Wide Screen Play Using Windows 10

[CrownVic95]

Just wondering if anyone here has run into this issue and may have some tips.

Up until 2 weeks ago, I ran RRTII on on an my older Windows XP custom-built machine and had no problem expanding it to a (stretched) wide screen display on my new 1920x1080 monitor. Sadly, the hard drive on that machine bit the dust, so I bought a new laptop running Windows 10. I never would have moved to W10 but for that sudden need, but I'm pleasantly surprised by it and like it more than I thought I would. I found it will run many older applications just fine, one of them being RRTII.

The one thing I can't get it to do is display a wide-screen image on my wide-screen monitor. I've tried all of the scaling options and each one results in the same small 1024x768 display in the center of the screen. I realize that the issue could be with the computer's HD graphics and not necessarily W10, but I've tried every option known to me and nothing makes any difference. 

Any suggestions? Thanks in advance.

 

 

[Silverback]

A scaling issue is the likeliest culprit as you have already identified, but there are several places where scaling is set other than in the default generic windows settings. I don't run games  on the windows 10 machine I have so can't help directly. You may need to search the full manuals for your monitor and laptop for the equivalents of the following. 

MONITOR SETTINGS

I use a windows 7 desktop and monitor for games (32 bit)  and my monitor has monitor image size settings  of Auto or Wide. Auto keeps the aspect ratio the PC tells it to display whereas wide always stretches it. These settings vary from monitor to monitor. From what you say I'm presuming that you are using an external monitor and not the laptop's screen. (If you want to use the laptop screen then there may be a utility on your laptop change these settings for your built in screen or graphics chipset.) One additional thought here is if you use an external monitor then you may need to make sure ONLY this is in use as using the laptop screen and the monitor together may cause problems and show a smaller image on the external screen to match the built in screen for example, and also make sure the laptop detects the monitor's capabilities correctly as it may not know what the external monitor is capable of. There is usually a special set of function keys on laptops to tell it to use the internal screen, external screen or both.  Sometimes a monitor may have different settings for different inputs - some monitors have VGA, HDMI,  DVI etc inputs so did your XP PC connect to a different input on your monitor from your laptop and could this have affected your settings?   

GRAPHICS CARD / CHIPSET DRIVER SETTINGS

The settings for Nvidia  graphics card in the Nvidia control panel for my PC has 3 scaling modes Aspect ratio, full screen or no scaling. It seems as though you are getting the equivalent of no scaling - The windows control panel doesn't show these scaling options in most versions of windows so you need to use the graphics chipset manufacturer's utility, which may not be installed but should be available, or the laptops hardware settings which can be a separate utility provided by the laptop manufacturer. You might just need to increase the amount of memory the laptop allocates to graphics but this is unlikely.

GRAPHICS DRIVER CHANGE

You could also see if the graphics chipset manufacturer for your laptop has a different driver from the one windows 10 is using and change the driver. You could also see if windows has an updated driver but the chipset manufacturers drivers may have more facilities.

 

Finally I always keep the aspect ratio of the game as this is more to my taste then stretching the image widthways but for old games like this I do scale up the image in proportion to fill the monitor height and leave black bars either side of the image, so I use the setting of "Auto" on the monitor itself and "Aspect Ratio" in the Nvidia control panel which does exactly what I want. This took me some time to work out as the default was to do exactly what I think you want i.e. for the image to fill the monitor in both directions !   

Hope this helps - Good Luck    

[CrownVic95]

1 hour ago, Silverback said:

A scaling issue is the likeliest culprit as you have already identified, but there are several places where scaling is set other than in the default generic windows settings. I don't run games  on the windows 10 machine I have so can't help directly. You may need to search the full manuals for your monitor and laptop for the equivalents of the following. 

MONITOR SETTINGS

I use a windows 7 desktop and monitor for games (32 bit)  and my monitor has monitor image size settings  of Auto or Wide. Auto keeps the aspect ratio the PC tells it to display whereas wide always stretches it. These settings vary from monitor to monitor. From what you say I'm presuming that you are using an external monitor and not the laptop's screen. (If you want to use the laptop screen then there may be a utility on your laptop change these settings for your built in screen or graphics chipset.) One additional thought here is if you use an external monitor then you may need to make sure ONLY this is in use as using the laptop screen and the monitor together may cause problems and show a smaller image on the external screen to match the built in screen for example, and also make sure the laptop detects the monitor's capabilities correctly as it may not know what the external monitor is capable of. There is usually a special set of function keys on laptops to tell it to use the internal screen, external screen or both.  Sometimes a monitor may have different settings for different inputs - some monitors have VGA, HDMI,  DVI etc inputs so did your XP PC connect to a different input on your monitor from your laptop and could this have affected your settings?   

