Independent monitor scaling, any hope in Windows 10?

[SteveMac]

Hi All,

Sad to see that the ability to set display scaling for each monitor separately hasn't made it into Windows 10.

Has anyone seen anywhere at all that Microsoft has any plan to resolve as part of Windows 10?


The only app that is absolutely killing me now is Internet Explorer, when I open it on my external (1080) monitor the window elements and navigation bars are so large it is comical. Chrome and Firefox somehow manage this quite well.

 

[leeshor]

That subject has been discussed at length here on this forum. Windows 10 is still a few versions away from an RTM but I suspect it will be included.

 

[SteveMac]

Hi Leeshor, thanks for the reply. Yes I see a few discussions about Windows 8.X, and a few mentions about Windows 10. My question was more about if anyone had seen anything public where Microsoft have confirmed if this is in scope for resolution (nothing that I've seen so far).

I guess the interim solution is to purchase a matched high DPI external monitor.

 

[leeshor]

Everyone usually finds those things out when they happen so there won't likely be much in the way of advanced notice or discussion from Microsoft.

 

[jnjroach]

All we know currently is that the Algorithm is much improved with Windows 10. We'll we get true independent scaling at launch, I doubt it as there is still too much legacy code in both Windows and the Application Ecosystem that uses XP Style GDI Scaling.

Windows 10 in these last builds have moved many of the Control Panel features to WinRT and if they can move the rest, then maybe we'll see it at RTM.

 

[Jay Parisi]

It's there, but you have to go into the new settings app from the notifications bar. If you do the traditional right-click on the desktop you get the old settings. Going into the new one allows you to set different scaling for each monitor. You can even see the scaling jump when you slide a window from one monitor to the other.

 

[jnjroach]

It's there, but you have to go into the new settings app from the notifications bar. If you do the traditional right-click on the desktop you get the old settings. Going into the new one allows you to set different scaling for each monitor. You can even see the scaling jump when you slide a window from one monitor to the other.

You are correct....I hadn't noticed in the MUI Control Panel for Display....

Excellent - maybe we can stop the BMW now

 

[zhenya]

Great. Does this mean, however, that the size of elements is no longer an issue, but we still see some fuzziness as it rescales?

 

[jnjroach]

Great. Does this mean, however, that the size of elements is no longer an issue, but we still see some fuzziness as it rescales?

Yes and no, GDI Scaling is still GDI Scaling, that is why I went back to x64 Office as I can turn off scaling for the Binary which can't do on the x86 version of Office.

 

[SteveMac]

So what is going on with my Internet Explorer? When I pop it on the external low res monitor, the window elements are massive, same is not true of Firefox and Chrome.

To be honest, I'd rather use Firefox, however scrolling with touch just doesn't cut it, it is so jerky.

Am I holding it wrong

 

[zhenya]

IE elements will scale depending on the dpi of the screen you are on, but text and everything will always stay sharp. The other browsers are disabling that scaling so things so a consistent size, but their content will often be blurred and not sharp.

 

[SteveMac]

zhenya, thanks for the response, however my view is this isn't the way its supposed to work. Look at any other application that supports scaling correctly, the window "elements" (boarder/menus/toolbar etc) aren't supposed to grow to be oversized. That is why we now have different scaling DPI levels for each monitor.

It seems to me that IE pays no attention at all and retains the 150% scaling that I have set for my SP3 screen, and uses it on my external monitor.

Other apps that don't behave this way, ie they are correctly word, excel, powerpoint......