Media center UI not full screen

[vh57]

I was trying to review sound setting and I've somehow messed up how the Media Center User Interface appears on my screen. When the windows is maximized there is now a empty border around the interface. In a window it looks fine. The back and home buttons are no longer in the top left corner, they are indented to the right and down some. The play button etc are not at the very bottom of the screen. Essentially this whole ui is centered but has open space all around it. The background image appears in the space around it. When I play ripped movies they appear correctly. All other applications are appearing correctly on the TV display. I thought maybe I messed it up when I was checking the Media Center settings for my TV/display but I can't get it back to how it originally appeared. Any suggestions?

[webminster]

Have you tried going to Settings / TV / Configure TV or Monitor and running through that again? Perhaps you want to do that and select Television, and choose the appropriate resolution.

[IownFIVEechos]

Also check your video card settings for over scan settings. Should be able to stretch it back out, although many argue that it messes the picture I think.

[drtdiver]

Found this on the missing remote website for dealing with the ui elements


To push the UI elements back out to the corners after getting rid of overscan, you can modify the registry:

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Media Center\Settings\MCE.PerUserSettings]

"marginLeft"=dword:00000000

"marginTop"=dword:00000000

"marginRight"=dword:00000000

"marginBottom"=dword:00000000

"marginSaved"=dword:00000001

"useDefaultOverscanMargins"=dword:00000000

All this does is move the UI elements back to the corners.

[vh57]

drtdiver thanks for that suggestion. I'll check that when I get home this evening.

[dmagerl]

WMC tries to ensure there is overscan no matter what kind of video display you have. If you have a flat panel display it adds overscan. If you have a CRT type display it doesnt add overscan because it assumes the CRT itself is overscanning. It adjusts the on screen control positioning accordingly.

So if you have a flat panel display and set it for television, then it removes overscan and sucks the control positioning inward because it assumes the CRT is doing the overscan, which of course it isnt. Hence, the controls are positioned in from the edges.

Two ways to fix this:
1. Re-setup the monitor settings in WMC to use flat panel settings, in which case you'll get some overscan.
2. Leave things alone but apply the reg hack already given to move the controls back to the corners. This will give you no overscan so you'll see slightly more of the picture but in my experience you'll also see more offscreen signalling along the top of the screen on 480i pictures. You may find that annoying .

[barnabas1969]

drtdiver is absolutely correct. dmagerl is partially correct... most flat panel displays do add overscan, just like a CRT, unless you change a setting in the TV to do 1:1 pixel mapping. Not all TV's have this setting. In Samsung TV's, the option is called "screen fit". Other brands call it different names. I think Panasonic calls it "just scan". IownFIVEechos is correct that stretching (scaling) the image adds undesired artifacts to the image, but there is no argument about that.

Go through TV setup. When it asks you what kind of display you have, choose "Television", not "flat panel" or any of the other options. Apply the registry changes mentioned by drtdiver, reboot.

[vh57]

Thanks for all the suggestions and comments. Ultimately I re-ran the setup choosing TV and then applied the registry changes and the UI is back to normal.