Fast user switching & screen resolution

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Level 4

1,666 points

Fast user switching & screen resolution

Hello,
There are two users on this Mac (specs below), each with their own preference for screen resolution. When switching from the user with the lower screen resolution setting (1280 x 960) to the user with the higher resolution setting (1600 x 1200), the high-resolution user's screen briefly flashes at the lower resolution and windows are resized and rearranged to suit the lower resolution. Then the resolution change takes effect and the desktop appears at the proper (higher) resolution, but with the windows resized/rearranged.

Differences in eyesight make it difficult to keep both users at the same resolution. Is there a way to prevent the resizing/rearranging for the higher-resolution user?

Thanks and regards!

G4 400 MHz AGP (Sawtooth) Mac OS X (10.4.5) 768 MiB

Posted on Aug 30, 2006 6:34 PM

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Answer 1

Declan MacLeod Author

Level 4

1,666 points

Oct 4, 2006 4:08 AM in response to Declan MacLeod

No joy. Sigh.....

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Answer 2

Oct 4, 2006 7:13 AM in response to Declan MacLeod

Couple of suggestions:

1) Upgrade to 10.4.8 and get a Mighty Mouse, or mouse with a scroll wheel.
Ctrl-Scroll will then give you a very easy to use zoom. This may allow use of full resolution for both users.

B) Create a new user account set to high resolution, with no password, and restrict it as much as you can (no administrator privileges, etc.). When switching from the low resolution account, go to this new account first, then to the desired account. This will cause the window rearranging to occur on the dummy account (which won't have any windows, anyway).

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Answer 3

Declan MacLeod Author

Level 4

1,666 points

Oct 17, 2006 3:20 PM in response to Malcolm Rayfield

Hi Malcolm,

Thanks for the suggestions! See my comments inline....

Couple of suggestions:

1) Upgrade to 10.4.8 and get a Mighty Mouse, or mouse
with a scroll wheel.
Ctrl-Scroll will then give you a very easy to use
zoom. This may allow use of full resolution for both
users.

I'm already on 10.4.8 and have a mouse with a scroll wheel. I'll have to give the ctrl-scroll thing a try....

B) Create a new user account set to high resolution,
with no password, and restrict it as much as you can
(no administrator privileges, etc.). When switching
from the low resolution account, go to this new
account first, then to the desired account. This
will cause the window rearranging to occur on the
dummy account (which won't have any windows, anyway).

That's been my workaround so far, but it's annoying. I'm surprised that Apple let this behaviour out the door, given how much they want the user's experience to be as seamless and unobtrusive as possible.

There's one other workaround that we may resort to:
III) Set up the Winblows machine again and just use separate machines. I like the Mac just fine, but my other user hasn't found the switching experience to be to her liking....

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