Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with resolution

Surrounded by darkness...

ricochet biscuit — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 12:45:08 -0800

I have an Omnitech OM22WD monitor and I want to change the display. It is currently showing me a 4x3 aspect ratio (i.e. it is a wide screen and I am currently seeing two black bars bracketing the image) and I want to switch it back to full screen. I have misplaced the documentation. Any suggestions?

How to Initiate "Operation: Disambiguate"

Anonymous — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 15:11:34 -0800

So, this dude has been sending me extremely mixed and just plain weird signals for awhile. I've decided to get to the bottom of this. Problem: I'm hella awkward. Help me start this conversation, MeFi! For the past two and a half months or so, I’ve had an odd relationship with this one special dude. For various reasons, we see each other a lot (I’m a queer guy in college, for context), and our interactions with each other have been oscillating between blasé casual friendship and hyper-engagement with me for multiple hours. At times, I could swear he was flirting with me, which I had taken as a fairly probable signal for romantic-sexual interest, as I rarely think anyone is flirting with me, even if they in fact are. However, the disconcerting disconnect between the two sets of moods—combined with my own passive nature—led me to be really confused as to whether I should try to pursue anything further. (Obviously, I’m very interested, or else I wouldn’t be making this post!) One night when we’re up late working, though, he mentions that he “may as well” talk to a boy who he later identifies as his boyfriend, who is abroad far, far away. Weird, I think, for him not to mention a boyfriend when we see each other regularly, but my thought is that I must surely have been reading things incorrectly, as, duh, he’s taken and probably not actually interested in me. “Well, that sucks!” I think, and go back to my collegiate life.

The weirdness (or, at least, my perceived weirdness) doesn’t cease, though. At one party, he makes a big deal out of talking about his boyfriend in the past tense for about five minutes, then half-heartedly corrects himself into the present. At another recent party he invited me to, he did this strange thing where he would come up to me, start talking for a bit, retreat to the corner (talking to nobody), and then coming back up and talking to me again before restarting the cycle. This was apparently so noticeable that my friends there all noticed it as well, coming up to me to offer their own statements of confusion while I stood there, boggled with a drink in my hand. More importantly, at a party I invited him to in turn he takes me aside at the end, and pulls out some small cultural artifacts from his trip abroad this last semester, and hands them to me as a gift. (I had referenced them in a really, really passing verbal communication that I can’t even recall the context of now.) “These are my last [artifacts from my abroad trip.] I wanted you to have them,” he says before his friends drag him home. Today, he barely acknowledges my presence. lolwhut?

WTF WTF WTF. I’m stumped—my friends are stumped—it’s very possible that God himself is stumped. I’m still feeling like I’m getting mixed—and just kinda strange—signals. Most importantly, all this nonsense I've been putting myself through with regards to trying to analyze each individual unit of information, change of mood, gesture, et cetera has been driving me nuts, and I’ve decided it’s time to finally break out of my typical passivity and have a conversation with him directly addressing some of the questions I have. I wish I had just come out in one of these previous situations and just recognized the elephant in the room, but the best I can do at this stage is address it as soon as possible, probably as soon as we get back from the Thanksgiving holiday. It’ll suck if the answer isn’t what I want, but at least I’ll have an answer that I can process and move the hell on from, rather than keeping my psyche in this constant, vigilant holding pattern. I’m pessimistic, but want a consolidated reality rather than a gazillion possible realities.

The Question, Restated: However, this is so out of my comfort realm that I have near-literally no clue of how to go about this. How do you begin this sort of conversation? An e-mail message… what do I say, how do I preface it? All I can think of is, "Hi, we need to talk," and that just sounds awful and confrontational.

And, say, I get him down talking (in-person's the only way to go for the actual discussion, I realize)… what are some acceptable ways to go about this? Especially if this somehow all ends up being from my end and not from his, I don’t want to make things totally awkward and awful for him. In my mind, I’m thinking something like: “Hi, [dude,] so for awhile now I feel as though I've been receiving some messages that you may be attracted to me, but at other times I have not. I don't mean to accuse you of doing one or the other, but I just wanted to know how you actually feel, so I can figure out what's going on.” Does this sound OK? Could I say anything better? Is that laying it on too heavy, or sounding too accusatory? My main interest, after all, is just figuring things out in a way that can be best for everyone's emotions involved—I don't want to deal in any nonsense about him "leading me on" if that's the case, I just want to disambiguate the situation and move on from there. Does anyone have any experiences with this sort of thing that they could share?

