Correct me if I'm wrong, but...

doesn't the dxdiag utility in WinXP have a built-in refresh rate fix? You can set the refresh rate for your resolution to force a fixed rate for DX...but this only works for your desktop res. Still, why hasn't anyone mentioned this before?

we've mentioned it before. thats the direct draw refresh rate and its only worth when you want the same refresh rate to all resolutions in the d3d applications. it wont wokr with ogl and it wont apply different values to different resolutions. if you set it to 75Hz, directx will attempt to set that to any resoltuion a d3d application is running at.