Monitor Question

[aeromed202]

While I have been working on an LED beacon effect I had a question about what I was seeing. When I thought I had the right look when the aircraft filled most of the screen at night, I would pan back two key taps and the light effect lost a significant amount of its punch. My monitor is a 19" IBM Thinkvision 1280x1024. Is this resolution not enough to keep up with the graphics? Is it just how the game is?
I don't want to offer an effect that looks OK for me but others with better systems aren't interested in.

[Willy]

I'm running a 19" Viewsonic with a native resolution of 1280x1024 which is what I use. It seems to work pretty good for me, but my vid card is an old FX 5200.