Users Guide

Using the Display

Adjusting Brightness

When a Dell computer is running on battery power, you can conserve power by setting the display brightness to the lowest comfortable

setting by pressing <Fn> and the up- or down-arrow key on the keyboard.

NOTE: Brightness key combinations only affect the display on your portable computer, not monitors or projectors that

you attach to your portable computer or docking device. If your computer is connected to an external monitor and you

try to change the brightness level, the Brightness Meter may appear, but the brightness level on the external device

does not change.

Topics:

• Switching the Image From Computer Display to a Projector

• Making Images and Text Look Bigger or Sharper on the Screen: Setting Display Resolution and Refresh Rate

• Using the Ambient-Light Sensor

Switching the Image From Computer Display to a

Projector

Adjusting Brightness

When you start the computer with an external device (such as an external monitor or projector) attached and turned on, the image may

appear on either the computer display or the external device.

Press <Fn><F8> to switch the video image between the display only, the external device only, or the display and the external device

simultaneously.

Making Images and Text Look Bigger or Sharper on

the Screen: Setting Display Resolution and

Refresh Rate

NOTE:

If you change the display resolution from the current settings, the image may appear blurry or text may be hard

to read if you change the resolution to one not supported by your computer and display. Before you change any of the

display settings, make a note of the current settings so you can change back to the previous settings if you need to.

You can enhance the legibility of text and change the appearance of images on the screen by adjusting display resolution. As you increase

resolution, items appear smaller on the screen. In contrast, lower resolution causes text and images to appear larger and can benefit

people with vision impairments. To display a program at a specific resolution, both the video card and the display must support the

program, and the necessary video drivers must be installed.

NOTE:

Use only the Dell-installed video drivers, which are designed to offer the best performance with your Dell-

installed operating system.

If you choose a resolution or color palette that is higher than what the display supports, the settings adjust automatically to the closest

supported values.

To set the display resolution and refresh rate for your display, perform the steps in the following section that corresponds to the operating

system your computer is using.

Using the Display 13