screen resolution question

[bhome83]

what is the difference between screen resolution in games and the one on the computer desktop? i have my desktop set to 800x600. when it is set to something like 1024x768 it makes the whole screen smaller. why doesn't it do this in games when i make screen display bigger? what screen display should games be set on? playing nhl 2002 and it is set to default which is 640X480. what is the difference between this and something bigger? Thanks.

[RJ]

Actually there is no difference. The resolution indicates how many pixels are used to display a picture.

The higher you set the resolution, the more pixels are used and the smaller the pixels are because the screen area itself doesn't change.

RJ

[bhome83]

so for games what is a good resolution to set the game at?

[RJ]

Depends on how powerful the system, especially the graphics chip, is.

For 3D games 1024x768 is a good resolution. Set it to 1024x768 and see if it runs smooth. If so, then you can go even higher with the resolution of first improve graphics quality.
When the game starts to become choppy, then your setting is too high. Lower either graphics quality or resolution.

For strategy games, the higher the resolution the more you see on the screen. Minimum is 1024x768 IMO.

RJ

[fred]

'Something bigger' just improves the definition or quality of the picture, but also requires a faster system, because all those extra pixels need extra processing to do! Most gamers spend lots of extra money to achieve the higher quality displays. What resolution you can run a game at depends on how fast your system is. The best idea is to play the game until you are used to it at 640x480 then go to the next resolution. If your PC can't cope, you will soon tell. It will really slow down and your gameplay will suffer. Just keep doing that until you get to a nice high resolution! I play most of my games at 1024x768. That's high enough for me. I can't specifically comment about nhl 2002 cus I don't have it.