It's a big step for me, personally, to even think about having this kind of awkward conversation with someone, and I'd really appreciate the advice on how to go about doing it, because I'm determined to do it. Thanks so much, MeFi!

Bigger without Blurrier

rahnefan — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 20:52:27 -0800

How can I get a DVD movie to fill (at least one axis of) my screen without compromising the picture quality? Two years ago we were given a Samsung HDTV, something like 32 inches wide. In the settings, we generally have "Size" set to Just Scan. For normal TV or the HD channels, this works fine. For movies however, there's a problem.

Mrs. RahneFan and I are two different kinds of grumps. I won't watch anything visually intense if the picture quality is sabotaged by intentional distortion of the picture. A circle must be a true circle and the human body must have correct proportions. Details meant to impress me are things I don't want to miss. And nothing should be cropped. Conversely, detail, proportion, and seeing something as it was intended to be seen do not matter much to her, but she hates the so-called black bars probably more than your grandmother does.

Movies on cable channels only display undistorted if we change the resolution to 4:3 instead of Just Scan. So we flip back and forth for that, not a problem usually. But...

DVDs, when the TV is set to Just Scan, display in lovely, crisp detail, but do not fill our screen; the black borders she despises appear above, below, and on both sides. I see the movie, not the black, but like her, I would rather it filled our screen on at least one axis or the other. We have GOBS of space on all four sides, so why can't it be bigger?

The player is a Pioneer, don't even remember how old it is.

The only other options that appear available are 16:9 (unacceptable stretching), Zoom 1, and Zoom 2. Zoom 1 and Zoom 2 are both blurry and crop the movie on all four sides. For example, parts of DVD menus don't even appear onscreen at those settings.

Is there some way to maintain the clarity and detail of a DVD and have it large enough to fill our screen on at least one axis, without stretching or cropping the picture? Some way to make it automatically enlarge whatever is playing, regardless of aspect ratio, until it touches either the vertical or horizontal edge of the screen?

I am aware that movies can be shot in a wide variety of aspect ratios, and that DVDs can be edited with hard matting etc. Will it require knowing exactly what every movie's aspect ratio is and whether or not it has been matted and how, and relearning all this crap every time, and making some odd specific combination of settings to get it right? Shouldn't the technology be smart enough to do this on its own by now?

My best friend and wife are fighting. Should I try and mediate or stay out of it?

washateria — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 08:29:36 -0800

My best friend and wife are fighting. Should I try and mediate or stay out of it? My best friend of ten years is a former boss we can call her FormerBoss/Mentor. FormerBoss/Mentor and I have a great deal of common interests and even though she can be a bit prickly we have always gotten along and enjoy each others company.

My wife of five years is a professional house painter and recently did some painting work for my FormerBoss/Mentor. The work was suppose to be only painting, but my FormerBoss/Mentor called my wife and asked her to supervise another person doing work in the house while she was there, be there to let in other workers, etc. This wasn’t part of the work but my wife did everything that was asked. There were also a couple of pictures left out to be hung and a smoke alarm to be installed with a note, saying “would you please…?” and those things were not part of the agreement and my wife did not do those things. During the week the job ended they were to see each other at an event on Friday evening and they established during a phone call that my wife was to get paid for the job that evening. That evening came and my FormerBoss/Mentor said nothing but “Sorry, I forgot my checkbook.”

No other discussion, no thank you for the work. My wife handed her the keys to her house. The next day they saw each other at another event and there was not any discussion of the work or how my wife was to be paid or any thank you for doing the work. On Sunday my girlfriend emailed my FormerBoss/Mentor and said she was hurt, she felt unacknowledged and unappreciated and wanted to know how she was going to get paid. My friend sent an email saying “I had no idea you should have said something I don’t carry my checkbook with me everyday”.

A few days later a check arrived in the mail. There was a housewarming party where my wife chose not to go because she was still really angry with my friend and I didn’t go because something deep inside told me that no matter what I should stand by my wife. My FormerBoss/Mentor called me on Monday and asked why I wasn’t there and I said because she needed to work out this issue with my wife. My friend says she has done nothing wrong and that she has been very good to my wife and my wife won’t accept her part in it, she never provided an invoice. My partner says this has nothing to do with money or an invoice it has to do with acknowledgement and that my FormerBoss/Mentor should have thanked her for the work and acknowledged the job she did, painting + many extras.

