PLEASE HELP!! My new computer keeps reverting back to very low display resolution-and so do games!?

[geneticsdoctor]

Maybe this has been discussed a million times in past- but I'm hoping someone smart can give me some advice on how to fix this----

I'm really not great on fixing computer problems. If i can't figure this out with help from the forum I guess my next step is paying for Geek Squad help.

I bought a new gaming computer 2 months ago- so the computer and monitor are brand new- i love gaming.

The last 2 months were going great- fast game loads-vibrant colors - lots of fun!

About 10 days ago SOMETHING HAPPENED! i have no idea what caused it-

now when i boot up my computer it starts out at high res (perfect) then after 2 seconds switches to a small screen with 800x600 res which is terrible.

i have to go in to Display Settings on the task bar and switch back to the high res setting (3440x1440).

on Steam i love playing this game called Dead in Vinland (its a simple game but for me it's a lot of fun)

the game switches to this low res mode and looks terrible- i have to do a ctrl-alt-del to get the task manager up and then go to the task bar
and again to display settings (with the game still open in the background) and again choose the high res option for the game to change in to good graphics.

info on my computer- i have Windows 11- i bought a Dell/Alienware Aurora R16 with 32GB of RAM and an
Nvidia Geforce RTX 4090 graphics card- and a new Dell 34 inch curved gaming monitor- so I've got a new awesome system.


another question- I'm not sure if the nvidia control panel is really needed/helpful for gamers or can cause its own problems.


I looked this "computer auto switching to low res on boot up" problem on the net and I tried several things to fix-

1) for awhile i disabled the Nvidia graphics card under "devices"- that fixed the problem of the computer screen going to low res on boot up- but this simple game I'm playing
doesn't play well- everything is slow- so i "undisabled" the graphics card to get the game speed and performance back= so I'm guessing mabye the problem with the system switching to low res has something to do with the graphics card??

2) The last nvidia driver for the graphics card (everything on my system is brand new) - is dated June 2024. i uninstalled all the nvidia programs/drivers and reinstalled them.
I've tried updates on both the Windows operating system and the nvidia drivers- it keeps telling me everything is updated with the latest drivers- but the system keeps switching to low res on boot up and with starting the game and i have to
go back in to display settings and switch to high res display every time

3) i went through all the programs on the system (its a new system- so not a lot of garbage programs/apps yet) and i uninstalled anything that wasn't native to the computer or to nvidia- everything that i didn't need i uninstalled- and restarted the system. i again uninstalled and re installed the new nvidia RTX 4090 drivers

4) I did a virus scan on my computer- no viruses- Windows is telling me my computer is clean and perfect. I make it a point not to download anything from weird/suspect websites.

5) i rechecked my HDMI cable connection going from the monitor to the computer- yes - the HDMI cable is plugged in to the HDMI plug on the graphics card

6) I never made a restore point in the 2 months I've had the computer- so a "recovery/system restore" to an earlier version is not an option- maybe i'll do a restore check point after I fix this stupid problem.


???do i need a new HDMI cable? the one i have is probably new- would a bad HDMI cable cause the computer to switch to low res with boot up or when starting a game?

Is a $50 hdmi cable better for gaming/less likely to cause me problems than a cheapy $5 hdmi cable?

7) i read on internet about maybe faulty BIOS settings- i doubt this is the problem- but i don't know anything about BIOS settings and I'm scared that changing these settings will do damage to other parts of the system- so I'm not going there

8) i saw something on a steam forum for similar problem about going in to Steam for the game setup for DISPLAY and manually typing in the display resolution numbers (-w xxxx -h xxxx) and I tried this- but this did not fix the issue with the game
or fix the problem with the computer switching to low res from boot up


Thank you so much for your help!! could it really be a faulty (new but cheap) HDMI cable causing such a pain in the axx problem? Or is it something else? Again I'm not great with fixing computers- so any ideas or info you can give me would be great-
-can give as much detail and overexplain as much as you want - might be helpful. J :)