Games won't go full screen at less than 1920x1080

I'm using my Dell Studio XPS 17 laptop, which has a native 1920x1080 screen. Since it's getting old, it doesn't run modern games all that well, and I've found the dropping the resolution down to 720p gives me a massive boost in framerate. For example, Sleeping Dogs was just barely playable (hovering like 22-29 fps) at 1080p, and I dropped it to 720p without changing anything else, and had to turn on v sync to keep it from going over 60.

Most games seem to work no problem, but there are two games, Skryim and Crysis 2, that I'm having trouble with. The problem is, they won't go full screen at any less than 1080p. I set them to 720p, and full screen, and they give me the game in a little 1280x720 box, in the middle of my 1920x1080 screen, with a black background.

I've tried everything that I know of, and nothing will fix it. I've googled the sh!t out of the problem, and I'm starting to feel like I'm literally the only person in the world who's ever got this. I'm also starting to think that the issue is with my laptop, rather than the games. A friend of mine tested on his computer, and says Skyrim stretches to full screen no problem with he sets it below his native res. Also, as a last resort attempt, I went into the windows settings and changed my desktop resolution to 1280x720. Get this. My desktop came up in a little box with a black background. Also, it only happens on the actual laptop screen. If I use an HDMI and plug into my 1080p TV, it displays the games in full screen, even at 720p. On top of that, probably the weirdest part: If I plug into the TV, and have it set on duplicate screens, so the TV and laptop screen display the same thing, the games work fine, full screen, 720p, on both. But then I unplug from the TV, and the laptop screen crushes the game back into its little box. WHAT THE F***?

Does anyone have the slightest clue what's causing this and/or how to fix it? I'm completely at a loss, and those two games barely even playable (probably lower framerates than most PC gamers would even call "playable") at 1080p, but they run quite nicely at 720p, albeit in their little boxes.

What are your current specs for your laptop and how old is it?

Adjust the scaling/ratio options.darksusperia

Where?

And the laptop is 3 years old, got a mobility radeon HD4670 1gb. And my catalyst control center won't open. I tried getting the latest drivers (the official ones, right from the AMD site, the exact ones it told me to get) to fix that a couple weeks ago, and it made my computer sh!t itself. forced the resolution to 640x480 (stretched to widescreen, at that), my control panel display settings didn't recognize the monitor, and the device manager didn't even show my video card anymore. Had to use system restore to fix that.

[QUOTE="darksusperia"]Adjust the scaling/ratio options.the_bi99man

Where?

And the laptop is 3 years old, got a mobility radeon HD4670 1gb. And my catalyst control center won't open. I tried getting the latest drivers (the official ones, right from the AMD site, the exact ones it told me to get) to fix that a couple weeks ago, and it made my computer sh!t itself. forced the resolution to 640x480 (stretched to widescreen, at that), my control panel display settings didn't recognize the monitor, and the device manager didn't even show my video card anymore. Had to use system restore to fix that.

There's your issue, your laptop can't run in 1080p with that. Also AMD has stopped supporting your legacy Graphics card.

[QUOTE="the_bi99man"]

[QUOTE="darksusperia"]Adjust the scaling/ratio options.FireEmblem_Man

Where?

And the laptop is 3 years old, got a mobility radeon HD4670 1gb. And my catalyst control center won't open. I tried getting the latest drivers (the official ones, right from the AMD site, the exact ones it told me to get) to fix that a couple weeks ago, and it made my computer sh!t itself. forced the resolution to 640x480 (stretched to widescreen, at that), my control panel display settings didn't recognize the monitor, and the device manager didn't even show my video card anymore. Had to use system restore to fix that.

There's your issue, your laptop can't run in 1080p with that. Also AMD has stopped supporting your legacy Graphics card.

Oh shut up

[QUOTE="the_bi99man"]

[QUOTE="darksusperia"]Adjust the scaling/ratio options.FireEmblem_Man

Where?

And the laptop is 3 years old, got a mobility radeon HD4670 1gb. And my catalyst control center won't open. I tried getting the latest drivers (the official ones, right from the AMD site, the exact ones it told me to get) to fix that a couple weeks ago, and it made my computer sh!t itself. forced the resolution to 640x480 (stretched to widescreen, at that), my control panel display settings didn't recognize the monitor, and the device manager didn't even show my video card anymore. Had to use system restore to fix that.

There's your issue, your laptop can't run in 1080p with that. Also AMD has stopped supporting your legacy Graphics card.

