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
    2016-10-05T02:15:47+00:00

    Quick and easy solution, thank you very much.

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  2. Anonymous
    2016-10-04T15:28:10+00:00

    I'll just point out there's another discussion of the same problem here.  That thread started out limited to Powerpoint 2016, but I am seeing the scaling problem with multiple applications, not just Powerpoint and not just MS Office.

    I am also dismayed to see that the problem goes all the way back to Office 2013 under Windows 8, and still has not been resolved after 3 years and full version upgrades to both Windows and Office!

    Seems like MS simply doesn't have the resources, or doesn't care enough, to address these long-standing problems. (For another example of a known bug unaddressed for many years, see here and here.)

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  3. Anonymous
    2016-09-16T20:33:39+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.)

    I had the same issue, PPT only (not any of the other MS Office applications). Brand new Surface Pro 3 and an external Dell monitor.

    For those of you who might be less tech saavy, like me, I had to dig around a little to find the right file to adjust. Our file is here:

    C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office16

    Changing the wording in the document (also took a few tries until the permission took hold and allowed me to save) solved the issue.

    Good luck, everyone!

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  4. Anonymous
    2016-08-30T12:16:10+00:00

    I just tested this as well, removing the /PM seems to have the right effect.

    I.e. PPT scales correctly across both screens, and I don't seem to have the fuzziness that appears when you change the setting to False.

    Just need MS to fix this across the board now so that other apps work properly, for example skype for business...

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