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[Fahzgoolin]

Sorry OP. To be fair, 21:9 IS superior to 16:9. I just don't think that you wanna force that on a 1080p 16:9 monitor. Get yourself one of those legit 1080p or 1440p ultrawides. They're dope af

In my OP I don't have the cash. I love what this does for me.

It's an option.

I like the option.

I use the option.

I shared the option.

I'm sure many people do this. But if your monitor is small to begin with it's a bit of a bummer to look at

Also this is GAF, so I'm sure many people will disagree with you OP

apparently being a dismissive ignorant asshole = disagreeing.

 

[Barrel Cannon]

I'm sure many people do this. But if your monitor is small to begin with it's a bit of a bummer to look at

Also this is GAF, so I'm sure many people will disagree with you OP

 

[Darkstorne]

Actually, you are correct in the sense that it doesn't work for every game. Depends on the engine in question. For me, Dishonored 2 ran at about 10fps better and that is a terrible port.

I'm guessing this will help with games that are restricted by the GPU more than the CPU? Thanks for sharing this - I'm really curious to try it out. I'm sure black bars are deal breakers for some but they need to keep in mind that many people love adding them with Reshade/SweetFX for that cinematic look, and if adding them through this manner instead actually improves performance in some games... it's an awesome idea to get some extra life out of an ageing GPU. Black bars can look great imo:

 

[nOoblet16]

Actually, you are correct in the sense that it doesn't work for every game. Depends on the engine in question. For me, Dishonored 2 ran at about 10fps better and that is a terrible port.



It might, you just have to try. Once you have it set up in the control panel, the resolution will be there in games that allow you to change to arbritrary resolutions.



I haven't personally had any screen dimming or problem with brightness when doing this. You sure it's not just a monitor specific issue? I'm using an ASUS 144hz monitor. It's a TN panel. I'm not getting brightness variations.

Uh....I just found out something that has made me feel stupid it's because my monitor supports full range 0-255 but there has been an issue with nvidia cards since eternity in that if you are using HDMI then it'll automatically select limited range (16-235) for the native resolution. But whenever you use a custom resolution the range is set to full range thereby creating an image which has richer colours and can also display darker images.

So in reality it was actually showing correct colours and range but because my display was calibrated for limited range it looked odd.


The more you know.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

I'm guessing this will help with games that are restricted by the GPU more than the CPU? Thanks for sharing this - I'm really curious to try it out. I'm sure black bars are deal breakers for some but they need to keep in mind that many people love adding them with Reshade/SweetFX for that cinematic look, and if adding them through this manner instead actually improves performance in some games... it's an awesome idea to get some extra life out of an ageing GPU. Black bars can look great imo:

Exactly. Some people don't mind it and even add it in. It's a subjective thing. I use to do it with ENB on Skyrim, but the game is still rendering it behind the bars. I don't always like black bars, but if the screen is big enough or close enough, I don't notice it after a very short while.

Thank you sir =)

Uh....I just found out something that has made me feel stupid it's because my monitor supports full range 0-255 but there has been an issue with nvidia cards since eternity in that if you are using HDMI then it'll automatically select limited range (16-235) for the native resolution. But whenever you use a custom resolution the range is set to full range thereby creating an image which has richer colours and can also display darker images.

So in reality it was actually showing correct colours and range but because my display was calibrated for limited range it looked odd.


The more you know.

ohhhhh I know exactly what you are talking about now. That actually solves a problem for me now! I couldn't figure out why my HDMI signal to my TV was displaying colors strangely compared to my DVI signal to my monitor! LOL

 

[jet1911]

BF1 is incredible at 21:9

Here's some clips I recorded:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsucnuNJiu4

Yeaaaaaaaaah. Now I need to find how to do this haha. Thanks!

 

[renzolama]

16:9 it's the 30fps of aspect ratios.

That's it, this is now a holy war

 

[nOoblet16]

This issue is because using a custom res forces HDMI black level to full. I remember this being a problem with my last TV when I wanted to downsample because it only supported a limited range signal. Shouldn't be an issue on most monitors though and most TVs let you pick limited/full HDMI range or an auto setting that works.

Yep I just realised that, and so it seems it was actually that I was used to limited range and that it was the wrong option all along whereas using custom res would force full range...which my monitor supported but I never used.

Stupid nvidia...why does it not default to full range in the first place? It's been an issue since forever.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

Yep I just realised that, and so it seems it was actually that I was used to limited range and that it was the wrong option all along whereas using custom res would force full range...which my monitor supported but I never used.

