My display stretches 4:3 how to fix this?

[QwerkyPengwen]

HI there. my problem is hugely annoying but hopefully the fix is simple if there is one.

My monitor is a Dell E207WFP 16:10 @1680x1050 business monitor.
Whenever I load up an older game that doesn't support widescreen res. and only 4:3 it will stretch it to fill the whole screen. I want it to display the game in it's 4:3 state with black bars on either side of the game but for the love of me I can't seem to figure it out. As far as I know the monitor itself doesn't have any options to not stretch the image. the monitor is connected to my GPU via standard DVI connector.
What I would like to know is if there is even a way to fix this without playing these games in windowed mode (which some of them won't even do) and if so how do I do it?

 

[ffg7]

try lowering the resolution as the game might not be designed for 1680x1050.

 

[QwerkyPengwen]

try lowering the resolution as the game might not be designed for 1680x1050.

it'll stretch whatever image comes through it to fit the whole screen. even the desktop. I could set the desktop res to a 4:3 res and it'll still stretch it to fit the whole screen. so lowering my pc res won't fix this issue.

 

[Unolocogringo]

Open up Nvidia control panel.
on the left click on "Adjust desktop size and position".
On the scaling tab you have different options.
Full screen,aspect ratio, and no scaling.
And an option for scaling on the monitor or video card.
No scaling and scaling on the monitor are the ones you need to try.

I do not own the same monitor as you so I can not say how your monitor will react to each setting. Some Display fine with the image centered and some auto-scale.
Some do not give scaling option until it is needed.
So you will have to try the options and see how your monitor reacts.

 

[QwerkyPengwen]

Open up Nvidia control panel.
on the left click on "Adjust desktop size and position".
On the scaling tab you have different options.
Full screen,aspect ratio, and no scaling.
And an option for scaling on the monitor or video card.
No scaling and scaling on the monitor are the ones you need to try.

I do not own the same monitor as you so I can not say how your monitor will react to each setting. Some Display fine with the image centered and some auto-scale.
Some do not give scaling option until it is needed.
So you will have to try the options and see how your monitor reacts.

It looks like I have to do the screen resize option and manually set it to 1410x1050 (it wouldn't let me go to 1400 so my options were 1394 or 1410 and I chose the latter)
Below is a screen shot of what I had to do which is a pain but at least I now know that I do have a way of fixing it so that I can play those specific games without it stretching them. Thanks Unolocogringo!

 

[Unolocogringo]

Like I stated all monitors react differently so you have to try all of the different settings to see which one works for your setup. There is not one single answer that works for all setups.
Glad you got it working and have fun gaming without the stretched blurry screen.