I am so upset that they are fighting like this. Should I call my FormerBoss/Mentor and ask her to please just say thank you for the work my wife did so this can be over? Should I try and stay out of it? Before this happened we were all very close almost like family. I think personally that my former boss was upset that my girlfriend didn’t do ALL the extra things she left out for her and that not saying thanks was a small passive aggressive dig at her. Any advice is appreciated. I really don't know if I should try and mediate or stay out of it. I feel as if my water dish has been moved very far away from my bowl. Any thoughts are appreciated.

Looking for High Res Pic of World Map

Atarah — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 20:57:00 -0800

Looking for a High Res. Political Map to Print on Canvas So I found this lovely Canvas World Map at IKEA. However, it's $200, and that's quite a bit over my budget.

I was considering creating my own version however. I have a friend who has access to a large HP plotter at work that can print high res. pictures on canvas.

However, I've been looking for quite a while on the internet, and I cannot find a nice, high resolution, political/geographical hybrid map, that looks similar to that shown at IKEA.

If possible, I'd like to find a map that is slightly brighter and more colorful than the IKEA one, but it shouldn't be really childish (putting it in an office). Also, it should be as detailed as most maps, but I don't need to have every city in the world plastered all over the map, with trade winds and currents, etc. Going for simple, but informative.

Something like this would be perfect, but I can't find a digital version similar to this anywhere!

Would any of you know where I could get a digital copy of a map that fits most of these requirements? Please let me know if I can provide anymore information. Thanks a lot!

Thinkpad refuses to obey my wishes for higher resolution!

midatlanticwanderer — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 07:52:42 -0800

My new-ish laptop running Vista keeps resetting to 800 x 600 resolution on restarts (from crashing) and restarts from intentional shutdowns. How do I prevent this from happening in the future? Among other woes with Vista on my relatively new Lenovo Thinkpad T400 (purchased from the Lenovo outlet three months ago), it seems to crash frequently. When restarting from those crashes, it often resets to an 800 x 600 resolution from its default resolution of 1280 x 800. Also, when I intentionally shut down the computer, it will sometimes then start up in the 800 x 600 resolution.

I have seen some mention of this issue elsewhere (namely, here and here). The second link recommends setting the monitor to be the primary monitor and have it extended across the desktop, which I have already done. Otherwise, some of the solutions don't seem to apply (i.e. my "base video" item is unchecked on the boot tab of MSConfig).

The monitor on the laptop is a Thinkpad MaxBright Display 1280 x 800 ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3400 Series.

Any wisdom from the generally-more-informed hive mind would be much appreciated!

Select a TV for our conference room

namith — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 06:04:16 -0800

Help me select a TV (to be used as a computer monitor) for our conference room. We've got a small conference room at the office. I'm considering buying a used LCD (or plasma?) TV to use as a computer monitor for meetings. I need a little guidance in choosing the right specs. Size: We don't have too much wall space, so I'm thinking a 36" class would work. We will be sitting no more than 6 to 8 feet from the screen.

Input: The TV will likely hook up to an older 2GHz Intel MacBook. I assume most TV made within the past 3 or 4 years have standard inputs for computers (VGA and/or DVI). Should I be looking for something specific in terms of inputs?

Resolution: My biggest unknown is using the TV as a computer monitor. We are generally going to be looking at web stuff using a browser. I obviously want clear text and images. I don't know anything about how TV resolution compares to computer resolution. Most of the websites we'll be visiting are designed to be about 950 pixels wide, I guess to fit properly in 1024px monitor resolutions. For the TV, I want the browser window to roughly fit the screen -- not a very small window and likewise nothing that requires horizontal scrolling. So I guess the questions is, what resolution should I be looking for in selecting a model?

Refresh rate: I assume this is not too important in my case. I understand refresh rate to be important for sports (i.e. rapid changing graphics). We won't be doing any gaming in the conference room.

Type: Plasma vs. LCD?

