[MPlayer-users] monitor size vs. aspect ratio vs. resolution

[Reshat Sabiq]

RC wrote:

>On Mon, 15 Aug 2005 00:28:20 -0500
>Reshat Sabiq <sabiq at csociety.org> wrote:
>
>  
>
>>4. Is it a correct statement that non-widescreen videos should be 
>>watched in 4:3, and widescreen ones in 16:9, regardless of resolution 
>>and physical dimensions? 
>>    
>>
>
>No, the aspect ratio needs to be adjusted for screens that aren't 4/3
>to look correct.  However, you don't need to do that yourself.  Just set
>"-monitoraspect" and mplayer will handle it.
>
>  
>
>>Doesn't 4:3 already mean a distortion, since most DVDs, for instance,
>>are 720x480, which is a ratio of 1.5?
>>    
>>
>
>DVDs use 720x480, but they have an aspect ratio of 16/9 or 4/3.  So they
>are scaled upon playback to either 854x480, or 720x540.
>  
>
Thanks for all the answers.
2 folow-up questions:
1. so using -monitoraspect 332:209 basically delegates the choice of 
aspect ratio to mplayer, correct? I just tried both that and 1.78, and 
both of them result in 1.33:1 aspect being used. The bad thing for the 
DVD i just tried is that there is a lot of unused space in 4:3 aspect 
ratio on both left-right and top-bottom (almost half the screen is 
black). And while indeed 4:3 aspect ratio looks better for it than 16:9 
which i tried manually thru gmplayer menu item, it is only nicely 
viewable in xine where i can utilize most/all of the black space using 
Alt+z and Ctrl+z. I'm not aware of similar shortcuts in mplayer.

2. which monitor would you guys prefer: the one with max resolution of 
1280x800 (but it doesn't support 1280x720 or any other 16:9 pixel 
ratio), or the one with max resolution of 1280x720?

Thanks.
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