In the early days, you were lucky if your PC's monitor had contrast and brightness knobs. The adjustments you can make to your monitor now are endless. Sometimes, you make adjustments using a row of buttons that adorn the front of your monitor and look almost like a second keyboard. At other times, you use a combination of generic buttons, similar to the annoying way digital clocks are set.
Generally, the buttons on your monitor are of two types. The first type has a menu button and then two or four control buttons adorned with arrows or plus and minus symbols. Pressing the menu button pops up an onscreen display, such as the one shown in Figure 1. You use the buttons on the monitor (up, down, plus, and minus) to manipulate the menu and adjust the monitor.
Figure 1: A typical onscreen display.
The second type, often hidden behind a flap or door, has specific buttons with icons that adjust specific things, as shown in Figure 2. The idea is to use these buttons to adjust what the icons represent. Sometimes, you have to press more than one button to make a specific adjustment.
Figure 2: Icons on the typical PC monitor.
- This is one area of the PC that's ripe for standardization.
- The onscreen information appears over any other image displayed on the monitor. Don't let it freak you out.
- Use the buttons to adjust the image size to make full use of the monitor's display area.
- Monitors may also display frequency information (31KHz/60Hz, for example) when they change screen modes, such as when you play a game and the screen changes to another resolution.
- Most monitors also have a Save or Store button, which remembers the settings you have entered and makes them permanent. Use it.
