Ultra Wide for 16:9 gaming?

I currently use a Korean 27" 1440p display that's been great - but I would like to upgrade it to a 34" ultra wide. I work from home and the ultra wide would be great for work + let me move my current monitor to the side as a second screen (currently using a slowly dying and ancient samsung 19x12 LCD for second screen).

The thing is the games I play are competitive 16:9 - Dota 2, Starcraft 2, Overwatch.

A 34" Ultrawide with black bars on the side can be the same size as a 27" 16:9 monitor correct? Are there any issue with the mouse going into the blackness or any other weird side effects? The new monitor would also be cool for the occasional AAA FPS that comes out, but mainly I don't want to have any ill effects for my 99% played games.

I'd have to measure mine, I can't say for certain its the same as a 27" 1440p at 16x9. I also can't speak to DOTA or SC2 but Overwatch works fine in 16x9 and annoyingly, does not support true 21:9 gaming.

Yes, there are black bars but the game isn't rendering outside of the 16x9 window so there isn't anywhere for your mouse to go. So no, no weird side effects.

And I feel you, these days I don't think I could go back to a normal 16x9 display, they feel so constrained.

I just tried to run Apex Legends at 2560x1440 on my AW3418DW.

It displayed it in stretch mode and I can't find a setting on the monitor to fix that.

Maybe there is an Nvidia setting? Not sure, but if you can only display it in stretch mode, then that's probably a deal breaker.

DoubleTap said:

I just tried to run Apex Legends at 2560x1440 on my AW3418DW.

It displayed it in stretch mode and I can't find a setting on the monitor to fix that.

Maybe there is an Nvidia setting? Not sure, but if you can only display it in stretch mode, then that's probably a deal breaker.

Click to expand...

I have to set it to windowed full screen in Overwatch to achieve that. However, that's because Overwatch doesn't support ultra wide resolutions without cropping the top and bottom.

Apex beautifully supports 21:9 so there is no need.

Yup, i just tried Apex Legends and if you set it to Borderless Windowed, you can play in 16x9 just fine.. just not sure why you'd want to.

Difference between this and Overwatch though, it seems Apex doesn't black bar the sides and you can still see your desktop. No issues with the mouse, however, it stays locked in the window.

I tried Overwatch - I found a setting that let me run 3440x1440 but with 16:9 aspect ratio and I got the black bars on the side which is what I would want in a game that is limited to 16:9

My concern was that I'd have to play Overwatch in stretch mode.

Apex runs fine in 21:9 of course...