[Nestopia] Top and Bottom Black Borders in Fullscreen mode

Hi, how do you do guys?

I have a question about Nestopia fullscreen mode: why are there black borders on top and bottom of the screen in fullscreen mode? Shouldn't it scale the image as much as possible to fill the screen vertically while still keeping the TV aspect ratio? I have tested fullscreen mode with different resolutions, and unfortunately top and bottom black borders appears in all of them. Is it trying to maintain an even multiple of the original resolution? And if it's true, how can I disable it? I (we) can do this practically on famous emulators for other systems (ZSNES, Snes9x, Fusion). I mean scaling the image as much as possible to fill the screen vertically in fullscreen mode and still keep the 4:3 aspect ration on our 16:9 monitors. But, I can't do it in Nestopia.

I also have checked "TV Aspect" under "View --> Screen Size" (well, it's unrelated to this matter really, just wanted to let you know I've tried every option I can see in Nestopia)

Oh, BTW, it's not the first place I'm asking this. I went to Nestopia page on sourceforge and clicked on "Forum", but it's down ATM and I can't access it. I also went to emuforums and asked there, a friend was kind enough to suggest a solution, but I don't think that's what I'm looking for. The suggestion was to adjust the four boxes in "Options --> Video" to eliminate the black borders, I did do that and the result was not what I wanted. It also cut off the top and bottom image along the borders.

So, I'm lost here. Can someone suggest a better solution? Thanks in advance.

EDIT: I went and download Jnes to see if it can do what I want and voila. It did scale the image as much as possible vertically while keeping the IMAGE aspect ratio in fullscreen. It's good, but there is another problem, there is no option in it to set the aspect ratio to TV (4:3). It'll display the original aspect ratio of the IMAGE (system) which was 8:7(?). LOL. There's only option of "Stretch to fill the entire screen" which is good for 4:3 monitors, but it'll look very bad on 16:9 monitors.

The reason there are borders is that the default scaling modes (1X, 2X, 3X) scale all pixels equally, so that you don't have some lines of pixels thicker than others in an erratic uneven mess.

Unfortunately, I don't see an option for what you want in Nestopia. You can stretch to the full screen, or you can do 1X/2X/3X. Independently from this, you can also adjust the aspect ratio to be either square pixels or "TV aspect".

Edit: oh wait, hang on, there it is.

In the view menu under screen size, choose MAX and also TV Aspect. Does that do what you want?

This depends on OS, the exact set of video modes available, and the exact details of Nestopia's video implementation.

For me, on linux, I added a bunch of explicitly specified video modes to get full vertical size on my 16:9 monitors.

Also, what version are you using?

It looks like you're still using 1.4.0—you might see if the newer version changes anything mentioned here: viewtopic.php?t=10047

Thank you for your answer. Yeah, I've tried the "Max" setting under "Screen Size", but it'll make no difference in fullscreen mode. It'll only maximize the actual window of the emulator which is an equivalent of default Maximize button of the window. I Think you are right, after all. There is no option to scale the image to fill the screen vertically in fullscreen. It's a pity.

Well, I better give up and try to ignore black borders for the time being. I hope the developers add that in their next release... if there is a next release, that is. Again thanks for answering.



Hi, thank you for answering. Yes, I'm using 1.4.0. I will check newer builds and update this post if there is a solution. Thanks for letting me know of newer builds. It's a really great emulator.

You need to set Max and TV Aspect while you're already in Fullscreen mode. If you do it while in Windowed mode, the settings apply to Windowed mode.

Switch to Fullscreen, and hit Escape. You should be able to use the menu and access the settings for Fullscreen mode.

I didn't find this intuitive. I don't normally expect the settings in the menu to only apply to the current context, but that's how it's done in Nestopia, I guess.

Hey, thank you very much. It worked. YAY.

At 720p, you want 3x. If there are black borders on the top and bottom, those represent the area traditionally covered by overscan. Some HDTVs cut off the top and bottom lines of component or HDMI input, just as they do composite. What resolution are you using?