What happens if you run 1024x798 on a 1280x1024 LCD? Does the screen use only a small part of the display area? Does the LCD resize the display to full size and make it look ugly?

We want to buy 18 LCDs for our learning center thin clients. Most or all LCDs are 1280x1024, but we don't want that high resolution.

I just connected a SONY SDM-HS75P which has native resolution of 1280x1024
to a Pentium75 running Slackware that was is configured in /etc/X11/xorg.conf
for a max of 1024x768.

With the startx command a message is displayed saying Out Of Range.

Evidently, this monitor won't work with less that native resolution.

I think so, but it's a matter of opinion - some people don't mind wonky displays. For instance, 1024x768 is a different aspect ratio than 1280x1024 (4:3 vs 5:4) so everything will be elongated. LCD panels were really meant to be run at their full resolution.

Why not? 1280x1024 panels are usually big enough that nothing will be too small, and font sizes etc can be adjusted so everything looks nice.

As for guzzi's issue, was xorg.conf edited to give the correct VertRefresh and HorizSync ranges?

You can run your monitor (LCD or CRT) at whatever resoultion it can support, but if you will be paying for 1280x1024 resolution, my view is that you might as well use it. It's sort of like buying a first class plane ticket, but then sitting in coach - why spend the extra money for something you aren't using? Anyway, if the 1024x768 setting is what you want to use now, and plan to be using for the next 3 years or so, then my advice would be to buy LCD's where 1024x768 is the max it can support. I only have one LCD, but bottom line, it's happiest when the resolution is set to the recommended setting (which is the max)

In reply to two messages:

We are buying 1280x1024 because that's what is available. Every single LCD I looked at has that resolution. While a few models may be available otherwise, we want a complete set of 18 LCDs and we want a a lot of models to choose from.

Why not use 1280x1024? These are for thin clients, so lower resolution generally means better performance. The bottlenecks are the network bandwidth and maybe the old video cards.