you ever downscale your graphics?

i got a 295 card and except for crysis i can easily max out most games at max res of 1920x1080

however for many games i hate that res due making a lot of the UI just ultra small and for some games it actually give sme headaces. some like wow of course really handle the res good tho.

idk as of late im thinking of jsut making 1200x700(ish) my normal res. just makes everything fit the screen good. is there something wrong with that? is that normal for pc gamers?

Hmm, what's your monitor's default resolution, and did you try running the game to match that? Is it an LCD monitor to begin with?

One of the things I learned when I dropped a new graphics card in my system is that my LCD monitor can't really keep up with the card's own max fps. My monitor can only handle about 60 frames per second, and my card can pump up to 80+ frames per second even on the most intensive games, giving me headaches due to flickering.

My suggestion: try enabling v-sync on your games, to limit the maximum fps of you games to match your monitor's own refresh rate. It should cut down on the headaches, but maybe to the cost of some performance. I never had to "downscale" my graphics away from my monitor's max resolution. Also, especially with WoW, try enlarging the UI, or downloading a custom one from Curse or something. Some games have a UI scaling option which you should check out.

If all else fails, ever consider making a monitor upgrade to a nice 26-30in one (but, if you're a CAG, then this is not an option). Good luck in any case though.

EDIT: Hmm, I forgot one more thing: if your monitor plainly sucks, it might suffer from horrendous ghosting issues, which might give you a headache. What's the response rate on that puppy?

What games are you playing where the UI is small?

I have never run into that problem with my 1200p monitor.

While I don't experience these problems, I really wish more games had a scalable UI.

I always run pc games at the lowest supported resolution (640x480 or 800x600) with absolutely every last optional setting turned off or down as low as it will go, from shadows to lighting.

I just want max frame rate, I also prefer a polygonal look over the "realistic" shiny/clay look.

Well, not counting downscaling for framerate reasons...

Baldur's Gate doesn't like my graphics card, so I have to downscale a bit there. I'll often get mods to remove extraneous visual effects (glowing hands for special attacks in KotOR, auras in Dragon Age, etc.), and... why the are all my examples from Bioware games? God dammit.

It's common among serious Starcraft 2 players to minimze the graphics settings to increase unit visibility. Some might go with lower resolutions, too. I've heard of Quake players changing settings to maximize the contrast between characters and environments, though I don't recall the details.

Quake 3 players do it specifically because the physics of the game are tied to the frame rate, so there are things that you cannot do with a normal frame rate. Its mainly a competitive thing.

[quote name='Dr Mario Kart']Quake 3 players do it specifically because the physics of the game are tied to the frame rate, so there are things that you cannot do with a normal frame rate. Its mainly a competitive thing.[/QUOTE]
yep thats what we did,

Looks like I am in the minority here, but I play every pc game that I can at my monitors native resolution (1680x1050)... I can't stand turning games down. If I have frame rate issues I will always turn down Lighting and Texture Detail before I even touch the resolution. Can't say that I have ever noticed a problem with the text on the screen being too small either....

There's nothing wrong w/ running one of the best video cards at a lower resolution in-game. In a similar sense, I've down clocked my Pentium 4 CPU before because I didn't need it to run at 2.8GHz (also to reduce heat). As others have said, a lot of competitive gamers do it for various subtle advantages.

I always run at my monitors native res. If you have an LCD and don't run it at its native res it just looks like ass imo even if everything else is maxed out. Rather run at native res and lower some other graphic options, but thankfully you can usually find some guides or mods that improve performance for a lot of games.

I did this once years ago to get an edge during a game where players had stealth ability and by going to a lower resolution you could still see their outline. This was during my COH days and PVP was still hot.

I don't downscale my graphics, I try to run everything at 1920x1200 with full settings. If a game runs like crap on my PC, that usually means it's time for an upgrade.

ive quit using monitors
i got one thats 1900 native res for back up but ive pretty much switched to my samsung hdtv. as long as i stay with the 16:9 scale i really dont have problems with lower reses looking funky

but here are a few examples why i sort of like the lower reses

dragon age
can max graphics easy but it just plays so much better with the lower res graphics because teh ui is bigger and i dont mis click party members hehe.

witcher cant read a damn thing with the ui till its lower res

mirrors edge- i get a head ace 10 mins in due to most likely the colors but turn graphics down, not so bad hehe


half life 2- one of few games i can max just fine.

Yeah, I used to downscale too, back in the day because it gave me a competitive edge. I remember back when TF2 came out, that we were using custom .ini files that squeezed the most performance without having to figure out what adv settings to fiddle with, and what cannot be touched. Especially true when Q3 came out (you could google Quake 3 .ini files, and pick one that works for you system.

But, if the reason you're downscaling is not performance based, but health-based, then there is an underlying issue that should be looked at so that person could really enjoy gaming to the fullest, without need of having a puke bucket or an economy sized bottle of aspirin nearby.

I actually bought a 720p 32" TV for my bedroom/computer monitor instead of 1080p.

Only time I download mine is in games that the UI or text gets to small when I increase it to far but other than that I keep it jacked up pretty high.

Even though I can run crysis maxed (it has nothing to do with its graphics, the fact the game isnt optimized is what makes it run like shit, just like doom3) I usually dont on my games.