Resolution Reset on Startup

I have a 1280x1024 monitor. Every time I start Windows Vista, my screen
resolution automatically resets itself to 640x480. I have no idea why, but I
have to change it back every time i start Windows. I've looked around, but I
seem to be the only one I know of who has this problem. Does anyone know how
I can solve this?

I am having the same problem. I have a 3 month old Dell laptop and the
resolution keeps changing. At times the screen will go black in the middle of
working and changes the resolution. If you find a solution to this let me
know.

I have the same problem as well. I have a 1440X900 screen that sometimes
resets to a lower resolution upon startup. My computer is an HP Pavilion
DV9000, and I am using Windows Vista. Anyone know what is going on?

Same Problem... Running an 20" widescreen Acer brand new.

Same problem, just got a new Dell laptop and it's doing this every time I put
it on standby or reboot.

Did anyone find a solution?

I have this issue as well and it's been several months since this first post.
No answers yet? It's very annoying to have to reset the resolution everytime
I open the lid of my laptop.

some ideas:
1 If you use system on/off switch to turn off your system instead of your
shutdown option then your setting changes are not saved.
2. Do you mean when you start Vista or do you mean when you start Media
Center in Vista?
3. If you mean Media Center then make sure you have told Media Center that
you have a 1280x1024 display.
4, Is the native resolution of the laptop really 1280x1024?

This problem on my machine has now just stopped. I tried messing around with
the settings on control panel, but I'm not sure if that was what did it as it
didnt stop immediately.

FYI the folllowing two options are now ticked on Display Panel (Options)
when Monitor 1 is selected:

- it's my principal monitor
- stretch the desktop to this moniter

(NB these are rough translations from the French).

Talk about frustrating. I have a Toshiba satellite my monitor is 1440 X900
and i have the same problem. Don't know who to turn to anymore. Let me know
if any idea anyone.
Thanks

I've got the same problem with an Acer SA90. It's set for 1440 x 900 but
about one time in 20 it comes up in a lower resolution. I have to
restart the computer to cure it, just logging out and back in again
doesn't help, and I have to make sure I don't do anything much first
otherwise all my icons get moved about by it.

I also have a similar problem with my Sony Vaio. My laptop monitor works
fine but my externally connected monitor keeps changing screen resolution on
it on. Sometimes I can reset it to the resolution that I want. However,
sometimes my resolution isn't even available to select. This was happening
most of the time when I resumed from the photo screen saver so I quit using
that. Now I just have the problem if I restart the computer. So far the
only work around is to leave the computer on all the time. So much for
saving energy. But the only alternative is to spend sometimes 20 to 30
minutes trying to reset the screen resolution after a restart. Seems to be
some kind of bug with Vista not saving the current screen resolution on an
external monitor. Tried disabling TMM which seemed to be causing similar
problems to other machines with no external monitor but that didn't help mine.

Today I decided I'd try and install XP onto a partition on my drive and
to say the least everything went wrong. Anyway when i got back to vista
the res kept resetting on start up. So i tried everything even re
installed drivers. I eventually decided that it had to be a start up
problem and so I checked out the system config window (Run msconfig).

Under the boot tab there is an option called base video which was
checked. Evidently this option is not supposed to be checked because as
soon as I unchecked it and restarted my system I stopped having the
issue. Hope this helps!

i fixed it by acessing the winRE and running start up repair.
then booted into windows, adjusted the resolution one more time and
restart.
after that, every restart holds the settings as they should be.

Relating the problem where Vista resets the video resolution to 640 x
480 upon start-up. I found a solution.
From my own experience (I faced the exact same problem) I thought I
could blame it on hardware, driver etc. I recently upgraded to a new
graphics card and wanted to blame NVidia... :p

After some investigation I found that there is an option in the
"msconfig" Windows tool, under Boot, called "Base video". This should be
unticked!!!
The function of this "Base video" is to boot with minimum VGA
recources. Hence a LOW resolution.
I unticked it and problem vanished.

[chgo22phx]

I have a friend who kept having this problem and we kept resetting the display settings. I finally found this solution on

I had the same problem, and according to my googling, so have many, many others. Dell tech support was sure that installing new drivers would fix it (it didn't), others have suggested switching the resolution of your wallpaper image to match the screen's native resolution. That doesn't work either. Nor does switching to a blank screensaver (another web suggestion).

The actual culprit is TMM, Vista's process that looks for multiple monitors and attempts to intelligently modify resolution. If you aren't using multiple monitors, you can disable TMM:

1. right-click on 'computer' and select 'manage'
2. on the left pane, expand 'task scheduler' then ' task scheduler library' then 'Microsoft' then 'Windows' then 'MobilePC'
3. select TMM in the center pane, then on the right pane, choose 'disable'

Now you should be able to close your laptop, let it go to sleep and when it wakes up it will still be in your preferred resolution (also, the screen won't go blank for a second right after waking up)

I'm not sure if you will have to also disable it for future windows sessions (maybe in the 'triggers' tab on the bottom of the center pane).

It seems to have worked for her. The resolution seems to be stable for the time being (anyway).Go to the full post...

I had an issue where my screen resolution would go from 1680x1050 to
something like 640 or 800 seemingly at random after hybernation, restart
or even in some cases when I resumed operation after a screensaver was
ended by moving a mouse or something. All my icons would shift around on
my desktop, and it was generally annoying.

I found a fix to it by accident.

I run Vista 32 bit

I right click the desktop, choose properties.

Then I go to display settings, and choose the advanced settings at the
bottom of that little screen.

In this setting screen I have tabs at the top... Color Mangement,
GeForce 8800GT (My graphics card), Adapter, Monitor, and Troubleshoot.

Choose your graphics card tab. For me this brings up a screen that
shows NVIDIA. (just my graphics card maker)

Then I choose "start the NVIDIA control Panel" I chose the advanved
option, it gave me a choice between advanced and basic.

Then here it the fix!

The key was this: Under the display options I have the following
choices:
1) Change resolution
2) Change flat Panel Scaling*
3) Rotate Display
4) Manage Custom Resolutions
5) Set up Multiple Displays

* Choose Change Flat Panel Scaling.

This will bring up new options. My old setting was "Use my display's
built-in scaling"
I changed the selected option to "Use NVIDIA [My graphics card]
scaling"

Since I've done this. I've not had one issue with my screen resolution
changing back on me.

Hope this helps.