Stupid nvidia...why does it not default to full range in the first place? It's been an issue since forever.

I actually thought something was wrong with my Panasonic plasma for a while due to this. Thanks for sharing man.

 

[SapientWolf]

You could be disadvantaged in Rocket League because a lot of the game is airborne.

 

[Tenacious-D]

Or just buy a LG29UM68 or 25UM65. Both of those are pretty affordable.

21:9 rocks. More people should try it.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

You could be disadvantaged in Rocket League because a lot of the game is airborne.

You don't lose vertical information, only gain horizontal. So there is no disadvantage in any game. Just look at the screenshots provided and you will know what I mean.

Or just buy a LG29UM68 or 25UM65. Both of those are pretty affordable.

21:9 rocks. More people should try it.

I like my 144hz too much to change.

 

[Kayant]

Interesting idea I think I will this for single player games for that "cinematic" view as you said. I don't see myself using it in things like RL or FPS. I would rather tune my FOV as otherwise it would be too extreme for me but thanks for the heads up.

 

[Tain]

Clever solution, OP. Not for me, but still.

I got this weird desire to know what playing some modern games in 4:3 would be like now, lol. Most games don't base FOV on that, though, so I wouldn't be adding vertical visibility, right?

 

[nOoblet16]

Exactly. Some people don't mind it and even add it in. It's a subjective thing. I use to do it with ENB on Skyrim, but the game is still rendering it behind the bars. I don't always like black bars, but if the screen is big enough or close enough, I don't notice it after a very short while.

Thank you sir =)



ohhhhh I know exactly what you are talking about now. That actually solves a problem for me now! I couldn't figure out why my HDMI signal to my TV was displaying colors strangely compared to my DVI signal to my monitor! LOL

This has made me thing, going from 16-235 to 0-255 made such a big difference I can only imagine how big of a leap going to HDR10/Dolby HDR would be from here. Man I can't wait until I get an HDR TV.

I actually thought something was wrong with my Panasonic plasma for a while due to this. Thanks for sharing man.

No problem, I used to think my monitor was shit because the colours would always be washed out and though tit was the best it could do.
Hence I avoided playing a lot of games on my PC because of this.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

Clever solution, OP. Not for me, but still.

I got this weird desire to know what playing some modern games in 4:3 would be like now, lol. Most games don't base FOV on that, though, so I wouldn't be adding vertical visibility, right?

You would just be losing information. Some Counter Strike players still force 4:3 because it's what they are use to after all these years lol

 

[malboroking]

I don't understand why people have to be so harsh about stating that they don't like it.

This is an option for those who would like to try 21:9 without the warping effect of just raising the FOV.

It's also something that is accessible in that if you don't have the best hardware you can still try it without having to spend tons of cash on 21:9.

This is obviously not for resolution snobs but a possible solution or cool thing to try for those who aren't.

Good grief guys, it's not like this is going to become the standard or anything. I sometimes wonder if ya'll go around all day being openly harsh and defensive at literally everything in life that you don't prefer if you see that others do... Not everyone needs to like the same things you do. Good grief.

Let's put it this way:

Thread on GAF with intelligent criticism and discussion, 4 pages after 3 days.

Thread on GAF with LOL, Mass Effect animations! 42 pages after 12 hours.

Gamers are whiney as shit.

 

[GavinUK86]

Found some Dishonored 2 examples. It's a nice idea if you don't mind the bars. 16:9 was giving me 51fps and 21:9 gave me 58fps.

 

[SirMossyBloke]

Honestly I am not sure why some of you are going on at the OP like this. This is actually a good solution in that it provides native pixel density while providing 21:9 ratio at a reasonable cost on a 16:9 screen. Yes you will have less being displayed on screen BUT the game will be displaying more information than it would if it was using the entire screen.

Imagine if you have a 28 inch 16:9 monitor and you do this on it, the kind of image you are getting would be similar to what you'd get on a smaller 21:9 monitor like 24-26 inch or something. When you say "OP just get a 21:9 mo monitor", you are implying that if the OP bought a 24 inch 21:9 monitor that displays an image the same size as the one OP is getting right now you'd be ok with it...that...makes...no..goddamn...sense !

Yes the 21:9 monitor will have a higher native resolution but OP doesn't want a higher native resolution (GPU limitation), this is a solution for people who want to game at 21:9 on a 16:9 monitor while having the native pixel density exactly equivalent to 1080P.



