How to set screen resolution to 1920 x 1200?

Wow! I am impressed with the number of helpers and your collective wisdom. All of this is new to me... I've never tinkered with hardware, simply using what came with my system without issues. And, frankly, a lot of the discussion is foreign language to me.

bobkn - your replies have helped a lot. My system is what it is because I have used it to write, design, and self publish 9 books over the years using Quark, each with 100s of photos I process and enhance with Photoshop. I am not a gamer and do not use video apps. So maybe a return to Win 7 isn't such a bad idea. My only concern is that it will continue to function over the long haul, as in 10 more years. Do you have any thoughts about that? Also, can you tell me how to get back to where I was a week ago with Win 7? Thanks so much!

The highest resolution available on my Win7 Custom, Win8.1 Custom, Win10 Dell Inspiron and Linux Mint Dell Optiplex Desktops is 1920x1080 [16:9]. It's the ratio of 16:9 or 16:10 that usually determines the numbers, the one I use on 4 computers with an HP Compaq L2105tm monitor on a KVM is 1440x900 [16:10], looks the same on all 4 computers. The old 1024x768 or 800x600 had a ratio of 4:3.

Berton said:

The highest resolution available on my Win7 Custom, Win8.1 Custom, Win10 Dell Inspiron and Linux Mint Dell Optiplex Desktops is 1920x1080 [16:9]. It's the ratio of 16:9 or 16:10 that usually determines the numbers, the one I use on 4 computers with an HP Compaq L2105tm monitor on a KVM is 1440x900 [16:10], looks the same on all 4 computers. The old 1024x768 or 800x600 had a ratio of 4:3.

My monitor native resolution is 1920 x 1200 16:10 60 Hertz

jds63 said:

My monitor native resolution is 1920 x 1200 16:10 60 Hertz

A page of discussions about the difference:
Blog - 16:10 vs 16:9 - the monitor aspect ratio conundrum | bit-tech.net

Robin Faye said:

Wow! I am impressed with the number of helpers and your collective wisdom. All of this is new to me... I've never tinkered with hardware, simply using what came with my system without issues. And, frankly, a lot of the discussion is foreign language to me.

bobkn - your replies have helped a lot. My system is what it is because I have used it to write, design, and self publish 9 books over the years using Quark, each with 100s of photos I process and enhance with Photoshop. I am not a gamer and do not use video apps. So maybe a return to Win 7 isn't such a bad idea. My only concern is that it will continue to function over the long haul, as in 10 more years. Do you have any thoughts about that? Also, can you tell me how to get back to where I was a week ago with Win 7? Thanks so much!

10 years? Not impossible. A PC that I owned that has been handed down twice has just stopped working. I doubt that there's much wrong with it, but as the recipient just got a much newer machine from me, I doubt that he'll bother trying to fix it.

Windows support schedule:

Windows lifecycle fact sheet - Windows Help


(7 is already off mainstream support. Extended support ends for it in 2020. The 2020 date is the important one. I think security updates will cease then.)

It's possible to roll back to 7, if you haven't deleted any of the restoration files.

Windows 10 - Go Back to Previous Windows - Windows 10 Forums

If you search the forums a little, though, you may find that this isn't completely reliable.

I haven't tried it. I always image my installation before a major update, so I can restore that in less than 10 minutes. (That's the OS drive; I keep more data on a second drive.) I'd strongly recommend getting that capability, if you don't have it now. Most of us keep some fraction of our lives on our PCs. Maybe someday I'll embrace the Cloud to preserve my data, but for the moment, I prefer local backups.

It's up to you if you wish to return to 7.

In my opinion 10 is OK, as long as you have drivers for all of your peripherals, and all of your software is supported. If you don't like the Windows 10 interface, there are third party utilities that can more or less restore the 7 interface. I haven't tried them, but I used Startisback+ with Windows 8.1. (The integration of the Windows desktop and the interface once known as Metro was very limited. 10 seems much better in that regard.)

bobkn - I wish you were my brother or next door neighbor... You explain things very clearly, and have given me good leads for more information to make my decisions easier. Having the 2020 date helps too. Thanks!

Thanks all... By re-downloading Win 10 drivers, the stretched-image monitor view is resolved!