Brand: Once I figure out what I need, I'll be scouring Craiglist for something that fits the specs you recommend. I know there are 'throw away' brands such as Vizio and Polaroid. In visiting people's homes, I see Sony Bravia and Samsung. Any input on brands would be helpful as well. Honestly I don't expect to use this for a 'lifetime.' I'm just trying to get a few years of reliable service. Keep in mind, that it won't get the usage that a typical TV gets. Maybe a few hours a week at most.

Anything else?

Thanks for your input and guidance. Any details that can help me make a decision are much appreciated.

After Effects Resolution vs Adobe Premiere

bostonhill — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 12:22:09 -0800

After Effects Resolution vs Adobe Premiere Hey everyone,

I just bought After Effects and I am sort of a noob when it comes to this so I am hoping someone can help me when it comes to aspect ratio/resolution.

I have a file that was created in AE where the resolution is 1280x720 (16:9), however, the format I am working with in Adobe Premiere is 720x480 (I use a DVX100b camera).

What do I have to do in order for the 1280x720 resolution to fit properly in Premiere 720 by 480?

Much thanks

Mac and eystrain

lsemel — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 21:21:17 -0800

I've been wanting to switch to a Mac for around a year, but my vision isn't perfect and Macs seem to be designed for designers with 20/20 vision. First I tried a Macbook Pro 15" and everything was too tiny for me (I asked a question about this on this site previously, but couldn't find any good way to enlarge everything, unlike on Windows which is full of options for this). Then I got a Mac desktop and hooked it to my old monitor, which was nice and big (19" 1280x1024) but now the text is big but so fuzzy it immediately gives me a headache and eyestrain looking at it. When I switch to Windows in VMWare this feeling immediately goes away. I am already using DVI, have calibrated the monitor, adjusted the brightness, tried all levels of font smoothing, checked the resolution, toyed with the contrast settings in universal access, and tried every other adjustment I could think of.

So, what's the best super-sharp, high-contrast LCD monitor for a Mac that doesn't make everything look tiny? (Apple's 30" and 23" displays are too high-res for me) Or is there some other solution I've overlooked?

I have around 10 days before I have to return it, and if I don't find a way to use it comfortably, I'll just have to face that the Mac is just not for me and go back to Windows for the foreseeable future.

Windows 2000 max resolution issue

kraigory — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 08:12:27 -0800

I'm working on a windows 2000 pro machine that is running at 800 x 600 resolution. The monitor supports 1024x768, but in display settings, the resolution slider is all the way. It seems that 800 x 600 is the max resolution. Is there any way I can increase this?

Help me with new screen resolution!

Rad_Boy — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 14:27:36 -0800

I need to change the screen resolution to 1280x1024 for a new app on my work pc, but my eyes much prefer the lower resolution (1024x768). There are other problems, too! I have a dual monitor setup at work (each 19 inches) and have been happily computing along using Windows XP with my screen resolution set to 1024x768. I mostly use one monitor for my work while the other serves mostly to provide some extra deskspace for Goggle Desktop Apps. In the near future, I expect to use the second one more. But I'm digressing. I like this resolution because it's easier on my eyes. It's just plain easier to see. I wear progressive lense eyeglasses.

Now we are getting a new application for which the screen resolution has to be set to 1280x1024. I have tried changing back and forth between my preferred resolution and 1280x1024 because it is not too hard to do but it jacks up certain things: icon placement and wallpaper location.

I wonder what creative ways others have solved this problem.

digital photos scan resize resolution freeware frame

cuddles.mcsnuggy — Sat, 30 May 2009 11:01:07 -0800

Seeking software for scanning old paper photos into digital format. I'm hoping to find something that will automatically crop to borders of the photo so I don't need to manually crop every one in Photoshop. Bonus points if it will automatically resize all the scanned images into a specific resolution size. Mom's birthday is Wednesday and I have a digital photo frame. I'm planning to spend part of the weekend scanning old family photos from albums and saving onto an SD card to use in the frame. There are dozens, possibly a couple hundred, photos. I don't have nearly enough time to manually crop and resize every single digital pic so I turn to you, o' wise MeFites for guidance! My scanner is a Canon MP600, the frame is an 8" Matsunichi PF800M with 800x600 pixel resolution, and I have Photoshop CS4, but I'd rather not use Photoshop since it's much too slow and complicated for the simple stuff I need to do. I just want something quick and easy that'll let me hit "scan," and tah-dah! I'll have frame-ready photos in a flash. I prefer something free (or very cheap) that I can download from online since I need it right now. Does such a beast exist?

