GeForce 8600T: Issues with new Win7 installation

Hello,

I have just upgraded my computer from XP to Windows 7, and I am having a few problems with the display. I have an Nvidia GeForce 8600T graphics card, with the most current drivers I can find (9.18.13.2049), but I just can't seem to get the display looking right.

I started off at the native screen resolution of 1280x1024, but having been used to a resolution of 1024x768 for years with XP, I found that everything was simply too small on the higher resolution, and I could barely read most of the on screen text. I started fiddling with font sizes, but, as they do, some adjustments affected other things I didn't want them to affect, so I then had to fiddle with my browser fonts, as web pages weren't displaying correctly, and it all ended up a bit of a mess. I also noticed that the text, even with ClearType turned on, looked sort of 'blurry / fuzzy', when enlarged so that I could actually read it, so I ended up resetting all the fonts to default, and starting again.

I have a Xerox 4:3 monitor, which is perfectly suited to my needs, and I don't really have the room for a larger, or widescreen monitor on my computer desk, so I don't really want to change it. However, each of the other available screen resolutions crops the top and bottom of the screen, as they are presumably suited to widescreen displays, and that really isn't what I want. I have therefore, reverted to my old 1024x768 resolution, which is great, as I can read the text, and everything looks familiar again (is it just me, or do we all try to make a new operating system look like the old one? ), however, the aspect ratio of the display is no longer correct and true. What I mean is, a circle looks slightly vertically egg shaped, and a square looks slightly vertically rectangular.

I have been through the settings on my monitor, and although there are positional adjustments (move left, right, up and down), there is no 'height' adjustment, just one for 'width', which doesn't help, as stretching the width to make a circle correctly round, causes the sides of the display to overreach the edges of the screen. Needless to say, this is quite an irritating issue, because now I've noticed it, I keep looking for it.

I have to say, this has probably been the most challenging upgrade I have ever done, in about 14 years of using home computers. I have made self builds for myself, and other people, and have reinstalled, or upgraded operating systems many times, but with this one, well, I won't bore you with the list of things that have gone wrong, but nothing has seemed straightforward, and it's all taken far too long. This is the last of the issues I've been unable to solve, so I hope I've explained the situation clearly, and if anyone has any ideas on this, it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Simon.

Hi, and thanks for the reply.

So, would you recommend replacing the monitor or the graphics card? I'd favour a monitor replacement, as it's probably about time I got a widescreen display, but if the graphics card is still going to cause poor font rendering, then I may have to consider that as well, although I really don't want to have to rebuild half of my PC!

Thanks for the advice. :) In upgrading the OS, I hadn't bargained on the additional expenditure of a graphics card and monitor. Yes, it would be about 5 years old, as that's when I built the PC. I'll have to give this some thought. A monitor leads to a graphics card, which could possibly lead to a new PSU, and before I know it, I'll have practically spent half of what a new PC would cost!

Thanks for that - when you say "as long as it isn't AGP", could you clarify that? Would it not work at all if was AGP, or could it cause issues if it was? I can't actually remember whether it is or it isn't - is there a simple way to find out, without taking the case off?

I've actually done the things suggested in those tutorials, and have been flddinig with the Advanced Text options (Metrics) all week! With the ClearType calibtation, I found it difficult to tell the difference on some of the screens, but two showed clear differences. The trouble I'm having is that the text is very 'thin' - that's not the font itself, as in 'condensed', but the actual text. I've tried different fonts, and have found MS Reference Sans Serif to be the clearest to me so far.

I have now got a new monitor, which is up and running, and is a 20" Iiyama ProLite. After first reaching for the Raybans and sunblock once I'd toned down the brightness and contrast, the screen is about the same sharpness as my old monitor, but, of course, there's more of it, and at the default resolution of 1600 x 900, I can actually read the text, although the font size is set to a custom 110%, just until I get more used to it.

The problem that has arisen now though, is that of motion blur on text, when scrolling. If, for example, I scroll up and down this forum thread, each line of text leaves a white 'comet tail' behind it for about a quarter of a second, which might not seem a lot, but is noticeable, given that it didn't happen at all on my old monitor. Would there be any reason for this? I have been advised that my current graphics card should be perfectly adequate to support my current screen resolution, and higher, but what it doesn't seem to want to do is move above the currently set 60Hz refresh rate. I'm not sure of this is relevant to the text motion blur or not.

I will try playing with the graphics card settings, as you suggested, although, | don't recall seeing any anti-aliasing settings when I've looked at the control panel before.

And yes, I do need to get my eyes tested, but I didn't have any problems this time last week, when I still had Windows XP and my old monitor. That was perfectly clear and readable, so I can't believe that my eyesight could have suddenly deteriorated in the time it took to install Windows 7!