Monitor "out Of Range" In Most 3d Apps

Hi,
I use a BENQ FP731 monitor with an Nvidia FX5500. After I install Nvidia driver (x11-video-nvidiaG01 from NVIDIA repository ), SaX2 seemingly becomes unable to detect my monitor's specs correctly. If (using SaX2) I try to set up 1280x1024 native resolution, FP731 spits out an “out of range message”. A workaround is to use nvidia-config utility, which actually manages to do the trick, but not completely. The problems is that running some applications that require 3d support (f.e. X-moto, Nexuis, Alien Arena, Baldur's Gate 2) results in the dreaded “out of range message” which I could only cure by restarting X. Interestingly though, other 3d apps work quite flawlessly: Warcraft 3, Google Earth.
Feeling confident, I carefully punched in the official resolution and sync values into xorg.conf which, to my utter amazement, resulted in completely screwing the monitor.
After I got the d*** thing repaired for $130 (the warranty had long expired), I installed Ubuntu 8.04 on my “experimental” partition to test the issue, but Hardy had no problems with FP731 and the troublesome 3d apps.
Is there a ... safe way to befriend nvidia driver to SaX2 so that my crappy monitor works well with my OpenSuse 10.3 KDE installation?

Thanks