Except they take less space with this because you have a wider FoV and more is being shown.
Just look at the very pictures OP posted

Yes look at the picture, it makes it smaller, as I said.

Edit: also I can get a wider fov without the bars if I want to see more.

 

[Darkstorne]

So this is weird. I tried this out in Mass Effect: Andromeda and it did indeed boost performance by about 15fps on the Tempest (biggest slowdowns I've seen on my GTX 970), so that was really nice. But... in that game the resolution was squished sideways, so side bars instead of top and bottom bars. Which is odd because using the custom resolution on my desktop works as expected with only bottom bars and a widescreen image. Maybe that's just the game not supporting ultra wide resolutions? I'll try some different games.

EDIT: Nope, no side bars, just stretches up and down so there are no bars at all. Tried it with Dragon Age and it does the same thing - big FPS boost but vertically stretched image. I'm clearly doing something wrong somewhere...

 

[Huge Succeeded]

You know what? I think I might just play through Witcher 3 like this so I can enjoy Hairworks on my 970 :3

 

[Transistor]

So this is weird. I tried this out in Mass Effect: Andromeda and it did indeed boost performance by about 15fps on the Tempest (biggest slowdowns I've seen on my GTX 970), so that was really nice. But... in that game the resolution was squished sideways, so side bars instead of top and bottom bars. Which is odd because using the custom resolution on my desktop works as expected with only bottom bars and a widescreen image. Maybe that's just the game not supporting ultra wide resolutions? I'll try some different games.

THat's weird. You would think a new game would support ultrawide right out of the box

 

[Mysterious Stranger]

I have an ultrawide but I use it as secondary monitor. My gsync 144hz 16:9 is my main. I hate black bars and games that don't use up real estate space.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

Found some Dishonored 2 examples. It's a nice idea if you don't mind the bars. 16:9 was giving me 51fps and 21:9 gave me 58fps.

added to OP... thank you sir!

 

[nOoblet16]

Yes look at the picture, it makes it smaller, as I said.

It also makes the HUD smaller if you didn't notice.
The bottom line is more of the game world is on screen for you due to higher FoV...so it's not like you are getting black bars while the hands and HUD stay the same size as before.
If you have a large screen that already has lots of screen estate doing this shouldn't really affect much as it'd be pretty much like using a 21:9 monitor that's a size or two lower than your 16:9 monitor.

Edit: also I can get a wider fov without the bars if I want to see more.

No you can't...not without serious fish eye effects.
If it was possible to get FoV equivalent to 21:9 on a 16:9 screen without serious fish eye effect people would be doing that instead of playing at 21:9.

 

[SirMossyBloke]

It also makes the HUD smaller if you didn't notice.
The bottom line is more of the game world is on screen for you due to higher FoV...so it's not like you are getting black bars while the hands and HUD stay the same size as before.

If you have a large screen that already has lots of screen estate doing this shouldn't really affect much as it'd be pretty much like using a 21:9 monitor that's a size or two lower than your 16:9 monitor.

Maybe this would work on a monitor, not a TV though, I'd have to then increase the UI size which brings me back to my original issue.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

So this is weird. I tried this out in Mass Effect: Andromeda and it did indeed boost performance by about 15fps on the Tempest (biggest slowdowns I've seen on my GTX 970), so that was really nice. But... in that game the resolution was squished sideways, so side bars instead of top and bottom bars. Which is odd because using the custom resolution on my desktop works as expected with only bottom bars and a widescreen image. Maybe that's just the game not supporting ultra wide resolutions? I'll try some different games.

Make sure you have "no scaling" enabled like I mentioned in the OP. Sometimes games will stretch it strangely, depending on your control panel options.

Maybe this would work on a monitor, not a TV though, I'd have to then increase the UI size which brings me back to my original issue.

This is indeed true, depending on the game. I usually play with as little UI as possible in single player games, so it's a non-issue most of the time for me.

 

[Sword Of Doom]

If I were playing competitive and took it seriously I would like the 25% more power for performance but for me casually playing games, anything above 90fps looks and feels very similar. I'm sure I'll notice the faster response but visually I really can't tell above 90fps. It all just looks incredibly smooth after a certain point.


I have a 27" 1440p screen so I might try it out to see how games look

 

[gelf]

I quite like this idea, some games need a little more performance squeezing out of them on my system these days and I stop noticing black bars after a while anyway.

 

[MacGurcules]

I'll back you up on this, OP. I sometimes run a 21:9 chunk of my 4k monitor because I don't quite have the juice to do a full 4k. Some games do benefit from the ultrawide presentation.