GRAPHICS CARD / CHIPSET DRIVER SETTINGS

The settings for Nvidia  graphics card in the Nvidia control panel for my PC has 3 scaling modes Aspect ratio, full screen or no scaling. It seems as though you are getting the equivalent of no scaling - The windows control panel doesn't show these scaling options in most versions of windows so you need to use the graphics chipset manufacturer's utility, which may not be installed but should be available, or the laptops hardware settings which can be a separate utility provided by the laptop manufacturer. You might just need to increase the amount of memory the laptop allocates to graphics but this is unlikely.

GRAPHICS DRIVER CHANGE

You could also see if the graphics chipset manufacturer for your laptop has a different driver from the one windows 10 is using and change the driver. You could also see if windows has an updated driver but the chipset manufacturers drivers may have more facilities.

 

Finally I always keep the aspect ratio of the game as this is more to my taste then stretching the image widthways but for old games like this I do scale up the image in proportion to fill the monitor height and leave black bars either side of the image, so I use the setting of "Auto" on the monitor itself and "Aspect Ratio" in the Nvidia control panel which does exactly what I want. This took me some time to work out as the default was to do exactly what I think you want i.e. for the image to fill the monitor in both directions !   

Hope this helps - Good Luck    

What an outstanding and thorough response....thank you so much for taking the time!

Don't have time right now to say much more than that - I'll respond in detail probably tomorrow morning. Thanks again!!

[CrownVic95]

Ok, back now for some additional comments. Still have the same display and nothing makes any difference.

MONITOR SETTINGS

Yes, I have connected my 22" Samsung wide screen via HDMI (only option). It has setting options for auto and wide and I've tried both - back and forth, repeatedly. Makes no difference - both result in the same 4:3 image. I have the external monitor set as the only display, but I've looked at all options, combos and they all have the same result.

I connected the XP PC to the same monitor using a DVI to HDMI cable. Not sure whether that could make a difference, but I'm inclined to doubt it.

GRAPHICS CARD / CHIPSET DRIVER SETTINGS

My laptop has Intel HD Graphics and has 4 scaling options - center image, scale full screen, maintain display scaling, and maintain aspect ratio. I've tried them all....each with the same result. Same 4:3 image.

GRAPHICS DRIVER CHANGE

I had thought of that as well, so yesterday I clicked on the update driver button, it searched for and found a new driver, installed it, then turned my screen black and hung there - still on, but not responding to any inputs of any kind. After 45 minutes, this was clearly a "reset" or power off scenario, but alas....where's the reset button on a laptop? This is my first laptop, by the way. So I pulled the power plug, quickly realizing that that made no difference on a laptop with a fully charged battery. After a few minutes of feeling helpless to do anything but call Lenovo's support line and be at their mercy, something made me try pressing and holding the power button. That did the trick and turned it off....and I breathed a big sigh of relief.

So........when I turned it back on, checked and found I had new display drivers installed....and they worked exactly like the old drivers. Same 4:3 image, no matter the settings.

I think what I'm up against is a glitch or limitation in the Intel HD graphics since a Google search on the issue brings a multitude of results with lots of others frustrated with the same problem. It's not really that big of a deal, because the 4:3 image does look better and sharper, with the scale that was intended for the game. But ideally I'd rather not play for hours at a time, as I often do, with those black bars. I know image burning is not the issue it once was with CRTs, but I've read that it is not altogether gone as a concern with LCDs either.

 

 

 

 

 

[Silverback]

Maybe you need to try the intel website or the lenovo website for later drivers than those from windows update. 15.40.25.4463 may be the latest version from Intel direct and says it fixes some scaling problems.

Does your screen display RTII full height or is the black border all around?

I've not noticed a burn problem with my screen but I have noticed some persistent image issues on brighter parts of the screen (after I had set the brilliance to 100% and also left the display static for several hours) which I thought were burn in but which faded away to nothing over an hour or so when other applications were used.

