New MacBookPro with hi res screen is low res when projected

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Hello,
I've been using my new MacBookPro 8,2 (2.2GHz) with various projectors and the images that appear sharp on my laptop screen are blurry on the projected screen. I've tried different file formats (pdf, jpeg, tif and psd) as well as viewing through different applications but the projected image remains blurry.
It doesn't seem to be a projector problem, as I've tried connecting other people's computers and the image is sharp. Perhaps it is a problem with my computer's default internal settings when connected to a projector?
Can anyone suggest what might solve this issue?
Thanks a lot
 
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Your Mac's Specs
13inch 2.3 i5 MBP 64gb SSD 320gb HD 8gb 1333
What are you using to connect it to the projectors? VGA, DVI, HDMI? A lot of projectors just aren't very good. Colors and lighting become terrible though I usually think the sharpness is reasonable, not great though.
 

bobtomay

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Your Mac's Specs
15" MBP '06 2.33 C2D 4GB 10.7; 13" MBA '14 1.8 i7 8GB 10.11; 21" iMac '13 2.9 i5 8GB 10.11; 6S
Did you open System Preferences - Displays and set the correct resolution for the projector?
 
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Using mini VGA, and the problem shouldn't be the projector as when someone else plugged their macbook into the same projector, the image came out sharp.

And Bobtomay, in response to your question, I did open system preferences but it wouldnt let me change resolution of projector, only my own screen. The other resolution options for the projector were greyed out, so something like 800 x 600 was only option. It seems like when the two are connected, the resolution defaults to a low value. Any ideas on how to solve this?

Thanks for your responses so far.
 

bobtomay

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15" MBP '06 2.33 C2D 4GB 10.7; 13" MBA '14 1.8 i7 8GB 10.11; 21" iMac '13 2.9 i5 8GB 10.11; 6S
What resolution does the projector accept via it's mini-VGA input? This should be in the owner's manual. And this other MB, what resolution were they using?
 
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I think they were using 1024 x 768.
As I said, I'd switch it to that on my computer, but that didn't seem to affect the projector resolution, even though the projector was meant to be much higher, it was somehow defaulting to the lowest res....?
 

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