Well my wide screen LCD will just stretch everything. Remember the old games are 4:3.

Some LCDs have controls to adjust this. But AFAIK you are better off buying a 4:3 or 5:4 LCD. A 1600 x 1200 model would likely be optimal.

For testing I use a 15" XGA 4:3 Philips and it does the job, but it is slow, so ok for adventures, but not good for fast games like quake.

With VGA cards the signal quality can vary, especially if we are talking ISA. AGP is much much better. PCI, someone else might be able to tell us more.

Mau1wurf1977: Regarding widescreen, do any monitors out there have a setting for full-screen stretching vs 4:3 with bars? With my modern desktop, the only options I've found are in the video card and/or its drivers (so in Windows, and not on the monitor itself). So I'm curious if any monitors out there do have adjustments for aspect ratio correction (like how modern HDTVs have a full-screen, zoom, 1:1 etc).

Assuming all LCD monitors will try to stretch any incoming signal to fit the entire screen, then it seems like you should try to match the LCD's aspect ratio to that of old monitors, which I assume would be 4:3.

In that case, does more pixels (1600x1200 vs 1024x768) mean a better image from a 320x200 source? Will more pixels make the up-scaled image more or less blury? Do any monitors let you choose between a nearest-neighbor type scaling vs filtered?

And most importantly, are there modern LCDs that simply refuse to display old signals?

Naibas, I really hope some people share their experiences about this topic. I keep meaning to upgrade my LCD. I did some research a while ago, and these two models seem good: Dell Ultrasharp U2410, and HP LP2475w. They are both widescreen, but apparently have good hardware scaling.

Both manuals are available online to download from Dell and HP, and in the appendix section, they state what resolutions are guaranteed to work with hardware scaling. I did copy and paste the relevant pages to a post of mine here about a year ago, but I can't locate this post at the moment...

I two 17" Viewsonic monitors, both are 4:3 ones (max resolution 1280x1024) and ~5ms ... I am very satisfied with them, you cannot reach the crt feeling but the space saved makes it worth 😀

If you want to keep it straight you should only use a crt 😉
Way back at the time of the Voodoo2 Imswitched from crt to a 15"lcd and that worked nicely for me.

My Dell 2405FPW and 2005FPW have options for full stretch, aspect ratio stretch, and no stretch. The 4:3 1600x1200 availability on the 24" gives a very nice aspect ratio stretch whereas the 1680x1050 doesn't fit DOS resolutions well so things get a little jagged in spots.

So I think monitors with 1600x1200 or 1024x768 available as native are probably best. It's too bad 1280x960 monitors don't exist.

An idea for figuring out what a monitor can do before buying it is to look up the manual online or look at monitors at a store and browse their menus.

Most LCDs run at lower resolutions just fine (they have to for now, in order to support text mode stuff like the BIOS readouts/CMOS setup/etc.), but that's not all you have to be concerned with.

If you ever run into a problem wherein your monitor puts a strange border around the stretched image at lower resolutions (and only at lower ones, i.e., 640x480 and below) and you're using HDMI, try VGA. I had a monitor that was doing that to me (28" Hannspree) - took me forever to figure out a way around it.

The panel type plays a big part in color reproduction - an IPS or PVS panel produces superior color variety without dithering when compared to a TN panel (typical monitor). I always thought TN panels were fine, until I had an IPS sitting in front of me. It's so much closer to a CRT in color quality - but most DOS games are very low in number-of-colors, so depending on what you're doing this may be irrelevant.

In addition, the ratio of screen size to resolution (called pixel pitch, the equivalent of dot pitch in CRTs) is important. If you don't have good eyesight, don't worry about that, but if you do, the smaller the pixel pitch the better - at around 0.25 pixel pitch I can't see the pixels without being an inch or two from the screen, and I've got incredible vision.

A big advantage to emulating classic games - when using an LCD only, mind you - is that the emulator (in this case DOSBox) can scale the image up to the native resolution, or the PC's hardware can. Often one of those two choices produces a better image than a monitor's scaling - but that depends on the monitor and GPU. If you get a monitor that you like but you feel it would benefit greatly from some better scaling, there are boxes you can buy that are dedicated to upscaling images better than your typical device can (but these can be expensive, I've never shopped for one though, so there might be cheaper options).

Personally I purchased a Dell monitor with a glossy finish (anti-glare kills my eyes), 21.5" 1920x1080 (.248 pixel pitch), and an IPS panel, and I'll be using it for DOSBox and real DOS machines (though I always keep a nice CRT nearby, usually my 21" Sony E540). I also bought a Matrox G250, which will be capable of running that monitor at 1920x1080 and has drivers for Win3x & 9x as well as good DOS support - it also has drivers in much newer OSes at least upward of WinXP (which means those drivers can be forced in Vista/7 if they don't have their own built-in or available somewhere, not that I'll be running the card on those OSes). That'll go in my primary retro box so I can share the monitor with my modern box (at native resolution under 9x).

^- Monitor I ordered, a ST2220T, Dell's only glossy IPS - also happens to be multitouch, that'll be amusing.. 😁

Naibas wrote:

Mau1wurf1977: Regarding widescreen, do any monitors out there have a setting for full-screen stretching vs 4:3 with bars? With my modern desktop, the only options I've found are in the video card and/or its drivers (so in Windows, and not on the monitor itself). So I'm curious if any monitors out there do have adjustments for aspect ratio correction (like how modern HDTVs have a full-screen, zoom, 1:1 etc).

These monitors exist, especially the 1920 x 1200 models. However I wouldn't count on 320 x 200 working on all models. This is something you really need to test.