Just make sure that you know how to revert to the older driver if the new one doesn't work as (rarely) the newer drivers may not work on your laptop. Getting into windows 10 safe mode is more difficult than it should be as the old methods don't work.   

At least the game works on windows 10 which is not bad for an old game. In my experience it is usually oddities in the graphics systems or the installer that cause the majority of issues, especially on 64 bit operating systems. If you could repair your old PC and have a way to reinstall XP then maybe it could be used just for older games - the problem is getting the parts e.g IDE hard disks are getting rare. IDE to SATA converters are available but then costs start to rise.   

 

[CrownVic95]

2 hours ago, Silverback said:

Maybe you need to try the intel website or the lenovo website for later drivers than those from windows update. 15.40.25.4463 may be the latest version from Intel direct and says it fixes some scaling problems.

Does your screen display RTII full height or is the black border all around?

I've not noticed a burn problem with my screen but I have noticed some persistent image issues on brighter parts of the screen (after I had set the brilliance to 100% and also left the display static for several hours) which I thought were burn in but which faded away to nothing over an hour or so when other applications were used.

Just make sure that you know how to revert to the older driver if the new one doesn't work as (rarely) the newer drivers may not work on your laptop. Getting into windows 10 safe mode is more difficult than it should be as the old methods don't work.   

At least the game works on windows 10 which is not bad for an old game. In my experience it is usually oddities in the graphics systems or the installer that cause the majority of issues, especially on 64 bit operating systems. If you could repair your old PC and have a way to reinstall XP then maybe it could be used just for older games - the problem is getting the parts e.g IDE hard disks are getting rare. IDE to SATA converters are available but then costs start to rise.   

 

Another outstanding response and worth another rep. Thank you.

The drivers I now have installed are, according to the device manager, 20.19.15.4463. Same 4463, but different numbers up front. I'm not sure what to make of that.

On my 22" 1920x1080 monitor, I have black bars all around. And I'm assuming that's because it's only using the game's default 1024x768. So, that being the case, there's loads of unused (black) acreage around it. The laptop's built-in display has a 1366x768 resolution. So the game's image fills it vertically, but leaves black bars on the sides.

As for my old PC, I have "repaired" it, of sorts. I had 2 IDE hard drives in it and, interestingly, the newer one was the one that died. It was a 40GB Western Digital about 12 years old and it had the OS on it. The 13GB IBM, made in 1999 and formerly installed in a W98 machine, has been used every day for 16 years and is still going strong. I re-installed Windows XP on it, so that machine is theoretically usable again for games, at least. I say theoretically because I don't foresee using it again to any significant degree for two reasons....

1. It is so infernally noisy with it's power supply, auxiliary case, CPU, and GeForce 6600 fans that I almost have to shut it down just to make a phone call. I am already spoiled by my laptop's essentially silent running.
2. Whereas before I had it updated through SP4 and thus fully usable online, Windows update appears to not function at all any longer for Windows XP. I guess that probably ended with its official end of support in 2014. My install disk is SP2, leaving Outlook Express in a primitive state that is unusable today and won't allow the latest Firefox versions either.

Now that I've gotten rid of the bundled McAfee software that came with my new laptop and was wreaking havoc, I can't find any really sound reason to hate Windows 10 like I thought I would. It runs everything I've asked it to, including 3 different programs designed for Windows 98 that I've enjoyed and depended on since the late 90s.

On another subject, what happened to the post preview option here?

Edited September 15, 2016 by CrownVic95

[jeffryfisher]

Are you able to run RT2 in windowed mode? If so, then you could get at least 2 benefits:

1) The screen area outside the window could display other apps running concurrently.

2) The RT2 window could run in compatibility mode, leaving the rest of the machine to run other things in more modern form.

[Silverback]

just thought of the following.

Or use the widows settings/control panel to set the display resolution to 1024x768 before launching RTII with the monitor set to "wide" on the physical monitor if you haven't already tried? (may not be possible)

Ive never run in windowed mode before My setup won't do windowed RTII without desktop setting changes - My 1920 by 1080 setting for the display wasn't recognised by RTII as suitable ( 1152 x 864 or greater is needed) until I set the desktop to 16 bit colour via windows settings/control panel after reading this link http://www.thegameengine.org/railroad-tycoon-2/railroad-tycoon-2-windowed-mode/  The window isn't resizable by dragging the edges though.     

