Change Screen Resolution with One Keyboard Shortcut
Do you find that you need to frequently change your screen resoltion? I do several times a day and some reasons are when: doing demos, showing my laptop screen to serveral people at once, switching between monitors, recording/capturing the screen, connecting to projectors, etc. It is a bit of a pain to go to the display properties each time or use the free little system tray icon utility provided by ATI.
So here's my solution. I can now very quickly switch between modes (800x600, 1024x768, 1600x1200, etc) with one keyboard shortcut per resolution at anytime. Here's how...
- Download WinKey
A small freeware app that lets you assign apps and folders to Windows-Key combinations. See my blog post on WinKey for more info. Add it to your Startup menu. - Download QRes
A small (4k) freeware command line app to change screen resolution. - Set WinKey to run QRes
Here are my assignments. Make sure your screen supports the resolution setting first.
If you put QRes under "C:\Program Files\QRes\QRes.exe", you can use this Windows Registry file to import these settings below into WinKey.
-- Win-Ctrl-8 to run "QRes.exe /x:800 /y:600" for 800x600 (presenting on small TV)
-- Win-Ctrl-1 to run "QRes.exe /x:1024 /y:768" for 1024x768 (presenting on large TV)
-- Win-Ctrl-2 to run "QRes.exe /x:1280 /y:1024" for 1280x1024 (presenting on projector)
-- Win-Ctrl-4 to run "QRes.exe /x:1400 /y:1050" for 1400x1050 (laptop's LCD's native)
-- Win-Ctrl-6 to run "QRes.exe /x:1600 /y:1200" for 1600x1200 (laptop when docked)
Update on 2/22/07 -- Self Installation Now Avalible!
I've packaged this all up into a nice & easy little self installer. It does the steps above for you.
Install: SetupChangeResolutionHotkey.zip
Vista Users: You must run Setup.exe (not the .msi file) in the zip and reboot to start the app.
Comments
Anonymous
December 05, 2006
Noah, this is so cool. I'm using it now and it's quite useful. No more properties-settings when trying to set my screen res for demos. :-)Anonymous
December 06, 2006
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February 15, 2007
This was exactly what I was looking for, thank you so much!Anonymous
February 23, 2007
Thanks very much! Extremely useful. I was fedup of having to enter display properties everytime I had to change display resolution!Anonymous
March 22, 2007
Thank you so much! I was constantly having to change my resolution on my laptop and this is a lifesaver!Anonymous
April 09, 2007
Cool, but useless for me. The main screen resolution change I make is from a 2 screen environment with each screen showing something else to a 2 screen environment with both screens showing the same thing and this doesn’t help.Anonymous
May 19, 2007
Thanks for a great program! Exactly what was needed for my work. Thanks Again Noah.Anonymous
May 23, 2007
Super! This makes life so much easier. Thanks!!!Anonymous
June 24, 2007
did what it said on the tin (vista premium)Anonymous
July 01, 2007
Doesn't seem to load on Win XP64. Any suggestions? Would be a super program. EdAnonymous
August 17, 2007
I only wish to change screen 2. How can I make this work for that?Anonymous
September 03, 2007
This is just what I was looking for. I have a 19" widescreen attached to my smartboard (800x600) is best. Thanks for the shortcut!Anonymous
September 13, 2007
thanks for the instructions i already had QRes but needed to remember how to use itAnonymous
October 23, 2007
i've been using this for a few weeks and seems to work great - however i just now tried to switch by hitting the ctrl-win-2 combo and it sent my machine into restart mode and when it came back up i got a web page from microsoft error reporting: http://wer.microsoft.com/responses/Response.aspx/10/en-us/5.1.2600.2.00010300.2.0?SGD=dc134b5c-43e9-433f-bbad-c05139ef95ba here is the info that was on the page: Problem caused by Device Driver You received this message because a device driver installed on your computer caused the Windows operating system to stop unexpectedly. This type of error is referred to as a "stop error." A stop error requires you to restart your computer. More information Problem report summary Problem type Windows stop error (a message appears on a blue screen with error code information) Solution available? No What does this problem mean? Windows has encountered a problem it cannot recover from and it needs to be restarted Cause Unknown Computer symptoms A message appears on a blue screen with error code information (for example: 0x0000001E, KMODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED) Additional steps for you to take Please continue to send problem reports so analysts at Microsoft can study and try to correct the problem as quickly as possibleAnonymous
December 13, 2007
