Help fix my Jumpy Mac OS X Universal Access Zooming!

September 16, 2005 8:27 PM

Help fix my jumpy Mac OS X Universal Access Zooming! I use the zoom function of OS X's Universal Access to help me read things and watch videos and such. This has been working wonderfully until I switched my monitor configuration from both of my monitors side-to-side to the current configuration of having one monitor on top of the other. Now when I zoom in and move the mouse at all, the zoomed in rectangle jumps so that the bottom edge is stuck to the bottom edge of the bottom monitor. I can move left and right, but no longer up or down. Any ideas?

Settings in Universal Access:
Max zoom: 2x, Min Zoom: 1x. Smooth images, Zoom follows keyboard focus both checked. When zoomed in, the screen image moves: continuously with pointer.

Settings in Displays:
Bottom: 1280x1024, 85Hz. Top: 832x624, 74.5 Hz. Both Millions of colors.
Arrangement: Big screen on bottom with menu bar. Smaller screen centered on top.

Computer: G4 Dual 1Ghz.

posted by sirion to Computers & Internet (6 answers total)

I've never seen this...jumpiness...

but I'm going to guess that it's because the menubar is in the middle of the screen, not at the top of the two vertical screens.

Two ways to test this.

1) physically leave the screens alone...software, move them back to side by side.

What happens?

2) Move the menu bar from the middle of the two screens to the top screen.

Again, what happens?
posted by filmgeek at 12:17 AM on September 17, 2005

Response by poster: Definitely has something to do with arrangement:
I can only make it not jumpy when the menubar is on the big screen and when the small screen is on the left or right side of the big screen. Also, if I move the small screen so that the top border of the small is a pixel above the top border of the big screen, it's jumpy again.
posted by sirion at 7:46 AM on September 17, 2005

Response by poster: Cant find a configuration where it's not jumpy with the menubar on the small screen
posted by sirion at 7:47 AM on September 17, 2005

sirion, I'm going with..."It's a Feature" (well, actually bug.)

I could see the guys who are designing the zoom not taking into account a vertical configuration.

As I recall...(not having a second screen attached right now), there is a choice which screen is the *Primary* or boot screen.

This may or may not be where the menu is (In OS9 these were seperate, but I can't recall if they are seprate in OSX.)

See if making the smaller/secondary screen the boot screen.
posted by filmgeek at 10:29 AM on September 17, 2005

Response by poster: Cant find a configuration where it won't jump if the menu is on the small screen, and I can't find any other sort of way to select a boot screen. Will try switching which monitor goes into which port on my videocard
posted by sirion at 3:27 PM on September 17, 2005

Response by poster: Just switched them, and it produced no change as far as this problem is concerned. On the other hand, the contrast on my big monitor is GREATLY improved; it looks gorgeous!
posted by sirion at 3:36 PM on September 17, 2005