That's brilliant, thanks for the detailed write up. I also fear that going forward, high resolution VGA support will become quite rare.

Using one universal LCD for modern and retro PC is nice... saves a lot of space. But does it support the 1600x1200 @ VGA in native resolution mode (black bars on the top/bottom/left/right side)? So far I've never seen LCD that can do this when using VGA input. Most LCDs can preserve the aspect ratio 4:3 but image is still blurry as it interpolates 1600x1200 pixels to something like 1920x1440.

PhilsComputerLab wrote:

That's brilliant, thanks for the detailed write up. I also fear that going forward, high resolution VGA support will become quite rare.

It's true -- the XL2735 has already dropped D-SUB. We'll have to rely on adapters down the road.

I had to reinstall my Voodoo 3 drivers and I lost my custom resolution. I spent a great deal of time tinkering with Powerstrip and I'm having a hard time reproducing what I did to finally get 1600x1200 in my resolution slider. I'm glad to have the program but I wish it wasn't so complicated to use... googling for guides doesn't yield much either.
Edit: Got it working... the problem was the Voodoo 3 1.07 driver. Once I reverted to 1.05 I was able to get my custom resolutions right away.

I thought the problem might have to do with the fact that when I go to monitor info it will show the custom driver I made when the pull-down is on Mode 1 -- showing 1920x1200. However, whenever I enter Monitor Information... it defaults to Mode 2 which shows 1920x1080p.

If I select "Read data from registry" and then recalculate display parameters it will again go to Mode 2 1080p which makes no sense since every entry that I've searched for containing the monitor name in the registry has it at 1920,1200 for max resolution -- the same as the custom .INF I created and installed. If I choose to "Read data from EDID" or "directly from Monitor" it will show Mode 2, 2504x1408@110. This leads me to believe that I'm not actually selecting or making changes anything in the monitor information section but just viewing.

If I go into Display settings and Advanced Timings/Custom Resolutions... well... either selecting a preset or creating a new one and hitting Add Resolution gives the "The parameters you have specified may be beyond the capabilities of your monitor or graphics card. Please recheck the resolution, horizontal and vertical refresh rates, and the pixel clock to ensure they are within spec." Choosing to continue has the monitor do a "res change" without actually changing the resolution. It follows up with the "Windows will need to be restarted to see if the display driver has accepted the new resolution. Unless you have additional custom resolutions to define, you should restart Windows at this time. Note: As a safety precaution Windows will be restarted at the current resolution. You can then use PowerStrip to switch to the new resolution, if available, with the option of easily cancelling the operation if your monitor goes out of sync." ... except the option isn't there after a restart.

Then I was sure that it was going to Display Profiles and clicking on the picture of the monitor next to the resolution slider to bring up "Uncap Monitor: An attempt will be made to remove Windows registry ceilings on resolutions and refresh rates available to your monitor. Are you sure you want to continue?" This, however, did not yield success either.

I'm really not sure why creating a custom resolution in Win98 is so complicated compared to in Windows 7 with nvidia control panel... but I'll try again tomorrow .... starting with a fresh Windows 98 install if need be.

Using one universal LCD for modern and retro PC is nice... saves a lot of space. But does it support the 1600x1200 @ VGA in native resolution mode (black bars on the top/bottom/left/right side)? So far I've never seen LCD that can do this when using VGA input. Most LCDs can preserve the aspect ratio 4:3 but image is still blurry as it interpolates 1600x1200 pixels to something like 1920x1440.

Yes. Once you've got the monitor set to 1600x1200 (and it will say so on the OSD) you just choose "1:1" instead of "Aspect" or one of the "4:3" modes and it will have borders all around. This is my preferred way of playing 320x200 resolution games in DOSBox.

Here is the monitor doing 1600x1200@60 over VGA in 1:1 mode like you inquired.

Terrific. I remember studying the user manual and the Benq gaming screens have the most options I've seen in regards to these retro resolutions. It's great seeing it do 1600 x 1200 in 1:1 like that.

