DOS box full-screen "out of range"

[chromatic47]

I just switched from a CRT monitor to LCD, and one of the more irritating differences in useage is that an out of range notifier pops up on the screen during BIOS post and stays there until arriving at the Windows desktop, after which the notifier disappears and monitor is happy. (This is with analog D-SUB not DVI connection.)

Then once in Windows, if a DOS box is opened up in windowed mode, the monitor has no problem with that, but the instant I switch to full-screen mode within the DOS box, up comes the out of range notifier again. Something drastic appears to be happening to either the refresh rate and/or the screen resolution when DOS or a DOS program is shown full-screen as opposed to windowed. Can somebody explain why this is, and how to correct it if possible?

System: Win98se, nVidia FX 5200 video card, NEC 20WMGX2 monitor -- but same thing happens also on the Win95 machine with ATI Rage Pro 128 card. Any help to solve this mystery much appreciated.

Edited October 6, 2008 by chromatic47

[Tripredacus]

I believe that the DOS Window runs at a display resolution allowed by the mode.com program.

My LCD (NEC Accusync LCD 72vx) says that the command prompt in Windows 98 at full screen runs at 720x400.

This resolution is not supported by your monitor. SeePage 30.

http://www.necdisplay.com/cms/documents/Us...als/20WMGX2.pdf

I do not know if it is possible to configure what resolution the command prompt displays as.

Edited October 3, 2008 by Tripredacus

[chromatic47]

I believe that the DOS Window runs at a display resolution allowed by the mode.com program.

My LCD (NEC Accusync LCD 72vx) says that the command prompt in Windows 98 at full screen runs at 720x400.

Ah ha! Thank you for that info. It gives a starting point to fix this.

This resolution is not supported by your monitor. See Page 30.

http://www.necdisplay.com/cms/documents/Us...als/20WMGX2.pdf

Yes the manual gives a short-list of recommended resolutions, but the monitor will nevertheless display at other res's — it just complains about it. (Not sure what the point of that is.

I do not know if it is possible to configure what resolution the command prompt displays as.

I'll definitely look into that. Thanks for your help.

[BenoitRen]

LCD monitors are different than CRT ones. They have a native resolution. All others are scaled.

[chromatic47]

LCD monitors are different than CRT ones. They have a native resolution. All others are scaled.

Correct, and some LCDs are better at this than others. Right now I am using 1024x768 to browse with, and while it is stretched to the 1680x1050 screen, it remains very clear and sharp. A 720x400 DOS screen is stretched as well, and quite readable, but the out of range notifier comes up because the monitor doesn't have a built-in scaling algorithm for that res. 720x400 is 80x25 textmode with the standard VGA 9x16 font. Probably NEC dispensed with this mode because the monitor was pointed to the gaming market. I bought it for the S-IPS panel, which has very good viewing angles and true 8-bit color for photo editing.

At any rate, I found a neat little TSR which provides complete control over either a windowed or full-screen DOS box or session. Among other things it can set the number of columns, number of lines, and fg/bg colors. Most importantly for me it can set the VESA mode, so I can get up to 1600x1200 32-bit color in a full-screen DOS session. I set it to 800x600, which keeps the out of range notifier happy.

There are two variants, one for windowed boxes (~8k) and one for full-screen sessions (~21k). If anyone wants to customize their DOS sessions, this utility is pretty cool.

http://www.geocities.com/jadoxa/tm/index.html

And a list of the VESA codes:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VESA_BIOS_Extensions

[Tripredacus]

I was also wondering from reading the manual. It says that on the secondary inputs (not HDMI or DVI) you could set the screen to display at actual size. Wouldn't this mean you would have a really tiny DOS box in the middle of the screen surrounded by black?

[chromatic47]

I was also wondering from reading the manual. It says that on the secondary inputs (not HDMI or DVI) you could set the screen to display at actual size. Wouldn't this mean you would have a really tiny DOS box in the middle of the screen surrounded by black?

Given the maximum res of this LCD of 1680x1050, at 1:1 scaling the native DOS res of 720x400 would be a little less than half of screen width and height, and surrounded by black. Not super tiny, but any text would be pretty small. However if the TSR mentioned above were used to set a VESA mode of say, 1280x1024 it would fill a good chunk of the screen.

But with the NEC 20WMGX2 it can't happen anyway because the hardware scaling implementation is not available for DVI-D or analog, only for HD and video inputs as you said. Seems a bit arbitrary.

I just got DVI set up on the Windows 98 machine, and DOS screens are automatically displayed at 1680x1050. I can now get scaling through the nvidia control panel, so I'm going to experiment with the TSR and see if it works under DVI with driver scaling.

Edited October 7, 2008 by chromatic47

[Tripredacus]

I think its fun when I try to help people with problems I have no experience in. I am good at general ideas sometimes that make other people remember or think of something to try. Either way, it usually turns out to be a learning experience for myself anyways.

Glad I could help.

[chromatic47]

Either way, it usually turns out to be a learning experience for myself anyways.

That does seem to be how it always works.

Thanks!