I recently bought a new HP Pavilion and had a choice of monitors so chose a 19" widescreen LCD thinking it would be the best but now regret my choice. Don't get me wrong, the monitor an Acer AL1916W is a fine piece of equipment, but unless you intend to watch movies all the time why do want a widescreen which either distorts your pictures to fill the screen or hides a chunk out of view and you are forever scrolling.

I have a 17" (diagonal) LCD monitor on another machine and the viewable area is 13 3/8"w x 10 3/4"h. The 19" widescreen is 16 1/8"w x 10 1/8"h so you lose a significant amount of height with a supposedly larger monitor.

I have a large widescreen LCD TV set up as my #1 monitor and am very pleased with that, but for general desktop computer work I would always choose a normal type monitor from now on.

Some points for you to ponder if you are in the market for a new monitor.

Cheers

Hi rowal5555. I have the very same model of monitor and I can't say I have had any of the problems you reported. Make sure your resolution is at least 1440x900 which is the default resolution for this model.

I found the extra width but not height a little unusual, but I quickly learned to love it! I find the extra width very useful when using more than one Window side-by-side.

I have a 19" widescreen, at home, and the distortion is almost nonexistant. I mean, you can see it, if you're looking for it and look hard enough. Check out your settings like Andrew suggested...