aspect=true

That doesn't fix the problem and in fact makes things worse because then the game is squeezed on the sides.

are you sure this game shouldn't be like that? what about other games?

seems to work in some games and not work in other

name the games where it works and where it doesn't

well it doesn't work for space invaders for one

In skyroads it works well (I think, the speedometer is perfectly round. is it supposed to be?)

In Ping & Kooky's Cuckoo Zoo (don't judge me. I downloaded it just for testing.) some elements seem to be ok and others are not.

To sum up if I have the aspect set to false, every game looks exactly like the screenshots on abandonia. If I turn it off, some games (like skyroads) actually look better.

edit: could it be that it actually is supposed to be kind of widescreen-ish in some games? Looking at screenshots of other games they are almost all like that.

Thing is that 90% of screenshots on the internet have the wrong aspect ratio because most aren't aware. DOSBox's built-in screen-capture feature stores the images at 320 x 200 which is stretched unless you scale it to a 4:3 ratio resolution like 640 x 480. Most people don't scale them.

YouTube is FULL of intros, let's plays and playthroughs with old games in widescreen.

These are the settings I use and they should "just work":

[sdl] fullscreen=true fulldouble=false fullresolution=0x0 windowresolution=640x480 output=opengl […]
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[sdl]
fullscreen=true
fulldouble=false
fullresolution=0x0
windowresolution=640x480
output=opengl

[dosbox]
machine=svga_s3

[render]
frameskip=0
aspect=true
scaler=normal3x

There are more settings, but these are the ones to check / make sure they match.

Instead of output=opengl you can also try openglnb or ddraw if you prefer razor sharp pixels but don't mind some pixels being different sizes.

opengl will smoothen things out a little but also make it a bit less sharp.

I can test it on my DOSBox and also on my real DOS machine and tell you what happens.

PS: Text mode AFAIK is different and won't be 4:3. Can't remember the reasons or / if there are versions of DOSBox that do display the text in 4:3. With text I mean the command promt.

Thing is that 90% of screenshots on the internet have the wrong aspect ratio because most aren't aware.

Well that's good. All those screenshots actually got me thinking that I may be the one that's doing it wrong 😊

Feel free to email me that game for TESTING only.

No need. Here's the abandonia link:

http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/25139/Ping+ … Cuckoo+Zoo.html

The thing is, with this game it was really hard to tell which aspect ratio is the correct one. As you can see on the screenshots, the green GO sign is squeezed and the red STOP sign isn't.

With 4:3 aspect ratio the HUD seems fine but all the animals seem a little stretched. They actually look somewhat better and more realistic with the widescreen aspect ratio but then the HUD is squeezed.

Anyway, thanks for the settings advice. Now I've just got to figure out why midi won't work and I'm good to go.

How come that DOSBox in windowed mode with 640x480 gives me squished pixels? If 640x480 is the right aspect ratio shouldn't that give me the best results?

[sdl] fullscreen=false fulldouble=false fullresolution=0x0 windowresolution=640x480 output=openglnb […]
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[sdl]
fullscreen=false
fulldouble=false
fullresolution=0x0
windowresolution=640x480
output=openglnb

[dosbox]
machine=svga_s3

[render]
frameskip=0
aspect=true
scaler=normal2x

I use:
fullscreen=true
fulldouble=true
fullresolution=0x0
windowresolution=original
output=opengl
aspect=true
scaler=none

This will cause OpenGL to stretch the game to the native resolution of your monitor, with aspect correction.

Stay away from the scalers if you want to stretch to your full screen (with or without aspect correction). If you're using anything other than scaler=none, then that's probably why you're getting bars all the way around.

@teppic: 640x480 is too small to stretch from 320x200 with aspect correction without being able to see some stretched pixels.

I see now why that wouldn't work. When I use 800x600 with my config above everything looks alright, but I take it pixels aren't actually right or something?

Can I somehow set DOSBox to use aspect=false for windowed mode and aspect=true for full screen?

Yasashii wrote:

No need. Here's the abandonia link:

http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/25139/Ping+ … Cuckoo+Zoo.html

This is what it looks like on my PC:

Here my complete config file (I use D-Fend reloaded frontend)

# This DOSBox configuration file was automatically created by D-Fend Reloaded. # Changes made to this file will NOT be transfere […]
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# This DOSBox configuration file was automatically created by D-Fend Reloaded.
# Changes made to this file will NOT be transfered to D-Rend Reloaded profiles list.
# D-Fend Reloaded will delete this file from temp directory on program close.

