Frustration

Okay, I've gotten a number of minor issues taken care of concerning the wonderful world of Vista learning. But would someone please help me with something that should be relatively simple?? Pretty please? I have a 22 inch flat screen monitor. The optimum resolution, according to Dell, is 1680 x 1050. Yeah, right! Oh, it's beautiful! The text is so clear and the quality is great, but........it's made for teeny tiny people with teeny tiny eyes!! I would be blind in two weeks tops....not something I'm particularly looking forward to since I rather enjoy having sight. I've checked around a lot of places, and it appears that people using Vista have two main resolutions: 1024 x 768 and 1280 x 1024. The latter one makes for small print, and also leaves about 2.5 inches of blank space on each side of the web page. What's the point of having a nice big monitor if it doesn't use it well? Lol. And the former leaves everything at a nice size (no eye strain), with about 1 inch remaining on each side of the web page. But the photos and the text are not SHARP and clear. I have tried every resolution for a 22 inch monitor with 32-bit color, and the 1024 x 768 seems to be the best. But why isn't it sharp and clear? Boo hoo. The photos are a little on the grainy side, and the text is a little on the pale, fuzzy side. What resolution do you use? And what other settings do you use for the colors, etc? I've been trying, but I just can't get my mind wrapped around it. Thank you, guys. Sorry for bothering you so much. I know I'm a pain.