 

[Darkstorne]

Make sure you have "no scaling" enabled like I mentioned in the OP. Sometimes games will stretch it strangely, depending on your control panel options.



This is indeed true, depending on the game. I usually play with as little UI as possible in single player games, so it's a non-issue most of the time for me.

I've definitely got "no scaling" selected but I've now also noticed there's a checkbox underneath it that can be selected that says "override the scaling mode set by games and programs." Hopefully that's the issue =D

 

[DJ88]

This is great. I will definitely be trying it out when I get my new 16:9 monitor. I love the advantages of 21:9 but don't want to get an ultrawide since that aspect ratio isn't suported as widely as 16:9. I'd be seeing black bars on the sides of an ultrawide way more often with no additional information gained.

I've got nothing against some black bars on the top and bottom if it means I gain more visual information. I love blu-ray movies in 2:35:1.

 

[SmokedMeat]

This is quite an advantage in a game like Rainbow Six Siege.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

This is quite an advantage in a game like Rainbow Six Siege.

Yup. I had people accusing me of cheating because I spotted them in the corner of my eye and turned to head shot them. It has saved me many times.

Pretty cool way to extend the life of a GPU relatively harmlessly.

I have a gtx 960 4gb and it struggles with some games on Ultra. I can now enable ultra on most games and even get away with about 2-4x anti-aliasing and have good performance. Depends on the game, but it's pretty great.

 

[Nowy]

I'd love to game at 21:9, but on a 16:9 monitor the letterboxing is distracting. My brain ignores it when watching videos but not for games.

 

[Iced]

Question for anyone who has went from a 16:9 to 21:9 display: what do you set your FOV to in game (when it's an option)? I always set mine to 90. Don't like to go higher because I don't like the fisheye effect. So what's the 90 equivalent on a 21:9 display? Hope this makes sense!

 

[jotun?]

So this is weird. I tried this out in Mass Effect: Andromeda and it did indeed boost performance by about 15fps on the Tempest (biggest slowdowns I've seen on my GTX 970), so that was really nice. But... in that game the resolution was squished sideways, so side bars instead of top and bottom bars. Which is odd because using the custom resolution on my desktop works as expected with only bottom bars and a widescreen image. Maybe that's just the game not supporting ultra wide resolutions? I'll try some different games.

EDIT: Nope, no side bars, just stretches up and down so there are no bars at all. Tried it with Dragon Age and it does the same thing - big FPS boost but vertically stretched image. I'm clearly doing something wrong somewhere...

Make sure you're doing true fullscreen, and not windowed or fake fullscreen

I've seen this happen in a Windows 10 UWP game when I tried to do it, because it's actually not even able to do real fullscreen, so when you give the game a different resolution than your desktop it just fucks it all up

Question for anyone who has went from a 16:9 to 21:9 display: what do you set your FOV to in game (when it's an option)? I always set mine to 90. Don't like to go higher because I don't like the fisheye effect. So what's the 90 equivalent on a 21:9 display? Hope this makes sense!

Not really an answer-able question because FOV settings are defined differently in different games. Games with good widescreen/multimonitor support would generally be Hor+ though, meaning the FOV is defined on the vertical axis, so the number you'd use wouldn't change when moving to a wider screen

 

[Cels]

LEL when CSGO allows actual 21:9 but overwatch cripples it because blizzard fears it would harm competitive integrity

 

[Darkstorne]

Make sure you have "no scaling" enabled like I mentioned in the OP. Sometimes games will stretch it strangely, depending on your control panel options.

I've definitely got "no scaling" selected but I've now also noticed there's a checkbox underneath it that can be selected that says "override the scaling mode set by games and programs." Hopefully that's the issue =D

That was it! Works perfectly in Andromeda now! It's like you're pulled further back from the screen, so it will take a bit of getting used to, but this is an amazing trick for improving framerates. Running around on the ship used to give me FPS fluctuations between 40-60, but at this resolution it's 55-60, and almost always 60. It'll only drop when it's stream loading new areas and then instantly bounces back to 60.

Thanks for the tip!

 

[xptoxyz]

How do you get CS to expose resolutions from aspect rations other than 4:3/16:9/16:10 in the options?

 

[Iced]

Not really an answer-able question because FOV settings are defined differently in different games. Games with good widescreen/multimonitor support would generally be Hor+ though, meaning the FOV is defined on the vertical axis, so the number you'd use wouldn't change when moving to a wider screen

Makes sense. Thanks!