Erm, not running in 1080p isn't the issue. And actually, it runs 1080p perfectly fine. The problem is that certain, more graphically intensive games, run a lot better at a lower resolution (naturally), and two of those games refuse to fill the screen at any less than native 1080p. Crysis 1 does exactly what I want it to do when I drop the resolution the 720p. It fills my whole screen, but looks worse, and runs at a higher framerate. Crysis 2 and Skyrim, however, don't fill the screen. It's like the screen stays at 1920x1080, and the game just runs in a little 1280x720 box.

in the nvidia control panel under scaling you can let the gpu perform aspect ratio scaling and even stretched rather than let your monitor handle this. (This also reduces input lag)

I am sure ati has something similar, if not, lol.

in the nvidia control panel under scaling you can let the gpu perform aspect ratio scaling and even stretched rather than let your monitor handle this. (This also reduces input lag)

I am sure ati has something similar, if not, lol.

JigglyWiggly_

Yeah, all the catalyst control center processes are running, but I cannot open the the control center. I used to be able to, and I'm not sure when it stopped working, but, like I said, i tried updating to the latest drivers and it damn near destroyed my computer. And I don't think that's the issue, anyway, because it's only those two games that have the problem. Also like I said, they'll go full screen at <1080p on my 1080p TV, and even go full screen on the laptop screen, when it's also plugged into the TV. It's the most confusing issue I've ever had with any computer.

[QUOTE="JigglyWiggly_"]

in the nvidia control panel under scaling you can let the gpu perform aspect ratio scaling and even stretched rather than let your monitor handle this. (This also reduces input lag)

I am sure ati has something similar, if not, lol.

nilzg

[QUOTE="nilzg"][QUOTE="JigglyWiggly_"]

in the nvidia control panel under scaling you can let the gpu perform aspect ratio scaling and even stretched rather than let your monitor handle this. (This also reduces input lag)

I am sure ati has something similar, if not, lol.

JigglyWiggly_

I also used driversweeper when I tried to install the latest drivers. May or may not have contributed to the fact that it completely broke my computer, and needed a system restore to the previous day.

[QUOTE="darksusperia"]Adjust the scaling/ratio options.the_bi99man

Where?

And the laptop is 3 years old, got a mobility radeon HD4670 1gb. And my catalyst control center won't open. I tried getting the latest drivers (the official ones, right from the AMD site, the exact ones it told me to get) to fix that a couple weeks ago, and it made my computer sh!t itself. forced the resolution to 640x480 (stretched to widescreen, at that), my control panel display settings didn't recognize the monitor, and the device manager didn't even show my video card anymore. Had to use system restore to fix that.

I was just having the same problem with Crysis 2 just a couple days ago. All I had to do was disable DirectX 11 through the in-game settings, restarted the program and BAM fullscreen! One difference in my case though is that I'm playing in 1080p, so I don't know if this will work at 720p resolution or not. Couldn't hurt to try though!

Alright I'm downloading the latest Catalyst drivers now. I'll give that a try.

[QUOTE="the_bi99man"]

[QUOTE="darksusperia"]Adjust the scaling/ratio options.darksusperia

Where?

And the laptop is 3 years old, got a mobility radeon HD4670 1gb. And my catalyst control center won't open. I tried getting the latest drivers (the official ones, right from the AMD site, the exact ones it told me to get) to fix that a couple weeks ago, and it made my computer sh!t itself. forced the resolution to 640x480 (stretched to widescreen, at that), my control panel display settings didn't recognize the monitor, and the device manager didn't even show my video card anymore. Had to use system restore to fix that.

Hmm. So, is it a problem if there's like, a sh!tload of entries with that token? Like over 200? Almost 300? Because I just looked, and, yeah. Sure that's all stuff I don't need and/or will be replaced with the new drivers? Some of them have names that I recognize, that look like they're part of the video drivers, but a lot don't look like anything I recognize.

[QUOTE="darksusperia"][QUOTE="the_bi99man"]

Where?

And the laptop is 3 years old, got a mobility radeon HD4670 1gb. And my catalyst control center won't open. I tried getting the latest drivers (the official ones, right from the AMD site, the exact ones it told me to get) to fix that a couple weeks ago, and it made my computer sh!t itself. forced the resolution to 640x480 (stretched to widescreen, at that), my control panel display settings didn't recognize the monitor, and the device manager didn't even show my video card anymore. Had to use system restore to fix that.

the_bi99man

Hmm. So, is it a problem if there's like, a sh!tload of entries with that token? Like over 200? Almost 300? Because I just looked, and, yeah. Sure that's all stuff I don't need and/or will be replaced with the new drivers? Some of them have names that I recognize, that look like they're part of the video drivers, but a lot don't look like anything I recognize.

