monitor alignment that lets you set a relative size rather than it being based off of resolution.

 

[hang-the-9]

The cursor behavior you see is normal due to the resolution differences. There is no way around it except to set both screens to the same resolution or get used to how this behaves. What you think should be happening is not how the computer thinks, human logical is not computer logical. In computer terms, it sees one screen as being say 1024 pixels high, the second is 720 pixels high. So the second screen is "smaller" even if it's physically larger. If you put a monkey costume on a human, a computer scan of it will say "it's a monkey" but you'll see is as a human in a monkey suit. It can't reason past what info it has in front of it.

 

[way2lazy2care]

Best answer selected by way2lazy2care.

 

[way2lazy2care]

The cursor behavior you see is normal due to the resolution differences. There is no way around it except to set both screens to the same resolution or get used to how this behaves. What you think should be happening is not how the computer thinks, human logical is not computer logical. In computer terms, it sees one screen as being say 1024 pixels high, the second is 720 pixels high. So the second screen is "smaller" even if it's physically larger. If you put a monkey costume on a human, a computer scan of it will say "it's a monkey" but you'll see is as a human in a monkey suit. It can't reason past what info it has in front of it.

Sorry your first reply popped up while I was writing my reply. (edit: oops. I got you confused with Dechy, but both of your answers were solid)

I kind of figured that would be the case, but I was hoping Windows might have some hidden option around it

It seems like an option that would make a lot of sense, but it is definitely a very edge case scenario of someone hobbling together all sorts of random screens. I did try shifting both monitors to the same resolution, and the smaller monitor worked better but I can't shake the feeling that gimping my small monitor to 720p is just hurting it's potential more than anything.

I just ended up aligning the monitors to the region I most usually draw my cursor across. Now it only runs into a wall at the bottom, since I drag my mouse across the top more frequently. It was very very annoying when I had the invisible wall at the top and the bottom though.

 

[Sitoshi]

The issue here is that the monitors are different aspect ratios and thus no resolutions will exist that will result in a full screen on all the monitors. To use your 3 monitors as an example, your 3 Left = 1280x1024 19", Centre = 1920x1080 23", Right = 1920x1200 24" will translate into 4:3, 16:9 and 16:10, although you could probably find a resolution that would be "acceptable" between the last two monitors, the image will still be stretched on one. If you bring the 4:3 into it then you will be left with black bars top and bottom of that screen to cope with the 16:9 or 16:10 resolutions. SO no monitor cloning will be worth it. You other option is to use the "extended desktop" and yes it will result with one screen being large and another being small AND you will still get the problem where you mouse will become stuck at the edge of one screen. Its like having a piece of A4 paper next to a piece of A3 paper, you couldn't draw a line between the two without first moving the pen up and in-line with the other sheet . . . if that makes sense. Hope this helps.

 

[Sitoshi]

The issue here is that the monitors are different aspect ratios and thus no resolutions will exist that will result in a full screen on all the monitors. To use your 3 monitors as an example, your 3 Left = 1280x1024 19", Centre = 1920x1080 23", Right = 1920x1200 24" will translate into 4:3, 16:9 and 16:10, although you could probably find a resolution that would be "acceptable" between the last two monitors, the image will still be stretched on one. If you bring the 4:3 into it then you will be left with black bars top and bottom of that screen to cope with the 16:9 or 16:10 resolutions. SO no monitor cloning will be worth it. You other option is to use the "extended desktop" and yes it will result with one screen being large and another being small AND you will still get the problem where you mouse will become stuck at the edge of one screen. Its like having a piece of A4 paper next to a piece of A3 paper, you couldn't draw a line between the two without first moving the pen up and in-line with the other sheet . . . if that makes sense. Hope this helps.

 

[eelcd]

under windows 7 control panel, display, screen resolution, at the top there is "Change the apperance of your displays", both monitors will be pictured based on the resolution you are running, you can drag the screens around to the position you want them in.

I run dual monitors, a dell 2411 in portrait 1200x1920 for web/documents and a samsung s23a950 landscape 1920x1080 for games/movies, I have the position based on the height of the samsung so when i drag something to the other screen it is linear, dragging from the dell it will stop if too high or too low.

 

[way2lazy2care]

under windows 7 control panel, display, screen resolution, at the top there is "Change the apperance of your displays", both monitors will be pictured based on the resolution you are running, you can drag the screens around to the position you want them in.

I run dual monitors, a dell 2411 in portrait 1200x1920 for web/documents and a samsung s23a950 landscape 1920x1080 for games/movies, I have the position based on the height of the samsung so when i drag something to the other screen it is linear, dragging from the dell it will stop if too high or too low.

Yea, I did that. The problem is that the larger monitor is lower resolution, so the mouse runs into an invisible wall because the bottom of the small monitor thinks it is below the bottom of the larger monitor, when in fact the larger monitor's top and bottom are both above/below (respectively) the top and bottom of the smaller monitor.

 

[Mousemonkey]

This topic has been closed by Mousemonkey