Seems like I might come unstuck with this problem, but, I'm building a Vista box purely as a media center. I'm using an integrated NV6150 GPU and the stock MS drivers shipped with Vista (seems like they currently give the best results, until NV sort their drivers out!).

But, in XP MCE I ran the desktop at 1280x720, which works fine for me, and looks great. In Vista, I'm not given this resolution, even if I select the display as being a Digital Flat Panel 1280x720 60Hz. Nearest available is a slightly underscanned resolution which looks cr*p.

So, is there any way I can create a custom resolution of 1280x720x60Hz with the supplied MS drivers? Would Powerstrip work? Is there another way? Can the driver resolutions be hacked to provide this display res?

Go into the display settings, under advanced settings, monitor, uncheck hide modes that this monitor cannot display, back out of the display settings entirely and go back into display settings.  This not only gives you options for refresh rates that weren't available but will also give you resolutions that weren't previously available.

Now, whether this works with the stock drivers is a ? to me, but it should work with the latest 158.xx drivers.

Thanks for the advice, but I'm a seasonded IT person , and that's one of the first things I tried. 1280x720 was NOT listed with all modes visible.

As it's a standard pixel mapped res of many hd displays, I'm curious as to why it's not available.

If your card is not a 8x card, powerstrip should help you.  just install the trial, add the resolution from powerstrip and you should get the option.

Like I said, you may need the 158 drivers to make my suggestion work.  It's specifically stated in the 158 release notes.  Also, with the nvidia control panel in 158 you can add HD timings and that should give you your resolution as well.

I've tried the beta 160 drivers and it seems those drivers will not only allow you to add specific timings but will underscan/overscan on the fly, at least this was the case with component out.

Thanks for the advice. I've heard that Nvidia are still having problems with their drivers, and the best ones are still the ones that ship with Vista, but obviously you don't get the NV control panel applet to define custom resolutions. :-(

Maybe I'll have a look at the latest NV driver, then take another look at Powerstrip.

I would disagree with that statement for HTPC/gaming purposes.  the 158.24 drivers are the most solid/performing drivers while the 160 drivers are the best performing that I've used on both 7 and 8 series cards.  The stock driver lacks DX, purevideo, and a ton of other driver add ins/enhancements - you'll see a difference in HD performance and guide transitions at least.  Now if you have SLI or 88 series or some other anomoly of cutting edge, yes there's still a lot of work to be done on the driver development, but for most users 158/160 are pretty solid.

...Creating a restore point before installing should grant you nothing to lose :)

You don't need Powerstrip to run a standard resolution like 1280x720. It seems to be a bug that the Nvidia drivers sometimes don't offer this resolution. I had run into a similar problem. What helped was adding the following line at the end of the section [nv_SoftwareDeviceSettings] in nv_disp.inf.

HKR,, NV_Modes, %REG_MULTI_SZ%, "{*}S 320x200 320x240 400x300 480x360 512x384 640x350 640x400=1FFF;SHV 640x480 720x400 720x480 768x576 800x600 852x480 853x480 854x480 864x480 1024x640 1024x768 1152x864 1280x720 1280x768 1280x800 1280x854 1280x960 1280x1024 1360x768 1365x768 1366x768 1400x1050 1440x900 1600x900 1600x1000 1600x1024 1600x1200 1680x1050 1800x1440 1920x1080 1920x1200 1920x1440 2048x1280 2048x1536 2560x1600 3840x2400x8,16,32,64=1F;"

(You will to install that driver again afterwards using this inf to make it appear.)