Mmk. Gonna try it now.

nevermind got it.

nevermind got it.

the_bi99man

okay, maybe not. Safe mode doesn't want to work. I'm pressing F8, I'm holding down F8, the thing's beeping at me, and not booting safe mode.

[QUOTE="the_bi99man"]

nevermind got it.

the_bi99man

okay, maybe not. Safe mode doesn't want to work. I'm pressing F8, I'm holding down F8, the thing's beeping at me, and not booting safe mode.

EDIT:

Alternatively:

Open the Start Menu, then type msconfig in the search box and press Enter.

If prompted by UAC, click on Yes.

Click on the Boot tab.

Select OS at the top, then check Safe boot and dot/tick/check Minimal.

Click on OK and restart the computer.

The computer will now restart and start into Safe Mode.

Okay, got safe mode to boot. Deleted everything having anything to do with ATI and AMD from every folder I could find, and deleted the whole pile of things from the windows assembly folder. Rebooted into normal mode, ran new catalyst package installer and.... it refuses to install anything but the video drivers (so, no catalyst control center) because it insists i have catalyst control center installed and up to date. And I most certainly do not.

Okay, got safe mode to boot. Deleting everything having anything to do with ATI and AMD from every folder I could find, and deleted the whole pile of things from the windows assembly folder. Rebooted into normal mode, ran new catalyst package installer and.... it refuses to install anything but the video drivers (so, no catalyst control center) because it insists i have catalyst control center installed and up to date.

the_bi99man

also try drivers sweeper and remove anything it finds.

Might be worth running CCleaner to remove any remaining reg entries that the installer may be looking at/for. (this will also remove any remaining programs & features entries too)

yeah, CCC is still in the programs list, but when I try to uninstall it it just says "setup.exe has stopped working". I'm like 99% positive that it not actually there, anywhere, so I'm just gonna try getting rid of all the entried with CCleaner.

Okay. Soo. After deleting all the ATI registry entries with CCleaner, I restarted, and tried the catalyst installer again. It didn't claim that I already had catalyst control center, and it said it installed it. But! After restarting the computer, I got this immediately on signing in.

Then, I tried opening CCC from the desktop right click option, and got this one.

Just looked for the actual program folder, and it doesn't look like CCC is even there.

Just tried that. Nothing. Did the entire safe mode uninstall/reinstall process over again after doing that. Still nothing. I'm now convinced that the official CCC download from AMD.com is fake. It does not contain CCC. I give up. Again. Going to plan b.

Step 1: System restore, to before I messed with it today.

Step 2: suck it up and live with inexplicable resolution/full screen problems with Crysis 2 and Skyrim, and a nonexistant GPU control panel.

Step 3: Remember to never buy anything from AMD again, because apparently functioning hardware and drivers are just too much to ask from those a$$holes.

Thanks for trying to help. Maybe someday I'll back up my entire harddrive, and do a complete format/reset to factory settings, and then not update.

i recommend this:
uninstall all ati software
upgrade to windows 8
install CCC again
prey the upgrade magically fixed your problem in the upgrade
it fixed my broken .net

but yeah i've had loads of problems opening CCC when I had ati

i' not going back

everything's just working on nvidia

(i was always ati b4)

Yeah, I've now dealt with one laptop with an ATI card, and two different ATI cards in my old desktop, and I've never had anything but horrific driver problems with all three of them, from day one. And now! Fan-fvcking-tastic. I just did a system restore to before I messed with any of it today, and I'm getting another error message on startup that I wasn't getting before (though I do recognize it from the last time I tried fixing this issue). This wonderful little guy.

I punched that into google, and found what looked to be a good solution, icluding driver sweeper, CCleaner, and new drivers. Did all of that. No luck at all. Did ANOTHER system restore, and it's still there. I think I'm just going to have to live with it. Fvcking ati/amd. I'm taking my laptop to a shop later this week. I'm just so completely fed up with all of this. I'm just going to tell someone at the shop whats happening, leave it there, and say "call me when it works".

Alternatively... does anyone know about replacing video cards in laptops? Is it possible? How easy? Where can I get an nVidia card for this thing?

just delete the entry from the startup reg. never have to see it again LOL.darksusperia

That was my first thought. But, in what is yet another of the wonderful mysteries of my laptop, it seems, there is no entry for it in the startup reg.

did you check both HKCU and HKLM?darksusperia

Hmm? I was looking in the startup and services tabs of MSCONFIG. Is there somewhere else I should look?

[QUOTE="darksusperia"]did you check both HKCU and HKLM?the_bi99man

Hmm? I was looking in the startup and services tabs of MSCONFIG. Is there somewhere else I should look?

Hmm. Nope. Nothing resembling that in either of those.