crt settings

[ninjasper]

i've had this 19" kds xflat for about 4 years now and i'm not 100% on this, but i'm thinking it's faded or dimmed a bit in this period. it's still sharp as i remember but i'm pretty sure it's darker than it was originally and the only real reference i have for this is whenever i get on a friend's comp, be it lcd or crt, their's tend to almost hurt my eyes cuz of how bright they seem to me - to them they probably think it is a normal setting and would think mine way too dark.

anyhow when i got my monitor i was pretty newb in all things tech, so once i learned its best to keep contrast and brightness as low as they seem acceptable to the viewer i tried to get them around 50 or 60% and have ever since been reluctant to adjust any higher. however like i said, i don't know if it's my drivers or gpu settings, but i think my image has gradually weakened so i'm crankin it up to about 66% for both brightness and contrast. is 1:1 an intelligent ratio for these settings in the first place?

to those with older crt's out there, what settings do you have yours at? have any of you needed to boost them over time?

also, my monitor supports 16x12 max but i very rarely tested that out as a desktop res, and until recently that i have acquired a gpu that can handle games maxed out at that res did i really bother to game that high. my follow up question is do higher resolutions wear a crt down quicker?

thanks all