How much detail could the Hubble telescope see?

crazyray — Tue, 12 May 2009 20:35:38 -0800

What resolution would the Hubble Telescope be able to discern, if we pointed it at my back yard instead of into the stars? Would it be able to pick up individual blades of grass? Would it be able to see bacteria or anything not visible to the naked eye? Could it see the illuminated dial of my watch at night? For the sake of argument, assume that there is zero cloud cover or atmospheric interference. Also assume the camera and mirrors etc. would even work pointed towards the earth instead of away. Bonus points if you can show how you calculated the resolution.

Help forcing non-native resolution for external monitor.

Jackie_Treehorn — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 08:00:20 -0800

Need help forcing older laptop to power external LCD monitor at a resolution of 1280 x 768. I've got a Gateway Solo 1450 laptop with an Intel 830M graphics chip inside. I need to hook up via VGA at large LCD monitor to it. The monitor has a native resolution of 1280 x 768.

My problem is that the 830M doesn't support that resolution. The closest resolutions I can choose are 1280 x 720 and 1280 x 760. The problem is that everything on the screen looks our of proportion with those.

Anything I can do?

Thank you!

sadly way too excited about actual-size PDF documents

Saucy Intruder — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 09:02:14 -0800

Work just gave me a 19-inch widescreen monitor (1440x900 resolution), which I promptly tilted into portrait mode. What are some software/settings hacks that will allow me to make the most of my setup? I'm running Windows 2000 (yeah, I know) in "Classic" view, Firefox, Outlook, Acrobat Professional v8. If I do get a second companion monitor, it will probably be an older 15-inch model that doesn't tilt.

forcing resolution change - good/bad/otherwise?

Baby_Balrog — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 15:23:35 -0800

What kind of "hardware damage" are we talking about? Netbook screen resolution question inside - please help. I'm profoundly frustrated that I can't play Transcendence on my wonderful little Acer AspireOne. The screen res for my netbook is 1024x600 natively (800x600 is also available). This doesn't work for Transcendence. I tried doing it in -dx and /windowed modes, that didn't help.
I posted to their forums and they were almost less than useless.
I read this question and it left me with more questions.
FINALLY, I was messing around with my monitor settings. Under Advanced options in the screen Settings menu, there's a monitor tab. It contains a checkbox that says "hide modes that monitor cannot display." I unchecked it and VOILA all kinds of crazy-ass resolutions suddenly became available to me. I tried going one higher than 1024x600 (1024x768) and it worked.

However. Under the aforementioned checkbox is a dire warning that clearing that box may lead to an unusable screen and/or hardware damage.

I don't care how the screen "looks" - I just wanna play Transcendence, skewed pixels or whatever. Just need to see the buttons on the bottom of the screen.

But what kind of hardware damage are we talking about here? Am I gonna fry my little friend's monitor if I do this?

I've been struggling with this deeply personal issue for nearly four months now and I need some help. Thanks wise mefites!

Pixels not included.

_dario — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 13:02:44 -0800

I'm at my wits' end trying to find a suitable LCD monitor to use as a secondary screen for an oldish Toshiba laptop. I have an laptop, a Toshiba Satellite A30 with an intel 82852-GM graphic chipset. I would like to buy an external monitor to use it (mainly) to watch movies. My size and price requirements direct me towards a 22" flat panel, so I looked into the market for those. Speakers are not a requirement since the audio output from the laptop is hooked to a hi-fi system, and the input port should be the classic VGA.

First disappointment: I saw an LG panel that looked great, (WG2234, apparently not marketed in the US) but - turns out - the laptop is not able to drive the panel with its native resolution (1680x1050). A little research on forums pointed out that there are many laptops with that same problem - apparently all those that have that graphics chipset which - besides Toshiba - was used by Dell, Acer and others.

A possible solution that was presented would be to download a developer kit from Intel and compile a custom driver for the resolution/frequency of that specific monitor. I don't want to do that, since success is apparently not guaranteed and I'd need the monitor anyway to make tests, etc., with a sizeable chance (I think) to damage it or void the warranty by feeding it the wrong res/freq values.

