Increasing resolution limit in Catalyst Drivers

[Supacon]

I just obtained a radeon 9500 that has been softmodded to a 9700. Things work fine with the softmod drivers, but I 'm not happy about the limit of the ATI drivers that does not allow one to increase the resolution of the monitors beyond 1600x1200. I used to run my two 21" monitors at 1800x1350 with an NVIDIA Ti4200, but it seems that I can't increase the maximum resolution beyond that with the catalyst drivers.

Does this have anything to do with the driver not picking up my Dell P1110s' DDC information? Is there a way to override this limit that the driver imposes, or to at least allow for higher options that what I'm now offered?

 

[C&C Freak 2K]

That's exactly why.

The drivers will drive a monitor up to its maximum resolution, or the video card to its maximum resolution (2048x1536). Go into the ATi control panel, click the Displays tab, click the properties button for your primary display, and see if it recognises your monitor and uses DDC.

 

[Supacon]

No, it is not able to use DDC information. I manually set the monitor in Windows XP (SP2), but it won't pick up the DDC. How can I do that?

Also, another problem I'm having is that I can't figure out how to actually make the refresh rate override feature here actually work, but first things first...

 

[NRP]

Supacon,
Try to download the .inf and .icm files from you monitor manufacturer's website. I think the Catalyst drivers look to these files to determine you monitor's max resolutions. If you're using WinXP's default files, then you're probably getting hosed. Basically, it isn't the Catalyst driver, but rather WinXP's default monitor profile that sets your max resolution.

 

[Supacon]

Hrm...

If this is the case, then it could perhaps be tweaked by hand... or perhaps with a 3rd party utility like powerstrip. If I use powerstrip, I wonder if the drivers will still limit it at what seems like a lower lever (like, closer to the hardware than the windows control for resolution, thus it takes priority.)

But still, "use DDC information" is not an option for me. I've never been sure why sometimes a computer won't pick this up. It is supposed to come straight from the monitor itself, is it not?

 

[C&C Freak 2K]

If you follow my steps, you can configure the maximum resolution and refresh rate manually. If you monitor doesn't support a particular mode, it should make some indication that it doesn't (tel you the parameters are out of range, go into sleep mode, etc). This is simply a workaround.

 

[Supacon]

Uhm... which steps are you referring to exactly? Am I missing something?

 

[Supacon]

Even powerstrip cannot change the resolution beyond 1600x1200...
Windows accepts the modes as valid, but the ATI drivers prohibit them from exceeding this at a lower level... so it only makes the DESKTOP that size, but the screen resolution remains at 1600x1200 (i.e. I have to scrol around to see edges of the screen)