# Config file for profile "Ping"

[sdl]
fullscreen=true
fulldouble=true
fullresolution=0x0
windowresolution=640x480
output=opengl
autolock=true
sensitivity=100
waitonerror=true
usescancodes=true
priority=higher,normal
mapperfile=I:\D-Fend Reloaded\mapper.map

[dosbox]
machine=svga_s3
captures=I:\D-Fend Reloaded\Capture\Space Quest\ #This seems a bug with copying profiles
memsize=16

[render]
frameskip=0
aspect=true
scaler=normal3x

[cpu]
core=auto
cputype=auto
cycles=fixed 30000
cycleup=10
cycledown=20

[mixer]
nosound=false
rate=49716
blocksize=1024
prebuffer=10

[midi]
mpu401=intelligent
mididevice=default
midiconfig=

[sblaster]
sbtype=sb16
sbbase=220
irq=7
dma=1
hdma=5
sbmixer=true
oplmode=auto
oplrate=49716
oplemu=default

[gus]
gus=false
gusrate=44100
gusbase=240
gusirq=5
gusdma=1
ultradir=C:\ULTRASND

[speaker]
pcspeaker=true
pcrate=49716
tandy=auto
tandyrate=49716
disney=false

[dos]
xms=true
ems=true
umb=true
keyboardlayout=US

[joystick]
joysticktype=none
timed=true
autofire=false
swap34=false
buttonwrap=false

[serial]
serial1=dummy
serial2=dummy
serial3=disabled
serial4=disabled

[autoexec]
@echo off
SET PATH=Z:\
keyb US 437
mount C "I:\D-Fend Reloaded\VirtualHD"
echo.
C:
cd\
cd \GAMES\PING\PING&K~1
Z:\config.com -securemode > nul
call ZOO.BAT
exit

Teppic wrote:

I see now why that wouldn't work. When I use 800x600 with my config above everything looks alright, but I take it pixels aren't actually right or something?

Can I somehow set DOSBox to use aspect=false for windowed mode and aspect=true for full screen?

Not sure what you mean with " pixels aren't actually right". But technically what is happening:

LCDs have square pixels
CRTs didn't (you adjusted the image to fit the screen)

And if a 320 x 200 resolution fills the whole screen (a 4:3 screen) then the pixels are non-square.

So to fix this the pixels need to be scaled and the aspect ratio corrected. And so what you see is a by-product of this.

However it should be very subtle and not that obvious IMO.

I only chose 640 x 480 as an example. Choose the highest one that fits into your screen. So if you have a 1920 x 1080 monitor like mine then 1280 x 960 will give you a nice large window.

Try out the render options opengl and openglnb and choose the one you like. opengl is smoother but not as sharp, openglnb is razor-sharp but pixels end up having different sizes.

Windows mode at 1280 x 960:

HunterZ wrote:

scaler=none[/b]

This results in a very blurry image on my machine. 2x or 3x scaler avoids this.

Try using output=openglnb and keeping scaler=none to avoid blurring. This will still fill the screen with an aspect-correct image without black areas around all 4 sides. The downside is that it may be more obvious that some emulated pixels have different sizes from others.

I prefer the blurring because it results in a softer, more CRT-like image and obfuscates variations in emulated pixel size, but that's just me.

I also tend prefer the blurry image of opengl vs. openglnb (although I would go with opengl or ddraw if I had a 1200p screen).

I have no letterboxing issues with 2x and 3x scalers. The machine has an Nvidia card.

HunterZ wrote:

Try using output=openglnb and keeping scaler=none to avoid blurring. This will still fill the screen with an aspect-correct image without black areas around all 4 sides. The downside is that it may be more obvious that some emulated pixels have different sizes from others.

Hmm but this will give you pixels of different size. IMO opengl with 3x scaler has the nicest overall look. Pixels are aliased so they appear to be of the same size. And this also makes the image a little bit smoother, not as razor sharp.

I took some more images:

opengl with 3x scaler

opengl with no scaler

openglnb with 3x scaler

openglnb with no scaler

Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

IMO opengl with 3x scaler has the nicest overall look. Pixels are aliased so they appear to be of the same size. And this also makes the image a little bit smoother, not as razor sharp.

That's my preference too. Having a "normal4x" or even "normal5x" scaler would be even nicer for today's increasing monitor sizes.

Those photos of yours should probably go in some kind of guide thread 😀

FWIW, I'd advise you guys to edit that game link out of your posts... being not exactly allowed and stuff.

Hmm, that opengl with no scaler actually looks as if it uses a radical scaler