Is it worthwhile to develop a site that changes with the screen res

I know I should be using CSS positioning, but I need to go one step at a time. My site currently is set for the layout to be 100% of the browser. On a larger res it can be quite "gangly," as one critic pointed out.

My problem is: I think the site is best viewed at 1000, but I don't want to have users, most of which still use 800, to have to scroll to the side. So now I have a problem. I could put a link to forward to the proper site depending on res, but I hate having to make people decide anything right at the start.

I was thinking maybe I could write some code that would show the site max 1000 (if res allows) or 800 if that is what they have. My concern is too much code, I already have an image intensive site, and the code I do have probably needs to be optimized (newbie).

Perhaps someone has some suggestion as to what they would do, or maybe the code would not be that intensive. I am currently learning PHP and I know a little bit of Javascript, so this solution does not pop right into my head.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Fluid design is good, but as you say, it does have the capability to look a bit too spacious on a higher resolution.

I have heard before there is meant to be a script to do similar to what you want, but apparently it wont validate.

My favourite for getting by this is by designing for a fixed center width of 800, and then being a little creative with the background. If you have a look at my 'emedia' & 'hosting' site, you can see what I mean. When someone is viewing 800x600, they dont see the background. They are tabless/css designs, but, the same can be achieved with tables & wihtout css though.

Good luck

Thanks for your advice.

In addition to my question I should ask everyone if it really matters? I have a friend who uses a >1000 res and he always makes his browser window smaller because he gets left with so much white space on most sites.

Is this the norm among users with a higher res or is it something I should definately change?