Disable all font smoothing in Windows 7 (ie: including taskbar, menus, control panel, etc...)

Anonymous
2009-07-14T21:44:09+00:00

I would like to completely disable all font smoothing, anti-aliasing, etc... on Windows 7. I find it difficult to read and it gives me a headache.

Here's what I've tried so far:

  1. Switched to Windows 7 Basic theme. (No Aero.)
  2. Run the ClearType tuner. (It didn't help. I want to remove font smoothing, not tweak it.)
  3. Disabled ClearType altogether. (Taskbar, menus, etc... remain smoothed/anti-aliased).
  4. Unchecked "Smooth edges of screens fonts" from Performance -> Visual Effects. (Taskbar fonts, help, control panel, etc... remain smoothed).
  5. Changed all my fonts to Tahoma under Personalize -> Windows Color
  6. Using regedit, added "Tahoma" as the first option under HKLM->Software->Microsoft->Windows NT->Current Version->FontSubstitutes
  7. Deleted all Segoe fonts from /Windows/Fonts (Had to take ownership to do so)
  8. Deleted nearly all extraneous fonts from /Windows/Fonts (I was getting frustrated...)
  9. Tried playing with HKCU->Control Panel->Desktop->   FontSmoothingType (both 1 and 0) and FontSmoothing (both 1 and 0).
  10. Tried running my laptop at a non-native resolution (Makes it even worse)

The above steps removed most font smoothing, though the taskbar, dialogue boxes, control panel, etc... remain smoothed/anti-aliased. So far, the only way I've found to completely disable any smoothing is to switch to Classic mode, which has the unfortunate effect of removing any visual styles whatsoever. In short, I want Win7 fonts to render in a binary/completely pixelated fashion, with no gray fuzziness or subpixel rendering.

Please help!

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Accessibility

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Anonymous
2009-08-02T09:31:33+00:00

Hi Ken,

Hopefully the Win 7 typography team will make this "feature" optional by SP1. I'm holding out until then. But if you insist on using 7 before the font smoothing is fixed, here's how to deal with registry font substitutes and UAC/system protection.

Edit the registry settings under FontSubstitutes so that "Tahoma" appears before Segoe in any FontSubstitute settings. Then, take ownership of the Windows directory (I took ownership of all subdirectories and files, which might be excessive, but made other tweaking easier to deal with) to delete Segoe. To take ownership, right click on the Windows system folder, select "Properties", click on Security, Advanced, then clik on Owner in Advanced security settings... Click on the edit button and change owner to your own account . Make certain "Replace owner on subcontainer..." is checked.

It's overkill, but will get it done.

R5N

P.S. If anyone does figure out how to remove font smoothing from the Win 7 taskbar, I will praise you for all of time.

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  1. Anonymous
    2010-04-02T13:29:02+00:00

    People I may have stumbled upon the ultimate resolution to this problem. I was really troubled by the Win 7 font smoothing too as I still use a CRT monitor at much lower than it's default resolution due to poor eye sight.

    On building a new PC I decided to give Win7 another chance and after install the fonts are now fine!

    I wouldn't ordinarily expect different hardware to produce these different results but I wonder if it's because my new graphics card is DirectX 11 compatible and handles the Windows font smoothing better?

    Also I have switched from NVidia to ATI but I wouldn't expect this to have made a difference.

    So if it's really bugging you and you have the cash to spare perhaps try upgrading your graphics card to a DX11 one?

    Brian

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  2. Anonymous
    2010-01-22T15:18:50+00:00

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  3. Anonymous
    2010-01-22T09:55:21+00:00

    You could also try this: http://www.karpatchev.com/windows/disable\_cleartype

    In my case i had to reinstall windows 7, then installed office and then turned off clear type font and font smoothing via system properties (not in registry). First time (when I installed office after turning font smoothing off in registry) I tried every possible scenario to turn it off in office 2007, but nothing worked.

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  4. Anonymous
    2010-01-21T19:18:26+00:00

    This TOTALLY worked for me. http://www.pctipsbox.com/disable-cleartype-font-smoothing/

    Give it a try.

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