I have a Gateway FPD2185W TFT LCD Monitor, 21 inch 16:10 aspect (1680x1050) so therefore I buy Widescreen DVD's.... but when I play it using my WinDVD7 I still get the black bars on top and bottom, like you would when watching it on a regular NON-widescreen LCD....
how do I solve this BS issue ??

That is because native widescreen DVDs are 16:9 ratio, not 16:10.

as the abyss said it is a format issue.

do you have any control of wehter it maintains aspect ratio or fill the screen. if you can get it to expand to fill the screen. that would do it although it might look skewed.

a little, but would. Also, as far as i know, there's more than one widescreen proportion.
Adon, just check your dvd box and check if it is 16:9 or any other value.

Oh, and terminator 2 is cool

If you use media player classic you can stretch videos to fit the screen by press 8 and 2 on the numpad you can stretch/compress the height.

Download the storm codec here, it includes the media player

What i hate most is when movies are displayed in anamorphic. WHAT IS THE POINT. We get widescreen then they bring out movies that are so widescreen that you still get black lines from your £2000 apple monitor (as an exageration).

Films are shot in varying degrees of widescreen. Big budget hollywood films (epics and action films largely) tend to get shot in about 2.35:1 which equates to about 16:7. Lower budget stuff (dramas, comedies etc) tend to get shot in 1.85:1 (which equates to about 16:9).

So when watching a 16:9 film on a 16:9 screen you get no letterbox. However, as The_abyss pointed out, your monitor a 16:10. So even watching a 16:9 film, you will still get very small letterboxing.

T2 is filmed in 2.35:1 so you get even more letterboxing. Try watching it on a 4:3 screen and then you'll appreciate your 16:10 screen!

kye3k1: The reason they release films in full 2.35:1 widescreen is because thats what the director wanted it to be in! If you dont like the small letterboxing then just stretch or chop as you prefer. Thats all that would happen if they released a 16:9 version of a 2.35:1 film. That way purists can watch the film as the director intended! 2.35:1 widescreen has been around for years, much longer than you have had a widescreen TV for!

Anyway for a very detailed and thrilling look at widescreen, check this site out.

Not exactly. They would use pan & scan, which prevents the image distortion you get if you stretch. Pan & scan on 16:9 is much better than on 4:3 because the scanner has more screen real estate to work with. The article I linked explains how some directors are now filming with 16:9 in mind, which allows the studio to chop off the edges without the need for pan & scan. I still prefer to view my movies at the native DVD resolution (720x480) in a window, but this obviously wouldn't work if you're watching across the room.

On the Gateway monitor, you can (temporarily) change the video card's resolution to 720p or 480p, but as usual with LCDs, the image quality deteriorates when you run it at anything other than native. If you hooked up a regular progressive scan DVD player (480p) to the monitor through the component input, the Faroudja chip will help improve the image quality at these lower resolutions. You can also connect an HD box at 720p. The chip isn't activated if you're using VGA or DVI. If your video card supports HD-out you can use that connection (component) to get the benefits of DCDi. You'll still get your letterbox bars on any movie that's not filmed or reformatted for 16:9, including any movie labeled as full-screen, where the bars appear on the sides. Most older movies (before the 50s) are narrow-screen.

Well...it's not "just like" because the bars are narrower and less obtrusive than on a 4:3 monitor. Stretch it and see if the distortion doesn't distract you. That varies from person to person. It distracts me so I stick with the black bars. I've grown used to them.

yes I know about the stretching in Media Player Classic.... but the reason I use WinDVD is because its the only player I know that has Trimension DNM... but I do wish that WinDVD had the same stretching option that Win Media Player classic has, cuz that would totally solve my problem..... and for any of you that do not know what Trimension is.... put it to you like this... with TrimensionDNM on, your movie plays at about 60 framerates per second, without it.. it plays under 30FPS....
so you can imagine how much more lifelike and how much smoother the movie is gonna look....... click on the link here and check out the sample videos to view the difference yourselves ... TRIMENSION SAMPLE

thanks for all your input guys, and yea I figured it had something to do with my LCD being 16:10....
and hey Kukito thanks for the info, I've actually been looking into HDTV and HDMI capable video cards for my next vid card purchase....
also a quick question, when the PS3 comes out I'm getting it, and using the HDMI output from the console will I be able to hook up my PS3 into my HDMI capable vid card and have the high resolution HDTV experience that we're all supposed to have using the PS3 ???

I run my 360 through a VGA adaptor in to my 20.1” widescreen monitor. I guess there is nothing to stop you doing that with the PS3. One thing I noticed though is that 720p looks completely guff on a 1680x1050, don’t know if it’s my monitor or if it’s like this for everyone. But when I use the 360 on the monitor it is like the non-native resolution is too bright.

For instance Tomb Raider had a tool to adjust brightness, it said adjust your brightness till you cannot see this line or something. I adjusted the brightness and the contrast to the lowest setting and I could still see the soding line???