Windows 7: PC game fullscreen problem

I just got a dell XPS laptop that runs on windows 7 and it has a 17 inch screen with a screen resolution of 1920x1080. I have been trying to play PC games (such as ones you download from Yahoo or BigFish) on this computer but the game isn’t taking up the whole screen (fullscreen), there are either black bars of either side of the game or completely surrounding the game.

I used to play these exact games on my old laptop which was exactly the same as this one except it was an Inspiron and windows XP.

I really need to resolve this, plz help me!!!!

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When you open the game press alt+enter.

looking forward to your results!

Sorry, nothing happened

Do you have nvidia or ati/amd video card?

I'm not sure, how do I find out? I do have Nvidia, but I don't know how to find out what kind of video card I have. Sorry, I'm a real computer dummy.

the reason is probably your resolution. Your old laptop might have been 1024x768 or somewhere in that range as well as a 5x4 resolution. The games you are playing are fixed resolution and aspect ratio. Your new laptop is 16x9.
drop your resolution to 1366x768 or 1280x720 and then play those games and let us know how it does.

The screen resolution was exactly the same on my previous computer and the games worked just fine. I tried what you suggested and it didn’t help, in fact the game was smaller than the already small resolution. Besides lowering the screen resolution just shrinks my screen and puts black all around the screen, just like with the games so nothings is really being solved.

It your card's inability to open the game in full screen or perhaps it could very well be obsolete video drivers.

Drivers - Download NVIDIA Drivers ... choose option 2 and it will let you know exactly what card you have and which driver you will need. Once you got the driver, download it and make sure you save it to a Temp folder or somewhere you can get to it later.

Also, make sure to download Driver Sweeper... Guru3D - Driver Sweeper

1) Uninstalled the driver through the Control Panel
2) Reboot into Safe Mode
3) Run Driver Sweeper and make sure the Nvidia folder in C is deleted
4) Reboot
5) Install new driver with Elevated Admin Rights (right click file and use Run as Admin)
6) Reboot