If the monitor being used is an LCD monitor, the display settings need to be set so that the display (desktop) area is at the native resolution of the monitor. That is, if the monitor has - for example - a 1280 x 1024 pixel panel, then the display needs to be set to 1280 x 1024. They need to match. So that 1 pixel on the screen equals 1 pixel on the computer's display. If this is not the case, then the display will look distinctly peculiar because the monitor will be trying to map (say) 1280 pixels into 1024 or vice versa and it won't divide exactly. Videos and still images will look rather odd, (How do photos look?) especially to people who are used to assessing image quality. In text display, fonts will look awful too. So I would be very interested to check display settings. If this has been done, I would be getting suspicious of the monitor. But you say that other people's monitors show the blurriness also. You say that store bought DVDs look blurry. If they look blurry on other people's monitors, I would suspect an outbreak of infectious myopia or hysterical blindness perhaps?
As for display properties, Vista changed a lot of things from XP making the new Vista user quite in the dark when it comes to finding features and options that he/she has gotten used to in older Windows versions. One such feature is the Display Properties. If you right-click on your desktop wallpaper, you might confused where that old Display Properties went.
For Vista, you get the “Personalize” option in the context menu. This replaces the Display Properties of old and has these options:
* Window Color and Appearance - Change the color of windows. Has a nice collection of color sets to choose from. Even has a color intensity slider.
* Desktop Background - Default wallpapers can be boring so customize your look with this.
* Screen Saver - Pretty much self-explanatory. I’m not a big fan of screen savers so the default works nicely for me.
* Sounds - Previously hidden with Control Panel, now you can easily change the way emptying the Recycle Bin sounds through this option. Still pretty much the same, though except for its availability in the Personalize window.
* Mouse Pointers - If you want to change your how your mouse pointer looks, this is your menu. Again, I’ve a default fan.
* Themes - Lets you switch between Windows Vista Basic, Standard (Aero), and Classic. So if you miss the old Windows 98 look, fire up Windows Classic by all means.
* Display Settings - The same old display settings that lets you tweak the resolution, DPI and monitor/desktop layout.
I can't find it. I found it on the computer I am currently on, which still has XP - but not the one that has the problem.
So the XP one doesn't have the problem?
