Why do some programs not rescale when moving across monitors on Surface 3?

Anonymous
2014-09-19T15:57:18+00:00

One of the nice features of the Surface 3 Pro is that in a multiple monitor setup (which I use a lot), windows will scale when I drag them from my primary display to the external one(s). That is, the scaling that is done to increase the size on the high DPI Surface screen is removed when I drag to en external monitor with a lower DPI. Very nice!

But, while this is nice, it doesn't work for all windows programs. Why? My example is, of all things, PowerPoint. Word is fine. Excel is fine, Firefox is fine, so is Thunderbird, Windows Explorer, etc. But when I use PowerPoint on my external monitor, the ribbon bar takes up 10-15% of the screen! Add to that the menu and such and I have less than 75% of my screen for actual work.

Is there anything one can do to fix this?

Microsoft 365 and Office | PowerPoint | For home | Windows

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Anonymous
2015-05-18T14:41:20+00:00

Thank you for this pointer. Seems that this does, indeed, fix the problem (for me, at least).

For my setup (Windows 8.1, Surface Pro 3, Office 365 - Office 15) the specific instructions are few and simple:

  1. Go to C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office 15\root\office15
  2. Right-click on powerpnt.exe.manifest and change the permission so you can modify the file
  3. Right-click on powerpnt.exe.manifest and open with Wordpad
  4. Change the line

    <dpiAware>True/PM</dpiAware>

    to

    <dpiAware>False/PM</dpiAware>

  1. Save file

(at least with Office 365, you don't need to do anything in the registry as it's already looking at the external manifest file.)

Yes, line 4 seems counter-intuitive, but it's correct. Once you change this to False, Powerpoint will scale moving from high to lower DPI monitors. I've not encountered any other issues, but I've not used it for very long, yet.

Thanks to the previous pointers/authors for this tip.

(Do read

http://www.danantonielli.com/adobe-app-scaling-on-high-dpi-displays-fix/

if you want more details and the history of this.)

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  1. Anonymous
    2014-09-23T19:06:37+00:00

    OK! Looks like it's Excel. Could somebody admit this and let us know how to report it and get a fix? I'm using Office 2013 (via Office365) so pay per month for support :-)

    Seems Excel won't get the scaling change and then rescale when moved between monitors with different scales.

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  2. Anonymous
    2014-09-23T18:59:01+00:00

    Hi,

    You are not alone I have exactly the same problem.

    I have a high resolution Lenovo Yoga pro 13" display (3200x1800) which when working at home I connect to a 27" AOC monitor (1920x1080). Using Windows 8.1 64bit and Office 2013

    Using Powerpoint on the Lenovo screen everything is fine connected or not connected to second monitor.

    As soon as I drag Powerpoint onto Second Monitor the ribbon bar and text on the menu bar takes up over a third over the vertical monitor making it impossible to use Powerpoint on this monitor. Excel doesn't do this, nor does Outlook, Word, Publisher, One Note, Chrome, iTunes or any other programme I currently use.

    I do not have this problem connecting up my older Dell Latitude laptop (1366x768) running Windows 7 and Powerpoint 2010 to this same monitor.

    One of the main reasons I have a large monitor is to work on Powerpoint presentations. 

    I suspect it is something to do with scaling as a consequence of the new breed of high resolution laptop screens.

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  3. Anonymous
    2014-09-22T13:20:53+00:00

    This has ALWAYS been a problem with PowerPoint. Word, Excel... no problems.

    I have three different configurations, several different external monitors and it does this no matter which one I use. I use the external HDMI on the Surface as well as the adapter on the dock. Several different HDMI cables, as well. This is not a cable/port issue as, see above, everything else works, fine.

    PowerPoint is the ONLY program, so far, that has exhibited this problem. I'm asking if anyone else has seen this. If not, then it is my problem, but I still have no idea why.

    Can you, Microsoft Forum Moderator, try dragging a PowerPoint slide from the main screen to an external monitor on  Surface 3  and see if it rescales properly?

    Thanks

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  4. Anonymous
    2014-09-19T23:21:36+00:00

    Hi TheDaveZ,

    Thank you for reaching out to us! I am sorry to hear about your experience with the scaling of an external monitor not adjusting the size of PowerPoint correctly. I'll try my best to help address the issue.

    • When did this issue start appearing? Was it always working but stopped all of a sudden? If it was working fine before, what change(s) have you made?
    • Have you tried using a different external monitor to see if you get the same issue?
    • Additionally, I would suggest testing a different adapter just to see if it makes a difference.

    Please let me know your findings.

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