In that case, does more pixels (1600x1200 vs 1024x768) mean a better image from a 320x200 source? Will more pixels make the up-scaled image more or less blury? Do any monitors let you choose between a nearest-neighbor type scaling vs filtered?

I would assume the 1600 x 1200 would do better scaling. I haven't come across a LCD where you can change the scaling algorithm.

1024 x 768 screens are usually quite old, slow, not the best colors. 1600 x 1200 are great, but a lot harder to find and expensive. They are also massive in size.

1280 x 1024 are very cheap, easy to find and available with good specifications. They are 5:4 however. Now this is something many people don't even know, so it might not be a big deal.

IMO you should be able to get a 15" and 17" / 19" for next to no money. So I would grab a few second hand and just see how you go. Finding a 1600 x 1200 screen will certainly require some effort. Oh and there are also 1400 x 1050 LCDs...

And most importantly, are there modern LCDs that simply refuse to display old signals?

Nope, they will always display an image. Full screen stretched usually.

Finally regarding DOSBox, for 320 x 200 games, you are best off with a 1600 x 1200 or 1920 x 1200 screen.

Only with these screens will you get pixels that are the same size. Divide 1024, 1280 by 320 and you see what I mean. However you can always play in window mode and avoid this issue as well.

keropi: my guess is that your 1280x1024 is actually 5:4, not 4:3.

swaaye: awesome! good information there, thanks.

Yushatak: good info, thanks! I didn't know about pixel pitch before.

Mau1wurf1977: yeah, I agree, I'm thinking I should really pick up a 1024x768 and a 1280x1024 (off ebay, I suppose) and just see if either do the job. I wouldn't mind springing for a 1600x1200, although I like the idea of keeping the size around 17" or less.

Yea, these 1600 x 1200 screens are massive! That's why the industry loved going to 16:9. Less LCD material at the same screen size...

I remember my first LCD. It was a 19" model for ~ A$ 400 with 8ms. I was soo happy when I got it and never looked back to CRTs. I didn't know about the 4:3 and 5:4 issue until years later 🤣

15" you should be able to get for next to nothing. 17" and 19" still have some value, but not much. The push for widscreen works in our favour here. 4:3 screen really don't sell well 🤣

Anyone sharing Dosbox preferences for output/scaler on LCDs?

I use 0x0 tv2x forced on ddraw doublebuffered. I still miss the phosphors fading and a bright image though 🙁

For 1600x1200 LCDs, I was thinking of this one: Dell Ultrasharp 2007FP. I never bought it, because I was worried about the slower response time of 16ms. The other two monitors I mentioned earlier had faster response times, and had good hardware scaling, but they are more expensive.

leileilol wrote:

Anyone sharing Dosbox preferences for output/scaler on LCDs?

I use 0x0 tv2x forced on ddraw doublebuffered. I still miss the phosphors fading and a bright image though 🙁

I like it clean and blocky!

I use:

fullscreen=true fullresolution=0x0 output=openglnb aspect=true scaler=normal3x […]
Show full quote

fullscreen=true
fullresolution=0x0
output=openglnb
aspect=true
scaler=normal3x

The HP LP2065 (IPS version) is the God among 4:3 LCD's. It's also popular with the MAME crowd for similar reasons.

My Dell 2209WA (1680x1050) IPS screen also has excellent hardware scaling. It can be set to 4:3 mode and scale to the vertical height.

Around 3 years ago I bought an Iiyama ProLite B2403WS-1, which is a 24" screen with a 1920x1200 resolution. The colours aren't too great in my opinion, but what I do really like are the scaling options. You can stretch the picture, maintain aspect ratio or apply 1:1 pixel mapping. The last mode means that a 640x480 picture, for instance, will actually use only 640x480 pixels on the screen, which results in a very sharp picture. Of course the picture gets a bit tiny as you only use a small portion of the screen, but people in the past used small CRTs too, right? 😎

Anyone know the reason why they didn't make 1280 x 960 LCDs? I mean it's double 640 x 480 and would have made a lot of sense. Why did they go for 1024 lines?

Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

Anyone know the reason why they didn't make 1280 x 960 LCDs? I mean it's double 640 x 480 and would have made a lot of sense. Why did they go for 1024 lines?

Maybe because it was a more widescreen-ish solution??
Thinking about it, in the age of the ever increasing size CRT's who decided what resolutions were going to be standardized?
Anyway, it didn't matter for CRT's as those are (were) more flexible).

Yea good question.

Maybe they wanted to crack the 1000 pixel barrier 😜

Mau1wurf1977: I bet 5:4 fit a particular media or task better than 4:3. Like how 16:10 came about because it could fit a 16:9 movie and have space left over for editing UI for film editing software (at least that was the rumor I heard).

valnar: wow, the LP2065 sounds amazing, although pricey and from what I've read so far, uncertain if you'll actually get an IPS or not.

So I bought a ViewSonic VA903b (19", 1280x1024) off a guy on Craigslist for $30, and it is REALLY lovely. It is bigger than I wanted, but $30 seemed like a great price, especially when I saw how well it had been cared for.

I haven't run much on it so far (just DOS and Doom 2) because I'm fighting with the sound card now, but the 5:4 doesn't bother me (at least not yet :p ), and everything scales much cleaner than I expected. For my purposes, I think I've found what I need. I might revisit this once everything else is working, but for now I'm pleasantly surprised.

If you are interested in my AWE64 struggles, someone else started a thread with exactly my problem, and I've decided to hijack it: AWE64 Diagnose / AweUtil error