ezQuake Manual: LCD / TFT / Widescreen tips

There are several factors to resolve when you move from a CRT screen to TFT/LCD screen. This page lists some of them and gives you hints and links how to cope with them most efficiently.

Screen parameters

Various aspects you should know before buying a TFT screen are described in TFT article on QuakeWorld Wiki.

Screen proportions

The standard proportions of a CRT screen is 4:3, for TFT/LCD screens it's typically 16:10 - also called widescreen. (Some TFT displays have screen proportions 5:4 - that is not widescreen, the screen is even narrower than 4:3 screens are.)
To make your QuakeWorld client display image adjusted to these proportions, you can either change your field of view (fov variable) and image proportions (vid_conwidth / vid_conheight variables) values, or you can simply toggle a variable that will do all that for you:

vid_wideaspect 1

Toggling this variable will recalculate field of view and screen proportions from 4:3 settings into 16:10 settings. The calculation is done so that the image is not deformed and contains as much information as did the 4:3 image.

Head on to Widescreen Guide on QuakeWorld Wiki.

Another option is to not use whole area of your screen for the game image, but limit it on the sides (with black area filling the sides). You can achieve this with NVIDIA cards by using "Use NVIDIA scaling with fixed aspect ratio" option in the NVIDIA tweak control panel.

Image smoothness

TFT screens do not refresh as fast as CRT screens do (typically 60 Hz vs. 120 Hz), they also tend to suffer from tearing and lagging.

Check Smooth Quake wiki article to know which settings you can fine-tune to get smooth and responsive gaming experience even with TFT screens.

Last update: 22.06.2009 16:24 UTC
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