I've got a new PC but still have my old "square" monitor. If I buy a widescreen monitor is it possible to display FS9 like the old "square" display and have black bars down each side, kind of like an old movie on a widescreen TV. I don't want to have everything streched. Sorry I'm not very technical and English is my fourth language.Thanks in advance for any replies.NiallerPS I know FS9 is not capable of widescreen while FSX is.

Incorrect, FS9 is more than capable of displaying widescreen and HD resolutions. However, once you get a widescreen monitor, running a resolution other than the native will make the sim look terrible.About the black bars I think you might be able to do that through the NVIDIA control panel or an ATI control panel as well.

Incorrect, FS9 is more than capable of displaying widescreen and HD resolutions. However, once you get a widescreen monitor, running a resolution other than the native will make the sim look terrible.About the black bars I think you might be able to do that through the NVIDIA control panel or an ATI control panel as well.

Thanks 833 HeavyNot quite sure what you mean by "running a resolution other than the native " Can you give me some more explanationThanksNialler

e.g. i use to have a square monitor now i use a widescreen one. fs9 is fine, but the add i use, pmdg 747, isnt so fine, the 2d panel is stretched. which is what i use to fly

They mean that if you ran FS at a different resolution to the 'real' pixel resolution of the screen, it would look bad. Of course, this is precisely why you would want to have some cropped areas on the sides, to avoid stretching your 2D panels (the VC view adapts automatically to fullscreen)...You should be able to do what you want with your graphics card driver software - I have also seen some monitors that have a '1:1' setting in their options which means that if you view (for example FS) at a 800x600 resolution, you will see exactly the middle 800x600 pixels being used on the screen (most of the time the default setting would be to fit the screen).Something you should consider though is to modify your panel setup (perhaps even make a wider panel bitmap and move gauges) in order to take advantage of the extra viewable area - the sim only gets more immersive as you increase what you can see (I'm running 'custom' 2D panels on a 3840x1200 display)!Cheers,Geoff

"running a resolution other than the native " means that flat LCD monitors are made with a certain resolution that works "best" for that particular monitor. Most of the time ( if not always) it will be the top (highest) resolution that it is capable of displaying. The monitor I'm using for this reply is a 22" Viewsonic" LCD monitor. It has the following possible resolutions that can be set and will be used for the display:640 x 480 all the way to 1680 x 1050. I think the resolution of 1680 x 1050 was the "native" resolution for this monitor, but since the higher the resolution the "smaller" given objects will seem to appear. I do NOT use this computer for Flight Sims so I have the resolution set to a NON-native resolution of 1024 x 768 so that TEXT will be large enough for me to read easy. On my Flight Sim computer which has (3) 26" Viewsonic monitors (a wide 16 x 9 ratio monitor) I do have it set to its native resolution of 1920 x 1200 and the round gauges are still ROUND, not oblong. On a wide monitor ( not a 4:3 ratio square monitor), to keep the round gauges round, the monitor must be set to its native resolution. I am NO expert on this subject, but I do believe the above information to be true and correct. I did a lot of research before I bought my present 26" monitors for my flight sim. jerrycwo4

I've got a new PC but still have my old "square" monitor. If I buy a widescreen monitor is it possible to display FS9 like the old "square" display and have black bars down each side, kind of like an old movie on a widescreen TV. I don't want to have everything streched. Sorry I'm not very technical and English is my fourth language.Thanks in advance for any replies.NiallerPS I know FS9 is not capable of widescreen while FSX is.

You can easily use a wide monitor in 2D, by simply dragging right edge of the panel to the left until gauges are round again, then filling in the blank space with popup(s). The pic is a simulation of wide monitors on my triple 4:3 monitor arrangement. The black areas are unused desktop for this "wide monitor" demo.When you're happy, save the flight for a fast setup next time.Alex ReidDreamFleet Bonanza in a simulated widescreen format. In this pic, the Throttle, Fuel Sw. & COM popups are used to fill in the blank area after dragging the main panel leftward.

If you have an Nvidia card, try this http://forums1.avsim.net/index.php?showtopic=245280&hl= (scroll to the very last post in that thread).RJ