New LCD Monitor won't work with certain emulators

[markronz]

I've been helping a friend of mine configure his new cocktail cabinet recently.  The other day, you fine folks here on the forum helped direct me to a better monitor that has an excellent viewing angle.  This was the post here.   We went with the Dell UltraSharp 2007FP 20-inch model LCD.  It had an L at the end of the serial number, so it's a S-IPS panel.   Anyway, the monitor did totally fix the viewing angle stuff.   It works with MAME, and most other emulators, but there's two in specific where the monitor doesn't seem to work with.   When I try to run either the nestopia or snes9x emulators (at full screen) the monitor displays an error message.   It says "Out of range signal. Cannot display this video mode, change computer display input to 1920x1200 @ 60 hz"   I am currently running Windows at 800 x 600, and I believe I have the monitor settings in Windows set to 60hz.   So I guess I'm a little clueless as to where to start with this?   When I look at the Device Manager, the monitor is just listed as "defualt monitor" or something generic like that.  Do you think there's like specific drivers I would need for this monitor or something?   Or do you think there's something else I'd have to configure to get it to work?  I have this same software on my own PC, same config, and I've never had a problem.  I just copied it directly over to his PC.  So it has something to do with his PC or monitor.  Any ideas for things I can try to resolve this?

Thank you!

[JODY]

The full screen resolution is probably set wrong in the emulators.  In Snes9x for example go to Options then Display Configuration.  The default full screen resolution is 640x480. 

[markronz]

I don't believe that's the case but I will have to check it out later to confirm. I have my PC all set up as 800 x 600 so nothing should have changed as far as the emulators settings when I copied it over to his PC.  That is unless those settings are stored in the registry or something.  But I think most emulators for ini files. 

[jmohr1]

unless you have some reason not too, you should always shoot for the lcd's native resolution and refresh rate(which is probably what the error message is telling you, 1920x1200 60hz) on your emulators and even in windows. for the most part, as long as you don't turn on any weird filters, things will work out best that way. of course not all older emulators have settings for newer resolutions, so that may be causing a problem too. try to change all resolutions to the monitors actual pixel count and see what happens.

[JODY]

Yes, native resolution will look less fuzzy.  If using an old PC that isn't very powerful the higher resolutions may cause slow down or skipped frames but if at all possible always run at the higher resolution.