Poor font rendering in Windows 8 (blurry text)

No, it is neither bold nor untrue.

Read what I said:

"I never knew a single person who actually preferred Cleartype"...

That I never knew such a person is correct. What others that I did not know preferred, is unknown to me, of course. But those that I asked about it did not like Cleartype or switched from Cleartype to standard font smoothing when I showed them the difference.

I never understood what was so great about Cleartype anyway:

My eyes are able to see the red, blue and green subpixels shimmer around the letters - always!

So this does not only look extremely ugly but it also causes severe eyestrain and headaches.

I am glad, Cleartype will disappear - but I am, like others in this very thread, not impressed about modern and future rendering across pixel boundaries (as an option: yes, but not as something forced upon us).

-egman-

/edit/

Yes, sure:

I may have met people who really liked (or preferred) Cleartype  - without knowing it.

A bold and probably untrue statement. Maybe you didn't know they preferred it, but you undoubtedly came across one or two.

egman said "Personally, I never knew a single person who actually preferred Cleartype to standard (grayscale) font smoothing on normal TFT screens."

While there *was* a switch to grayscale antialiasing, it is not the the fact that it is grayscale antialiasing now that is making people complain (something people have been using for decades without any serious issues for many years in former versions of Windows), it is rather like that:

Antialiasing is implemented differently now, and it is tied to hardware rendering (something many many people have been complaining about even in Windows 7), and hardware rendering, obviously, cannot be disabled any longer (in Internet Explorer etc.). The pixel grid is no longer respected (rendering across pixel boundaries).

I remember when Firefox started hardware based rendering lots of people were dissatified because of that blurry type rendering. It was not a question of Cleartype or not, but a question of directwrite or not.

As I said before, many here might regret the loss of Cleartype (of coloured subpixel rendering), but looking at this same thread I saw quite a few screenshots posted where people did not even use Cleartype! So consequently, many did not even use Cleartype in Windows before W8 (I always hated it) - even those who did not use Cleartype in Vista or 7 are now complaining!

Ergo:

The absence of Cleartype rendering now is not the real issue.

It is the loss of pixel grid rendering and the loss of options to tell Internet Explorer etc. to use the rendering I want (like in Windows 7 where I could still use good old grayscale smoothing).

Personally, I never knew a single person who actually preferred Cleartype to standard (grayscale) font smoothing on normal TFT screens.

-egman-

That's not a solution but a tedious workaround to a problem that exists solely because MS switched Windows to grey-scale anti-aliasing. Much easier to just use nonwindows progs.

Much confusion in this thread...

The problem does *not* arise from switching to grayscale anti-aliasing, but from switching to hardware rendering (directwrite) and from not giving us an option to disable it.

In fact, I love grayscale font smoothing, always liked it.

And I don't remember people complaing about blurry fonts in the olden times when there was just the choice between a) "unsmoothed" font rendering and b) the socalled "standard font smoothing" (=grayscale).

We had these options (if I recall correctly) since Windows 95 (with plus pack), and of course in Windows 2000 and XP. And fortunately, this traditional way of font smoothing can still be used instead of headache-inducing Cleartype until today in Windows 7 and 8.

Nothing beats crispness in grayscale smoothing in all kinds of Windows (as compared to Linux which only comes close but not enough for me to enjoy reading long texts - all fontconfig settings tried, nothing helps to get the same degree of sharpness). Standard font smoothing (grayscale) is still the best for my eyes, while Cleartype is completely useless (for me) giving me hurting eyes and headaches.

I understand that some (many?) people in this very long thread miss RGB font rendering (coloured Cleartype subpixel rendering). That's okay, if you like it that way.

Nevertheless, I still claim that this is not the root of the Windows 8 font rendering issue.

As I said, it is the switch to hardware rendering and the lack of an option to disable it or to even use coloured rendering.

If there were such an option, people would be free to use any of those 3 (or 4) options:

• unsmoothed
• grayscale
• Cleartype
• directwrite

What is so hard to offer these various options?

-egman-

No, you're wrong, the problem DOES arise from switching to grayscale antialiasing and not due to hardware rendering.. It's the coloured antialiasing that made the font (in IE for instance) much more readable.. Hardware rendering already been part of font rendering in windows for some time, but only with Windows 8 they switched from 'coloured' antialiasing to grayscale..

The simple point is: Font rendering (for IE-based rendering) is fubar in Windows 8 compared to Windows 7 and earlier, no matter what the real reason is.. The problem has already been acknowledged by the developmentteam with a message that it will not be changed (at least at the time of the answer, but then again, they are comming back on a lot of poor decissions made in Windows 8)..

That's not a solution but a tedious workaround to a problem that exists solely because MS switched Windows to grey-scale anti-aliasing. Much easier to just use nonwindows progs.

Much confusion in this thread...

The problem does *not* arise from switching to grayscale anti-aliasing, but from switching to hardware rendering (directwrite) and from not giving us an option to disable it.

In fact, I love grayscale font smoothing, always liked it.

And I don't remember people complaing about blurry fonts in the olden times when there was just the choice between a) "unsmoothed" font rendering and b) the socalled "standard font smoothing" (=grayscale).

We had these options (if I recall correctly) since Windows 95 (with plus pack), and of course in Windows 2000 and XP. And fortunately, this traditional way of font smoothing can still be used instead of headache-inducing Cleartype until today in Windows 7 and 8.

Nothing beats crispness in grayscale smoothing in all kinds of Windows (as compared to Linux which only comes close but not enough for me to enjoy reading long texts - all fontconfig settings tried, nothing helps to get the same degree of sharpness). Standard font smoothing (grayscale) is still the best for my eyes, while Cleartype is completely useless (for me) giving me hurting eyes and headaches.

I understand that some (many?) people in this very long thread miss RGB font rendering (coloured Cleartype subpixel rendering). That's okay, if you like it that way.

Nevertheless, I still claim that this is not the root of the Windows 8 font rendering issue.

As I said, it is the switch to hardware rendering and the lack of an option to disable it or to even use coloured rendering.

If there were such an option, people would be free to use any of those 3 (or 4) options:

• unsmoothed
• grayscale
• Cleartype
• directwrite

What is so hard to offer these various options?

-egman-