I guess I'll leave it at 800 x 600 for a while and get used to that. My 17 inch screen is actually 16" when you measure it.
Maybe it's the fact that my monitor is 2 arm lenghts away (4.5 feet) from my eyes made me choose 640 x 480.
I like to sit far away from the monitor, kind of keep away from bad radiation.
And the 640 x 480 was great for looking at these