Isn't there a retro 4:3 1440p resolution? 1920 x 1440?

Yup! There is 1920x1440. Again, for VGA it will require a custom resolution but if you're using a DVI or later card you should be able to select it by default -- it goes 2560x1440, 1920x1440, 1920x1200, 1920x1080 for the preset resolutions over digital.

Are you able to test commander keen 1 or 4 with VGA input in dos?

Not trying to be an ass, nor do I disagree with anything written here, just my 2 cents: "The perfect retro gaming LCD" is a bit subjective, for example some require extra inputs like SCART & video-in from "The perfect" LCD. 8-bit machines have soul too 😉

dirkmirk wrote:

Are you able to test commander keen 1 or 4 with VGA input in dos?

On a V3 2000 with WBC's KeenFix TSR they work 100% with the correct colors.

Without the fix it is sporadic, sometimes the game would load with correct palettes and other times there would be color corruption with red tints. Never any scrolling issues, though.

Those 2 games seem to make or break vga compatibility, they don't work on my Dell U2412M with various graphics cards or my old 8 series Panasonic Plasma which I tried for the hell of it.

I would get the red tinge corruption on the plasma they simply did not display on the lcd.

I wasnt aware of the Keenfix TSR but I presume thats one of handful of games that wouldn't work with any modern display(without the fix)

Epic pinball works fine on both displays, Commander keen must be some unique beast.

dirkmirk wrote:

I wasnt aware of the Keenfix TSR but I presume thats one of handful of games that wouldn't work with any modern display(without the fix)

Commander Keen problem!

It's a simple .COM file that you run in the directory.

yep. I have the XL2430T which is the 24" version, its great. I hook my SS7 up to it. can force it into 4:3 and stuff. works fantastically.

That's all fine and dandy, but TN matrix and horrible colors (usual problem of BenQ) is a big no-no in my book.

I agree same thing with my dell, good colours but blacks are atrocious, until OLED monitors become a thing I doubt we'll see the perfect retro monitor but ultimately VGA is not the "future" for retro builds we will all need to use DVI or HDMI with an adapter, VGA is getting harder and harder.

What I've always wondered: can it do 640x480 with high refresh rates on the D-Sub port with out skipping frames?

falloutboy wrote:

What I've always wondered: can it do 640x480 with high refresh rates on the D-Sub port with out skipping frames?

What might be a game to test? Usually the monitors that cannot do this are ones that can't really do more than 60 refresh. This monitor can go up to 144 and does true 70 when in 720x400.

Hah someone else with my monitor using it for retro gaming 😀. You're right it's fantastic for it, been using mine for a couple of years now, when I retire it as my primary monitor (most likely next year) I'll keep it around for a 100% dedicated retro monitor.

infiniteclouds wrote:

falloutboy wrote:

What I've always wondered: can it do 640x480 with high refresh rates on the D-Sub port with out skipping frames?

What might be a game to test? Usually the monitors that cannot do this are ones that can't really do more than 60 refresh. This monitor can go up to 144 and does true 70 when in 720x400.

Basically I just want to know if this monitor supports more than 76 Hz at the VGA-port, which I saw in the specifications for this model. This might be for the native resolution since it matches the maximum of 400 MHz pixel clock for VGA at 2560x1440.

For frame skipping testing I personally use the tool PixPerAn.
Info http://www.prad.de/en/monitore/testsoftware/pixperan.html
Download http://www.prad.de/download/pixperan_english.zip

It's using the resolution and refresh rate of the desktop settings.
There is a scrolling game and other tests included, which makes it easy to see stutters. It might require some CPU-power to hit 144 fps.
Would be great to know if this monitor can display high refresh rates with the VGA-port at lower resolutions as it's native.

Had to install powerstrip to mess with the hz since it just shows up as a default monitor for me, however I was able to run at 100hz 1280x720 just fine using the test above, the game ran at 100fps with 3 frames skipped, ran really smooth actually.

I remember a PDF showing refresh rates for VGA. Might be worth taking a look.