Change display resolution while MP is running: Can it work? (1 Viewer)

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    I will be getting a 4K television in the near future. I may also get a new video card for my HTPC that can output 2160p@30hz for watching 4k videos in MP. However, 30hz is not good for watching television, so I would need to switch my display to 1080p@60hz for TV viewing.

    I found software which can change my display resolution on the fly, to any preset amount that I choose. I can have it switch back and forth between 2160p@30hz and 1080p@60hz, at any time, by running a command-line utility or with a keystroke. The television set should be able to detect either signal and adjust accordingly.

    Here is what I would like to know. If I suddenly change my screen resolution while MediaPortal is running (fullscreen mode), how will Mediaportal respond to that? Would the menus suddenly get twice as big/small? Would it automatically adjust its own size? Would it crash? Would it give me an error or burst into flames? Would it... well you get the idea, I just want to know if this plan of mine would work without any problems.
     

    mm1352000

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    Hello

    If I suddenly change my screen resolution while MediaPortal is running (fullscreen mode), how will Mediaportal respond to that?
    In theory MediaPortal should adjust the window size and UI component scaling as appropriate.
    In practice sometimes resolution changes don't work as intended. The results very much depend on if/how Windows and your GPU handle and broadcast the change... and unfortunately Windows and GPU drivers don't always behave predictably, especially when HDMI is involved.

    In other words: probably the most honest and accurate answer is that you'll only know for sure when you try it.

    Would the menus suddenly get twice as big/small?
    As above: yes, if everything works out then the UI should be scaled as appropriate.

    Would it automatically adjust its own size?
    As above: yes, if everything works out then the size should be adjusted to match the new full screen resolution.

    Would it crash?
    Not usually.

    Would it give me an error or burst into flames? Would it... well you get the idea, I just want to know if this plan of mine would work without any problems.
    Nobody can give you a guarantee. It's going to be a case of try and see what happens. If it doesn't work it's not the end of the world. Just provide a bug report and we'll be happy to see if there's anything we can do to improve the situation.
     

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    Would the menus suddenly get twice as big/small?
    As above: yes, if everything works out then the UI should be scaled as appropriate.

    Thank you for your reply, but I think I should have phrased this question better. Let's say I'm running in 2160p and MP has its menus scaled to display correctly in this resolution. When I switch the display to 1080p, would the menus become too big such that only one quarter of it fits on my screen? Conversely, when switching from 1080p to 2160p, would everything shrink down to cover only one fourth of the screen?

    I'm sure I will have to try it out for myself to see what happens. But I'd like to know if anyone has any experience with this.
     

    kiwijunglist

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    If you have problems what you can do is.

    1. Watch live tv using MP internal video player
    2. Use external player for movies. MPC-HC using mad-vr can be set to change resolution+refresh rate based on video attributes. eg. if UHD then change to 2160p30, otherwise chage to 1080pXX where xx matches fps rate. MPC-HC can be set to return resolution to default resolution on exiting / finishing playback.
     

    resa

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    I can add this experience to the discussion: Due to the behavior of my receiver the windows is somewhat often forced to switch unintentional between 1920x1080, 720x576 and back. This happens i.e. starting up the machine with receiver on but tv off or every time i turn off only the tv for some time. MePo refreshs the gui back to normal without problems, no matter that, since skin is 1080StreamedMP, the gui-elements was moved temporarily together into an unusuable overlapping heap of mess at 720x576 (so it seems like for a second after switching TV on again until the GUI-refresh takes place).

    however, in rare cases i noticed that currently running live-tv or video-playback got stuttering and have to be restarted to be fixed. See specs in signature for my used HW.

    regards.
     
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    regeszter

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    Here is what I would like to know. If I suddenly change my screen resolution while MediaPortal is running (fullscreen mode), how will Mediaportal respond to that? Would the menus suddenly get twice as big/small? Would it automatically adjust its own size? Would it crash? Would it give me an error or burst into flames? Would it... well you get the idea, I just want to know if this plan of mine would work without any problems.

    Try to simulate this with changing between 1080 and 720 using same command as you plane later.
     

    2.0

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    I just got the new television yesterday. It was sooner than I had planned but the sale was about to end.

    Try to simulate this with changing between 1080 and 720 using same command as you plane later.

    I did exactly this. I set up my HTPC to switch between 1080p@60hz and 720p@30hz. It worked perfectly. MediaPortal just paused for five seconds after the switch and recalibrated itself nicely. Videos played normally in either resolution. No errors, bugs, bursting into flames or radioctive fallout.

    When I get the new video card, probably in a week or so, I will try switching to 2160p@30hz.
     

    2.0

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    I finally got the new video card, a Geforce GT 740. This is capable of producing 4k resolution over HDMI, though only at 30hz because of HDMI 1.4 limitations. My television recognized the 2160p signal. As before, MediaPortal was able to switch over to 2160p while running without any problems.

    For those who are curious as to how I set it up: I used a command-line utility called Qres which can change your display resolution. I wrote a couple of batch files, one using Qres at 1080p and another for 2160p. I use the MyMenu plugin to run these batch files. MyMenu is configured to work with my MCE remote so I can run these batch files (and others as well) at any time while MediaPortal is working.
     

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