Monitor : black area problem

[BlueMax]

I get a permanent black area all aound a monitor that I often use.

It is a BenQ M2200HD with a max native resolution of 1920x1080
Graphics card is a 512MB ATI Radeon HD4350

the OS is Win XP SP3 with all the latest updates
I have tried various media players such as MediaPlayer Classic, WMP, RealPlayer, VLC and Cyberlink PowerD Ultra

Any way I can get to use full area of this monitor?
Thanx

[anon]

Tried using its menu pad to expand the image's horizontal and vertical size?

[BlueMax]

Tried using its menu pad to expand the image's horizontal and vertical size?

thanks but it not the size of window. It is the maximum viewable size, that is the problem; like the size of the desktop.

[darkstate01]

Can you post a pic of the problem, It may give us some ideas as It maybe an easy fix by looking at the picture.

[BlueMax]

Can you post a pic of the problem, It may give us some ideas as It maybe an easy fix by looking at the picture.

a 'print screen' won't show it. cos the black area is outside that...
ie. outside the desktop area.
Tried various settings in 'display properties' in 'control panel'

I wonder if it is a hardare mismatch ?!!!!!!

[darkstate01]

I was thinking more of a camera picture as you said it was on the screen. So as you said it wouldn't show via printscreen.

[anon]

thanks but it not the size of window.

I wasn't talking about windows... your monitor should have a menu pad on its front. You can expand the image's size with it.

[BlueMax]

thanks but it not the size of window.

I wasn't talking about windows... your monitor should have a menu pad on its front. You can expand the image's size with it.

Yes. monitor has number of buttons along the right side.
I had tried those and the only one that I could find so far that made any difference to the size is:
In 'display mode' I set 'overscan' to 'full'.
That made the image size liitle wider.
Now there is about 12mm each left and right plus 6mm each top and bottom.

[BlueMax]

Haven't done this before; hope it works!
two pics attached. taken with my Nokia 5800. quality poor but hope it shows the prob.

[Detale]

Lemme guess you're using an ATI video card right??

I had this same issue that drove me nuts for about a week. I don't use that card anymore so I'm going by memory here. In the catalyst control center t here is an option you need to uncheck but I can't remember for the life of me which it is. I think it's Image Scaling in the Monitor/Digital Panel Properties but Im not sure. Play around in there as I'm sure thats it.

EDIT: Yep I looked up the CCC options and it says here

Image Scaling: This section allows you to choose whether to have the images on the screen 'Scale to full panel size', or 'Use centered timings'. For most displays the 'Scale image to full panel size' is the best option, however the further away your current resolution is from your display's 'native' resolution, the blurrier the onscreen image will be. Note, you can use the free Microsoft ClearType utility to make text in non-native resolutions much clearer. If you want to force all resolutions to display at your monitor's native resolution - hence providing the sharpest image quality - select the 'Use Centered Timings' option, however note that any resolutions below your native resolution will appear as a centered box on the screen with black borders.

Edit 2: Damn just re-read that you said you have an ATI. I really missed that the first time around.