Is there anyway that this can be deployed through GPO silently. I have tried the /quiet switch also the /qb switch and also the /silent switch but they all dispaly the IE page and the Winkey window at the end. Can this be stoppped? I intend to deply a reg file with the appropriate settings.Anonymous
January 13, 2008
my monitor current resolution 800600 i wanted to increase that 1024768 but i change that manualy that automaticaly come on 800*600 please help meAnonymous
February 01, 2008
This is so useful. I had to switch resolutions first thing daily at work, manually. Thank you.Anonymous
March 04, 2008
Hey, works good however i have a dual screen and require to change my second monitors res. Or change both monitors to the same res. Any ideas?????Anonymous
March 20, 2008
this app is terrific! i regularly use a bunch of different display resolutions (1920 x 1440 for music production, 16x12 when surfing the web, 800x600 for web tv) and clicking into display properties 5 times a day was getting annoying. this seemingly simply lil app is making me that much more productive at my pc. a million thanks.Anonymous
April 28, 2008
Great app! I'm a webdesigner, so I need to switch all the time when testing pages - why did I wait so long before actually going ahead and Googling 'shortcut change resolution'..???Anonymous
June 29, 2008
Great app. Thanks! In addition: I surely would like if I hit the win-ctrl-1 that besides switching to 1024 res also the nvidia setup changes from 1 screen (which is my monitor 1280x1024) to clone view (which should be TV+monitor in 1024x768) and win-ctrl-2 would be 1 screen + 1280x1024. Is that a possibllity? Thanks in advance.Anonymous
July 09, 2008
Fantastic! Why is it that the little pieces of software are always the most useful. Thanks!Anonymous
July 21, 2008
Been searching for so long for this sort of program. Perfect for LCD+computer and the wireless keyboard in the sofa :-) Thanks Alot!Anonymous
July 24, 2008
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September 08, 2008
Man........u rock the world.......its a great software.. ThnxAnonymous
September 14, 2008
It looked great at first blush, but it goes through reinstall every time PC is restarted. I do not see a setting to change this. It will be uninstalled until I hear about a workaround.Anonymous
September 25, 2008
Sweet app, saves me 5 clicks of the mouse every time!Anonymous
April 03, 2009
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July 29, 2009
Hi this is exactly what I need but it does not support Vista x64! Is there any solution to make it work on Vista x64! Please help! Thanks allotAnonymous
July 30, 2009
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August 12, 2009
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August 31, 2009
It's really usefull for me.. thanks alot~Anonymous
October 13, 2009
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December 04, 2009
Thanks Noah!!! This is the utility I was looking for!, I have a customer using an Acer Aspire One, and max. resolution is 1024x600. He need to run a CCTV app and only supports 1024x768. Thanks a lot!Anonymous
December 28, 2009
Hey Noah!! May i know the source code for this application. send it to ralph.nader@live.com Thanks RalphAnonymous
January 07, 2010
help, i have pressed a combination of keys and the size of my screen has changed, anybody got any ideas how i can reverse this. pleaseAnonymous
January 19, 2010
Wanna Change Monitor Resolution for any of the Dual Monitors connected to your pc? google Resolution controller or navigate to http://www.murgee.com/MurGeeMon/dual-monitor-resolution-controller/Anonymous
May 30, 2010
Couldn't get it to work on Vista, so used this alternative instead: kenzig.blogspot.com/.../download-pick-resswitch-change.html Just an annoying security message to click on, and can't seem to make that not appear in future. But works fine and a lot simpler than the Windows way :0)Anonymous
December 19, 2010
Thanks, Noah! I use this all the time to custom-size the resolutions on my HTPCs, and also for Pogo.com (made by Electronic Arts, I consider it like WoW for older people!). Pogo runs on Java, but has never run actual game windows any larger than about 50% of total screen size, so constant resizing is necessary to really enjoy it. I'm also glad I read your later post on using AutoHotKey for x64 OSs--it's next for me, one of my own HTPCs is 64-bit Vista.Anonymous
April 19, 2011
I really appreciate your efforts, this is a wonderful application.Anonymous
April 23, 2011
Thyankzzzz..... Can't believe How To Tell How Useful It Was !Anonymous
November 11, 2012
=== UPDATE === I'm no longer able to edit my own post here, so see the updated post here with new tool that works better and with Windows 7+: noahcoad.com/.../hotkey-to-change-screen-resolutionsAnonymous
April 23, 2013
I'm a chinese . I think ,this pro is very hi~hi~ . Can you share this Resource ? thanks ~ 谢谢了哈。