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Looking at getting a new monitor for my computer.
However, the one I was looking at (34" widescreen) has a resolution of 3440 x 1440.
My PC's graphic card will support a maximum resolution of 2560 x 1600.
So it can fill the screen vertically. Will there be black bars at the sides? Or is there some software scaling magic that will make it all look nice? Will black bars be the End-Of-All-Things?
Or should I just buy a smaller screen? This one was also going to be used with my work's laptop when I bring it home, which has the capacity to fill the screen (max resolution is 4096x2304). Had some other handy features like a USB-c charging dock and KVM switch built in which is why I was keen on it.
My graphics board to motherboard interface is "PCI-Express 2.0 x16" (quite old). Can you get graphics boards on that interface which would reach the resolution of the monitor?
What GPU is it?
Have you tried googling for "GPU XXX at 3440 x 1440" to see if anyone else has done it/faced the issue.
What GPU is it?
You can get cheap discrete GPU's for not much if you just need it for outputting a windows desktop, probably around £60-£100 currently, or look for a used one on ebay.
Or, you may find your CPU gpu is able to output that res no issues - I'm running a 3440x1440 and a 1080p screen from an i5 3570k from 2012.... (ok, the 3440x1440 is at 50hz but I do no gaming on it).
I think you would have to set the resolution to 2560x1080
What GPU is it?
Have you tried googling for “GPU XXX at 3440 x 1440” to see if anyone else has done it/faced the issue.
Yeah, try this. I had exactly the same issue with an older MacBook Air which claimed it would only support 2560x1600. Turns out it works fine at 3440x1440 60Hz. I guess the specs were just conservative and perhaps at the time no one envisaged using a much higher res monitor. So you may well get lucky.
But yes, if it doesn't support the full res, you'll probably have vertical black bars.
I wouldn't buy the screen if its main use was to run it at a lower res, but for only occasional use I might.
Buy the bigger screen; it will scale the input signal to match; all you need to do is make sure you use something with the same aspect ratio. I'd also be amazed if your card wouldn't output to it - chances are it's not listed on the spec because it's old enough that screens with that resolution didn't exist/weren't common when it was made.
Yeah, but a non native resolution on a PC monitor looks like utter crap. Don't do it unless you REALLY have to.
USB-c charging dock
check how many watts this can pump out - modern laptops need getting onto 100W when maxxed out - some cheaper charging docks only push out enough to keep a phone happy.
Yeah, but a non native resolution on a PC monitor looks like utter crap. Don’t do it unless you REALLY have to.
This this and thrice this.
To see (roughly) what it'll look like, set your current output to a similarly wrong res and see what happens.
check how many watts this can pump out – modern laptops need getting onto 100W when maxxed out – some cheaper charging docks only push out enough to keep a phone happy.
They seem to be either one or the other these days, loads of our work Lenovo latops are either 35w or 65w chargers, but we had some beasts in recently with 135w chargers. :O
My Dell XPS, 4k screen, 6 core 12 thread CPU, GTX 1050ti is a 130w charger. 100w or above now is reserved for the most powerful of laptops.
true about the resolution; unless you ran it 2:1; but then you'd be limited to 720p.
Some UW monitors support running as two separate 'screens'; with the left and the right sides separate feeds from your graphics card; that could be a way round it. Or just buy a better card that can support the res natively !
The graphics card is a Nvidia 8800GT.
Not seeing anything useful on google.
You're going to be hitting the bandwidth limit on the dual link DVI ports on that card, they're the limiting factor. You might be able to drive that res, but at a lower refresh rate.
You want something with displayport or hdmi 1.4 as a minimum.
What inputs does your monitor have? If HDMI, something like this should be fine:
https://www.ebuyer.com/964814-gigabyte-geforce-gt-710-1gb-low-profile-graphics-card-gv-n710d5-1gl
My current monitor has VGA and DVI inputs.
The one I was looking at has HDMI and DisplayPort connections.