<Alt><Enter> switches between Full-Screen mode and Windowed Mode.Hunts81 wrote:Im not really sure how the ALt+Enter feature works but im leaning towards the problem being a windows setting I cant figure out.
In Full-Screen mode the game and drivers output directly to the monitor without involving Windows (explorer.exe is not involved in rendering the output). This is also called "exclusive mode" because it locks the mouse to the game, and is more efficient because Windows doesn't bother rendering the other application that may running behind the game.
In Windowed mode, explorer.exe gets involved, and it renders the output to the screen (through the graphics drivers of course). This adds some overhead and possibly lag, because Windows in now involved and continues to render other applications in background. It may also be rescaling the images depending on the size of the window.
For me, I start the game in Full-Screen mode, then if I hit <ALT><Enter> the game switches to Full-Screen Borderless Windowed mode. It still looks like it's in Full-Screen, but I can see some slight additional lag and a few FPS drop because Windows is now rendering the game. The advantage of this mode is I can now use <ALT><Tab> to switch between my two monitors and other applications, but the game continues to run on the primary monitor and I can still see it. The downside is it looks a bit worse.
But, I can only do this once. If I <Alt><Enter> back the Full-Screen mode, the next time I <Alt><Enter> back the Windowed mode it will be in a bordered Windowed mode (no longer full-screen). The game still runs fine, but there is an obvious border around the window the game is running in that can be resized to any size/resolution and position. I'm personally not a fan of playing this way, but for people with only one monitor it's probably what they would need so they can use other applications while continuing the play the game at the same time.
It doesn't seem to matter how many times I <Alt><Enter> back and forth between Full-Screen and Windowed mode, only the first time will result in Borderless Windowed mode.
So if I know I'm going to be concentrating on a game and doing nothing else on my computer, I stay in Full Screen mode for the better image and less lag. If I'm going to be playing a long game, and doing other things (like surfing the Web while playing), I switch to Full-Screen Borderless Windowed mode, and use <Alt><Tab> switch back and forth between the game on my primary monitor and doing other things on my second monitor while continuing to watch and play the game on my primary monitor.