Browsing the list of resolutions the graphics card is capable of, turns out that no 16:10 resolutions are supported, while 16:9 resolutions as 1920 x 1080 are, so I turned my search into 16:9 screens, such as this Samsung 2233SN (apparently marketed as SW in the US), which looks good and has the right resolution.

Second disappointment: I had the monitor ordered from the store and took my laptop to check if everything matched, just to be sure. Despite numerous attempts by me and the guys at the store, there was no way to have the laptop and the monitor hook up correctly: even when the laptop resolution on the secondary desktop was 1920x1080, the monitor would have two black lateral bands, and all icons and such would be horizontally compressed, so in the end I had to leave it at the store.

My only hunch is that the 1920x1080 res. from the laptop is actually a lower resolution, which is then supposed to be stretched to a 16:9 factor by the display, but other than that, at this point I'm out of ideas. Can you suggest alternative models or - preferred - a way to have the (Samsung) monitor work as expected?

Most common web video sizes?

jurczyk — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 09:17:29 -0800

What are the most common web video sizes? I know that YouTube is 320x240 but I want to produce video in the most popular sizes.

Is there a resource for Web Video stats like there is for browser display statistics?

Digital Camera advice: which specs are important?

brenton — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 00:45:25 -0800

What factors should I be looking at when considering the purchase of a new digital camera. I know that a lot of people think more megapixels = better quality. But I have a 4 megapixel SLR that takes *infinitely* better pictures than a friend's 10 megapixel camera. Looking at the cameras, it is obvious: my SLR has huge lenses that are expensive, his has a tiny hole in the front. But I have no objective idea what makes the difference. Some cameras have "big lenses" that seem to be mostly for show. So I am trying to figure out what really goes into making a good picture, and how to calculate it. What specs should I look at and how should I look at them? By the way, there are a few things I know coming into this. I am not looking for another bulky SLR, but a small one that could fit in a back pocket with some wrangling or fit into a cargo pocket on cargo pants. The photos won't be going into museums, in fact, they'll mostly be going to facebook. However, I do notice when photos look bad, though I can't always put my finger on what exactly is wrong. I do want to be able to print these out at a photo print station at my supermarket and have them look good.

I am looking for something really cheap, and I think that if I really knew what to look for, that I would be able to know when I find a cheap camera if it's just "cheap" or if it's actually a good deal for a good camera.

Make PS3 games use 1080p?

Who_Am_I — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 08:08:22 -0800

How do I force PS3 games to play at their optimum resolution? I've got a PS3 hooked up to a 1080p native TV (Philips 42" LCD, can't remember model number) via HDMI. When I leave all the PS3 video settings alone, 720p-capable games play at 720p, but 1080p-capable games also play at 720p. If I disable 720p output from the PS3, then 1080p games go up to 1080p, but 720p games go down to 480p. I'm getting sick of switching the video setting around every time I play a different game, and I feel like I have to be missing something here. Why won't 1080p games use that resolution normally? How is this supposed to work?

Problem with LCD monitors & native resolution

4midori — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 21:25:00 -0800

Problem finding lower resolution LCD monitor. Hi,

I do web design & dev all day on a PC. My current setup is one 20" LCD as primary monitor, and a cheap 17" CRT as secondary.

Though the LCD's native resolution is 1600X1200, I run it at 1024X768 and it looks pretty good. No eyestrain. This allows me to fit a 960pixel-wide Photoshop image on the screen and work on it comfortably.

I just bought a 24" monitor, but its native resolution is 1900X1200. Running it that high makes everything TINY. I know I can change font sizes and edit other Windows settings, increase font sizes in Firefox, etc., but image editing and menu sizes are all WAY too small. For example, the File menu of applications is really tiny.

Two questions:

-Can I even find a 20" LCD monitor that has a 1024X768 native resolution?

-If not, what's the best solution here? I suppose I could just buy another 20" like I've got.

I have read through previous ask metafilter posts, but didn't quite find the answer.

Meeting new people at school?

Anonymous — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 15:55:40 -0800

I am a semester into college and extremely dissatisfied with my social life. Please help me set some tangible, reachable goals and create specific New Year (New Semester?) resolutions that will allow me to reach them. I don’t adore my very small group of friends, an extremely short relationship (my first) recently failed, and I often feel alone and hopeless. I recognize that my social life is in my hands, and I’m afraid that my attitude is holding me back. My dissatisfaction contributed to my being pretty depressed for the last few weeks of last semester, and I’m already dreading going back to school in a week and a half.

