In the last month I have seen two PowerPoint talks with slides that did not fit in the projector resolution (*). Before telling you the cause of the problem, let me first tell you the solution to avoid this problem “most” of the time (the order of events is important):
- Plug the video cable first.
- Start feeding video signal to the projector. (On ThinkPads, use Fn-F7.)
- Start the slide-show in PowerPoint.
The problem seems to be a combination of several factors. First, more and more laptop displays have a resolution that is higher than XGA (1024×768). Then, the speaker, for one reason or another, started the slide-show before she plugs in the video cable. At this point, the slide-show is already running at a super-XGA resolution. The rest can be attributed to a “bug” of PowerPoint’s slide-show module or a “feature” of the display driver, or whatever. Details omitted.
(*) These days, 1024×768 is standard, and my bet is that in 5 years it will still be standard due to the price of LCD projectors.
