Windows 98se Distorted Digital Camera Pics

[john god]

 :(Hello,
Problem is---When I download pics to my pc, they come out like a cartoon like feature, grey/white in color and distorted. Any help would be welcomed.
Thanks,
John God

[soybean]

Give us some more info.  Video specs for your system?  Onboard video or video card?  How much video memory?  How much RAM?  What resolution do you have your monitor set at?  What color settings do you have set in your Display settings?  

Go here  - http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1012&message=17498602 - and look at some photos.  Do they look clear?

[john god]

Hello,
Went to the site you said and they do look clear.Not at all like mine do.
Here is some info you requested. Some info I don't know where to get it from.

            Windows 98se    Dell Demension 700 XPS    Intel Pentium 3
            Internet Explorer 6      Outlook Express 6
            128 MB Ram      256 Colors     800 by 600 Pixels

Rest of the info I would need to know where to get it.
Thanks

[soybean]

Can you set your colors to 16-bit in your Display settings?  How many options do you have there?  Even if only temporary, I would change to a higher color setting to see whether it helps, although the fact that the pics to which I posted a link looked clear indicates changing this setting may not help much.  But, 256 is a rather low color setting and does not yield as nice a color display as the higher settings found on most systems.  I just checked this on my Win 98SE comp.  The difference between 256 color and 16-bit is quite remarkable.

I presume you're transferring pics from your digital camera.  Right?  I think you need to experiment with different settings in your camera and see how that affects how your pics look when transferred to your computer.  

If your system does not allow changing color to higher than the 256 color setting, you'd need to upgrade your video card to resolve this problem.  I gather you don't know whether you have onboard video or a separate video card.  Right?  Have you ever looked inside your computer case?  That's the best way to determine this.

[john god]

Hello Soybean,
That worked. I went to 16 bit, it was better, than 16 bit high color, now have it set at 32 bit true color. Seems allright now. Pictures are clear once again. Would this setting be good to keep?
Thanks for your help,
John God

[Backdated]

You can safely leave it set to 32 bit colour depth.

[soybean]

Hello Soybean,
That worked. I went to 16 bit, it was better, than 16 bit high color, now have it set at 32 bit true color. Seems allright now. Pictures are clear once again. Would this setting be good to keep?
Thanks for your help,
John God

Agree with Backdated.  It's safe to keep.  Depending on the specs and age of your system, you might notice a very slight difference in system performance between different color settings.  Your hardware has to work harder to display 16-bit color than 256 color and harder to display 32-bit than 16-bit or 256 color.  On modern computers, the user may notice no difference in performance.  If you notice that applications are slightly slower to be displayed on screen when you first open them or when you switch between open applications or that scrolling of web pages works slightly less smooth with the 32-bit setting than with lower settings, that's a clue to the performance issue.

And, you may not notice any difference between 16-bit and 32-bit color.  My eyes can't see a difference on my monitors.

[john god]

Thanks for all your help. My system is about 6 years old. I do see a difference between 32-bit and 256-bit color.
John

[Backdated]

As Soybean says, if there is a noticeable performance hit, 16 bit colour is good enough for most applications.

[john god]

Thanks for the help.....
John.........