Squashed images!

[Gertha]

When I had to purchase a replacement for my 17" inch monitor screen I found that there were few to choose from as it seems they are being phased out. I've been perfectly happy with the one I had but the shop salesmen couldn't comprehend why I wouldn't want to update to a 19"  -  better resolution, clearer picture cost very little more etc. What deterred me was that the one on display in the shop had very distorted images; everyone had squashed heads and sideways stretched bodies.
I was assured that this was because the set had not been adjusted.
"Oh if if it's easily corrected I'll take a 19" one then" I said. It was just a case of altering the screen resolution, they said! I tried it but found that all
the screen resolution does is make the whole image either bigger or smaller, not
correct the proportions. How can I do this? When I rang the shop they seem to think that most people just accept the distortion for the sake of a better picture.
I can't live with it.
I'm spending a lot of time putting a family history together through old photographs at present and it is no longer a pleasure when so many of our forebears appear as squat dwarves.
Please does anyone know how to rectify this before I lock horns with the dealer for a refund.

                                                                         Gertha

[jerryheavyarms]

May we know what brand and model this is? We have a Samsung 19inch widescreen here at our office and all we did was to change the resolution, I think its at 1440x900, if Im not mistaken.

[Gertha]

Jerryheavyarms

It is a GNR 19" LCD.
Thank you so much for your quick reply which has helped me to get it as good as I think I can.
I hope I can explain this coherently.
At first I was going into Display, upping the resolution slider and clicking OK.  After upping the slider the boxes and text became so small that I didn't notice there were three stages to this operation. First up the slider, (at this stage Apply is greyed out), then you have about 15 seconds to verify. If you say yes the Apply comes back. After clicking this you then click OK to finalise it.
Having got this right, I set it to 1440x900 as you suggested. This stopped the squashed look but made everything that was standard very small. I could adjust text size for what I was working on but permanents like desktop icons and tool bars remained so tiny that the text was almost unreadable. I reset to one slider position down 1360x768 which improved the general sizing (though it is still really too small) without compromising the photographs too much. One resolution size below that brings back the squashed head look. I suppose I must settle for this or get used to changing the screen resolution around according to what I'm doing.

                                                         Thanks again,  Gertha