 

The Post preview is now via the last icon above the reply box (looks a bit like a magnifying glass over a sheet of paper to me).

[CrownVic95]

2 hours ago, jeffryfisher said:

Are you able to run RT2 in windowed mode? If so, then you could get at least 2 benefits:

1) The screen area outside the window could display other apps running concurrently.

2) The RT2 window could run in compatibility mode, leaving the rest of the machine to run other things in more modern form.

No, and I'd love to be able to. Tried that and got the same error message I've always gotten.

54 minutes ago, Silverback said:

just thought of the following.

Or use the widows settings/control panel to set the display resolution to 1024x768 before launching RTII with the monitor set to "wide" on the physical monitor if you haven't already tried? (may not be possible)

Ive never run in windowed mode before My setup won't do windowed RTII without desktop setting changes - My 1920 by 1080 setting for the display wasn't recognised by RTII as suitable ( 1152 x 864 or greater is needed) until I set the desktop to 16 bit colour via windows settings/control panel after reading this link http://www.thegameengine.org/railroad-tycoon-2/railroad-tycoon-2-windowed-mode/  The window isn't resizable by dragging the edges though.     

 

The Post preview is now via the last icon above the reply box (looks a bit like a magnifying glass over a sheet of paper to me).

Are you ready for this? I went into the Intel graphics control panel, looking to change the color depth to 16 bit in order to try your suggestion. It shows one option only, 32 bit, it is checked and cannot be unchecked. It is unchangeable - in stark contrast to the Nvidia cards that I've run for most of the last 20 years. I don't guess Intel or Lenovo had users like us in mind....and we are probably few, weighed against all customers.

So then I tried your first suggestion - changing the resolution to 1024x768 before launching the game. Did that, everything looked like hell as you would expect, then started the game. What did I get? The same small 4:3 image in the middle of the screen. Then, checking the monitor resolution using it's menu, I get 1920x1080. Go figure....apparently the game launch somehow changed the resolution back to native.

I'm about done wasting time on this. It appears I'm either going to have to live with the noise of my old machine or the small (but sharp) image with the black bars.

Oh, and I see the little post preview icon. Thank you - never would have noticed it otherwise.

 

 

 

[Silverback]

Commiserations. Sometimes you just can't win and its best to give up. Sadly this seems to be one of those cases.

If anyone else reads this and has this issue and wants to carry out more tests ...

Compatability mode on the settings for the application in windows should allow 16 bit colour for that application. Windows 10 wont let you select 16 bit colour for everything unlike earlier versions of windows. For this specific issue I don't think it will deliver the solution wanted.

The windows settings may allow a lower monitor resolution and override the chipset manufacturers setting but it's unlikely.  Some games do change screen resolutions. Closing them should reset the screen resolution to the value before the launch if they are properly written. 

   

[CrownVic95]

And now another question that has me scratching my head....related only tangentially to the topic. Are you guys receiving email notifications of replies on content you are following? I have mine set-up to receive them - and I used to - but have received no emails about replies to this thread.  And, yes, I have the "instant" notification specified - not daily or weekly.

[Silverback]

I've never felt the need to set up email notification so never get emails ! my settings are all at default.

 

[CrownVic95]

This morning I installed Sid Meier's Railroads! on the laptop and am pleased as punch with the result. Not only does it expand to wide screen and fill the 1920x1080 monitor, but everything is in proper scale - not stretched versions of the 4:3 appearance. It looks absolutely terrific!

I think I'm on to (back to, really) a new Railroad game for the time being.

 

[Gwizz]

Making this map easier was not as easy as I thought it would be.    I removed or down sized many citys, etc.   

I changed the amount of available cargo.  I also reduced the passenger business.   Few pasengers to fill too many seats in the passenger cars.  

I used some peaple to make Soil Green When no other cargo was available to haul.      I still get too many AI companies trying to start up.

They always seems to have full money bags, buying mostly stock.   Will I finish this map   I don't know.  

 

[jeffryfisher]

10 hours ago, Gwizz said:

Making this map easier was not as easy as I thought it would be.    I removed or down sized many citys, etc.  

Which map are you talking about? Did you post in the wrong thread?