I want a small group of friends who are like-minded, smart, creative, and intellectual, as well as a good-sized network of acquaintances. A boyfriend would be nice as well :) I want to feel that I’m being proactive in forming friendships, rather than just hanging out with the people I know from my hall. I know that I’m still at the beginning of my college career and that these things take time, but I want to make sure I’m doing what I can.

Other information: My classes are generally pretty large but I will have a small class and a few small recitations this semester. I live on campus in a dormitory. The most popular weekend activity is attending frat parties, which I detest. I’m shy and have some social anxiety, but don’t consider myself unfriendly.

What dishes are considered classic cuisine? What are some different exercises and sports to try?

ReneeOg — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 11:06:38 -0800

I need help selecting classic cuisine dishes to perfect and new exercises and activities to try as part of my New Year's Resolution! So it's New Year's resolution time again. In addition to the requisite resolutions (workout more, get my paperwork organized, clean the basement, call my grandma more), I've decided I'd like to tackle one basic "classic cuisine" dish a month and to counteract the caloric intake, try a new physical activity every month.

I've had a hard time searching for classic dishes for my list so far. I was inspired by a Top Chef episode where each chef had to make classic dish or put a new spin on it, but the only two dishes I can remember are lasagne and veal picatta.

As far as physical activity, I already do yoga, run and take a brutal cycling class twice a week. I live in Michigan, so take the climate into consideration in your suggestions.

Can't wait to see what you all come up with!

How can I sharpen my conflict resolution skills?

self — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 17:06:34 -0800

Conflict resolution-filter: How can I be a better (read: appropriately responsive and fair) moderator and listener? A lot more inside. I am a shift supervisor at a large coffee shop. First, let me make a few things about my title clear:

-I cannot fire anyone.
-I can't always send people home, if it's a busy day
-I do not make the schedule
-It is imperative that I don't (I can't even seem to) play favorites
-I have a load of responsibility to the store, as I am an active manager when there, and this whole post is only about part of the things I have to deal with.

However, the following dilemma can ruin an entire day, trickle down through morale, and ultimate affect the entire operation of the store. This is why I'm posting. Okay, here 'goes....

My job requires me to manage coworkers who deal with the same issues I do. A lot of the time, because we're in the customer service and retail industry and rely on each other to make work easier and more efficient, those issues often pertain to problems between coworkers.

When a dispute breaks out between two or more of them, they will typically come to me individually and gripe about the one another. It is my responsibility to listen to these concerns (no matter how trivial they can be), and try to effectively quell the tide of hysteria or complaining to resolution.

If I can't solve the problem, I at least need to deal with it to the point where work can continue unabated until the manager has the time to address it themselves.

This is just one aspect of my roll at the store, and I by no means have the leisure to sharpen that one skill. I'm often in the very same boat as these coworkers, working along side them. Besides having to be there for my coworkers, I am always dealing with the customers' needs, my superiors' requests, and anything else that might crop up (See top where I explain that I am effectively an active manager when I'm on the clock).

So I turn to AskMe for this one. I need to make sure my coworkers are feeling like they are being heard, that their concerns or complaints are being addressed, and that they can always talk to me. I often find myself feeling weird sympathizing with both sides of an argument (I almost feel superficial), and am tired of just feeling like a nodding head on a stick. I realize that that's the basic want of someone who is venting, but there's definitely more.

What advise can you, the great hive mind, give me about conflict resolution? What do you like to hear or see from someone you are going to to have your issues dealt with? What does this role of mine dictate in these often delicate situations? And how can I feel less boss-like and more confidant-ish?

I realize there are a multitude of books on the subject, but I often find them containing bland language or (to me) over-analytic fallacies. I'm dealing with people, not first-initial-last-names on a roster. And I'm one of those people.

In essence, help me help you*!

*as in the people

How to make Windows use only the working part of my screen?

xxnopiratesxx — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 07:00:41 -0800

The right 1/3 of my laptop's LCD is unusable. Is it possible to make Windows XP display on only the left 2/3 of the screen? At first I thought that a custom resolution would solve this problem, but it is actually more of tricking Windows into thinking the screen is only as big as the left 2/3s that works.

The laptop is an Inspiron E1500 and has Intel's GMA950 as its video card.