 

[nOoblet16]

THat's weird. You would think a new game would support ultrawide right out of the box

It kind of does but also sort of doesn't...gameplay you get 21:9

But then when you have scenes where this could happen, this was taken during the Tempest landing scene:

But immediately a split second later:

Basically if it's a cutscene...even if it's a non directed cutscene (i.e. cutscenes without panning/moving cameras) and just a conversation the game reverts to 16:9.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

That was it! Works perfectly in Andromeda now! It's like you're pulled further back from the screen, so it will take a bit of getting used to, but this is an amazing trick for improving framerates. Running around on the ship used to give me FPS fluctuations between 40-60, but at this resolution it's 55-60, and almost always 60. It'll only drop when it's stream loading new areas and then instantly bounces back to 60.

Thanks for the tip!

Super happy to hear it's working for you! I can't wait to try this is Nier Automata as well. Seeing more to your left and right during hectic combat is super helpful.

How do you get CS to expose resolutions from aspect rations other than 4:3/16:9/16:10 in the options?

I think it shows it under the 16:9 option. Let me check.

Adding this to the OP since I forgot it:

 

[Kambing]

Thread was meant for 1080 players, but shit, I am going to do this on my 4k OLED tv. 21:9 at 3840 x 1600 -- save some of that performance and the aspect ratio will make the FOV so much better playing 55 inches @ 3-4 feet away. God damn thanks OP, can't believe I did not think of this.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

Thread was meant for 1080 players, but shit, I am going to do this on my 4k OLED tv. 21:9 at 3840 x 1600 -- save some of that performance and the aspect ratio will make the FOV so much better playing 55 inches @ 3-4 feet away. God damn thanks OP, can't believe I did not think of this.

Yup, that's a really great application of this. No problem and thank you! I love helping.

 

[Tenacious-D]

I like my 144hz too much to change.

Pretty sure 1080p and 1440p 100Hz UltraWides are coming this year. Probably won't be cheap though.

----

I saw some comments here saying that you lose picture vertically. You don't, 99% of the time. The only time that happens is when the developer is either incompetent, or has decided to deliberately do that. In the majority of circumstances, you gain horizontal image on the left and right.

 

[Transistor]

Pretty sure 1080p and 1440p 144Hz UltraWides are coming this year. Probably won't be cheap though.

----

I saw some comments here saying that you lose picture vertically. You don't, 99% of the time. The only time that happens is when the developer is either incompetent, or has decided to deliberately do that. In the majority of circumstances, you gain horizontal image on the left and right.

WSGF usually lets you know if a game is using Horizontal+ or Vertical-

For those who don't know Hor+ is where the game expands the image horizontally, giving you more to see. Vert- is where the game takes away from the top and bottom to create the widescreen image

Hor+ good
Vert- bad

 

[Fahzgoolin]

Pretty sure 1080p and 1440p 100Hz UltraWides are coming this year. Probably won't be cheap though.

----

I saw some comments here saying that you lose picture vertically. You don't, 99% of the time. The only time that happens is when the developer is either incompetent, or has decided to deliberately do that. In the majority of circumstances, you gain horizontal image on the left and right.

If you have the "override the scaling mode set by games" ticked in the Nvidia control panel, it will actually never happen. It will give the middle finger to the game lol. The only problem is when games have pre-rendered cut scenes in a specific resolution/aspect ratio.

And yeah, some monitors are out already and they are $1000 minimum usually.

 

[Shin-Ra]

When the 360 launched I had one HDTV, not always available for use and with high input latency so I used my old 4:3 CRT with the VGA cable as an alternative.

My CRT had a large edge-fill adjustment range so I squeezed the vertical fill to create a 16:9 shape and set the console to output 1280x720 widescreen.

I have nothing against this idea, and depending on the game I could see it being really nice, but (and correct me if I'm wrong) I don't see how it really increases FPS at all. Even though you're lowering the resolution, you're rendering more of the environment with a wider field of view.

Lower pixel fill vs extra geometry and whatever else you're seeing more of.

 

[RS4-]

THat's weird. You would think a new game would support ultrawide right out of the box

Lol you'd be surprised at how many don't. Even when the resolution is available, it isn't done properly.

Some elements aren't scaled the right way, some just stretch the image or crop a huge amount of the image to look ultra wide.

I understand why some games don't do it, but it's pretty fucking bad when it's done in a lazy way.

Iirc ME:A was said to support UW. At least in a typical sense. The cut scenes and such are still 16:9, though.