jmeissen,

Does this issue occur when you tried both the VGA and the DVI on the E228?

I think you may have been mislead by a typo somewhere. The correct native resolution for 22" widescreens is 1680 x 1050

OK, installing the Dell drivers didn't make any difference.

The CD has .inf, .icm and .cat files for the monitor. How do I force XP to use them? I'm going through a KVM and the monitor just shows up as "Default Monitor". In the old days you could select the monitor in the advanced section of the display settings and select Change and point it to the new .inf file. But I can't find a way to force XP to use a specific monitor setting.

You are correct. The monitor claims to want 1600x1050 when I try something it doesn't like. And that's what the original specs from Dell said. But I just checked the status while running off my Linux box and it says it's 1680x1050. So, OK. The "latest" drivers from ATI still won't give me that choice. I re-installed the ones from ATI's site since the Dell ones were dated sometime in 2004. I'll re-install Dell's and try to look for 1680x1050.

I've seen plenty of reports of monitors not working properly through KVMs, so I would try a direct connection. To install the monitor 'driver':

Remove old monitor entries from Device Manager
1. Open Device Manager
2. In the View menu, select Show hidden devices.
3. Expand the Monitors section.
4. Right-click each entry and choose 'Uninstall'.
5. The Monitors section is refreshed and should show only 'Default Monitor'.

Update the driver
1. In Device Manager- Monitors, right click on the Default Monitor and select Update Driver.
2. When the Hardware Update Wizard dialog box appears, choose “Install from a list or specific location" and then click NEXT.
3. Check the "Include this location in the search" box.
4. Use the browse button to find the location of the inf file on the CD, or in the folder extracted from the download.
5. Click Next - Finish to complete the installation.

When updating graphics drivers and problems arise, it is worth trying a clean uninstall using Driver Cleaner

OK, that worked. But only as long as I keep the monitor directly attached. I can't do that. I have at least three sytems I work with, two are Linux and one is XP. I have to be able to switch among them.

Why does XP have to be so obstinant? I am incredibly sick of this OS doing what I DON'T want it to.

Is there ANY way to set this up and make it stick?

Apparently ATI doesn't give me any credit, either, since there doesn't appear to be any way to make custom settings. I'm willing to go out and buy an nVidia card if I know for certain I can resolve this problem by doing so.

I have 1680x1050 as long as I keep it connected directly.

The 8-port Cybex KVM I'm using apparently doesn't pass the the monitor type data through, so Windows just uses "Default Monitor".

I haven't been able to find anything in the Catalyst interface that will let me specify resolutions not explicitly supported by the current monitor. Their "support" response is:
"If you have the latest drives for the card and you connect your monitor too the card automatically detects the resolution if your monitor resolution is not listed that means that its not a supported resolution you would have to use some third party software to customize that specific resolution."

:-P

It would be a lot cheaper for me to change video cards than to change KVMs.

I use the XP system for video editing, so it's important that I get this resolved.

Message Edited by jmeissen on 02-22-2007 03:09 PM

'you would have to use some third party software to customize that specific resolution'

- something like Powerstrip

EnTech (Powerstrip etc) forums looks pretty helpful.

These sites may also be of interest:
ATI Catalyst Tweak Guide
ATI Tray Tools
Omega Drivers
Rage3D forums

Hope you can get it sorted.