Font Smoothing makes everything blurry

I just tried Safari 3.1 beta for Windows Vista for the first time and found ALL levels of font smoothing to make my fonts blurry making it unusable. I use a 17" laptop lcd monitor and the "CRT" setting is the least blurry. Any way to turn this off completely?

They didn't fix the font problem?
HAHAHA. I posted about this, and submitted bug reports and they still didn't fix it?
Uh... why does version 3.01 not have this problem?
Wow. It boggles the mind. I'm not going to install 3.1 if the fonts look fine in 3.01.
I'm very unhappy with this development. What a joke.

Similar Messages

Is font smoothing fixed in Leopard?

I am using a 24" Imac and one of my biggest issues with OSX is that font smoothing makes everything blurry...Especially on this machine as it has a larger dot pitch display. It can actually become painful after a while. My 15" Macbook pro is a lot better as the display has a smaller dot pitch.
Now if I boot up Windows on my 24" Imac it is much much more legible...So my big question is: Have the fixed the font smoothing so that it does not cause eyestrain?
Thanks!

If anything, I'm finding it worse:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1195922&tstart=0

Font smoothing and connections

Hope this is the best place to post this. I have a new Dell s2209w monitor connected to my Macbook (which I run in clamshell to get the full resolution of 1920x1080.) I'd been using it with a mini-DVI to VGA connector and it looked good, but just changed tonight to a mini-Dvi to DVI. I'd understood there would be some advantage to doing so.
So I'm now DVI, running full-resolution, all calibrated... and my fonts are all blocky. Everywhere in snow leopard, regardless of program or font, they've all become blocky and not smooth, system fonts, custom fonts, etc. I've tried turning on and turning off font smoothing, and it doesn't seem to make any difference. I've sometimes seen Macs in the apple store look like this, with their fonts.
Suggestions?

I have the same issue on my HP monitor.
You may be able to try this:
http://blog.petersendidit.com/post/blurry-text-on-external-monitor-with-snow-leo pard/
It did not work for me though.

Font smoothing issues

Hi all. I noticed some others were complaining about font smoothing not seeming to work in Carbon applications (e.g. Camino, Firefox, MS Word and even iTunes). It seems the subpixel font-aliasing system preference (e.g. light) is ignored and, instead, the ugly CRT font smoothing is used.
I am puzzled this has not received a lot of attention, since it immediately bothered me when I received my Macbook Pro today.
Is everyone experiencing this font smoothing problem? I used the Migration Assistant to copy all files from my previous (Tiger-installed) Powerbook. Does anyone not having used the Migration Assistant also suffer from the font smoothing issue?
For more info, see http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=1829478&#1829478
Macbook Pro Mac OS X (10.4.6)

TinkerTool didn't make any difference for me. I played around with it and found that there was no improvements using it or disabling font smoothing.
I have watched DVD's on this LCD being played with my MacBook. I have seen 2MB+ full screen digital pictures. Both the DVD and digital pics look absolutely amazing on it.
It's only the fonts that appear blurry or in some areas they appear to have a shadown to the right. This happens with any text that appears in every app.
Keep in mind too, Windows Vista looks perfect on this display, but my prized MacBook looks really sub-par.
I'm not quite following you on changing the display preferences to change to pixel size to that of the MacBook...

Font smoothing issues with Samsun 23 inch LCD

I am having a font smoothing issue with my MacBook and my Samsung LN-S2352W 23 inch LCD (http://www.samsung.com/Products/TV/LCDTV/LNS2352WXXAA.asp). I am using the mini-DVI to VGA adapter and the plugging that into the VGA port of my LCD. It doesn't matter which app I run, but as long as it has fonts, they come out blurry, hazy, colors bleed, etc.
I have played with the font smoothing settings and that has not helped at all. I have heard of TinkerTool and will try it to see if it makes any difference, but am not expecting much.
I also have a PC running Windows Vista and I connected it to the VGA port of my LCD. Wow...the difference in picture quality was astounding. I'm ******. I want my MacBook to look that sweet on my LCD.
Anyone have any thoughts? Can this be fixed?

TinkerTool didn't make any difference for me. I played around with it and found that there was no improvements using it or disabling font smoothing.
I have watched DVD's on this LCD being played with my MacBook. I have seen 2MB+ full screen digital pictures. Both the DVD and digital pics look absolutely amazing on it.
It's only the fonts that appear blurry or in some areas they appear to have a shadown to the right. This happens with any text that appears in every app.
Keep in mind too, Windows Vista looks perfect on this display, but my prized MacBook looks really sub-par.
I'm not quite following you on changing the display preferences to change to pixel size to that of the MacBook...

Disable font-smoothing system wide

I want to disable font-smoothing (anti aliase) system wide for mavericks operating system. I already turned off font smoothing for LCD from system preferences (in general).
But it still shows blurry for small fonts in my editor (Zend studio for Eclipse). And it make totally impossible to read small codes.
Any help would be great.

It's definetely the issue. This worked for me: https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=382972

Safari Font Smoothing: Not an option?

I just purchased an iMac yesterday. It is incredible. I've done some research with the programs installed, and I came across the following web page that discusses how to turn on "font smoothing" with Safari: http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/apple/make-fonts-less-fuzzy-in-safari-for-windows /
However, when I follow the author's directions, I do not see the option for "font shadowing" -- I see everything else: standard font, fixed-width font, display images when page opens, and default encoding. I upgraded Safari to 3.1 (as my computer came with a slightly less version) last evening, too.
Is this still possible? Am I missing something?

Thanks, Bee! That explains everything.
My concern is, that in Safari, lowercase i's look like lowercase l's. I would show you a screenshot, but I don't think a "Print Screen" button exists, does it?
When you visit the following link, the text on the screen makes the separation between the dot in the "i" nonexistent:
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com
I hope you know what I am referencing. When I'm typing in this box, they appear fine. But, when I view certain web pages, they do not. I do hope this makes sense. Is this fixable or something I will just have to live with?

Font smoothing, font sizing, sub-pixel tuning, OS X vs Windows

I have a query regarding font the font smoothing implementation in OS X.
Having just come from the Windows world (using ClearType) naturally comparisons will be made. I am trying to get fonts looking as readable as possible on my Mac. I have 19" LCD connected via DVI so would expect no issues there. It seems difficult to get fonts looking... crisp. I am starting from the basis of using font smoothing across the board as recommended. Turn off smoothing is set to font size 8 or smaller.
I note with respect to tuning of font smoothing (anti-aliasing) that there is not a 'fine tuning' tool like as made available on Windows...
http://www.microsoft.com/typography/cleartype/tuner/Step1.aspx
for the Mac. At least I can't find anything Googling. And I am not thinking of TinkerTool as that is not a fine tuner. The Windows ClearType tuner can really make a noticeable difference by adjusting the sub-pixel tuning. Is there any equivalent tool/configuration option available for Macs?

You must have extremely good vision to be able to
tell the enhacement made by ClearType on XGA or
better displays. I wish my eyesight is as good as
yours.
Well by your own admission you must be half blind, and I think you must be if you can't see the difference between - and let's be precise about this - no anti-aliasing vs. anti-aliasing +- sub-pixel rendering. Whether on Windows and/or OS X. There is.
Subpixel rendering is a trick used when resolution of
displays are challenged and small font readability is
crucial.
Today, the only place this makes sense is on
cell phones when you are trying to render small type
like a webpage.
I believe the website links I posted show that I have a reasonable grasp of what sub-pixel rendering is, that was not the purpose of my question. Also, actually, you are incorrect when you state that sub-pixel rendering is relevant/necessary only for small fonts. The exact opposite is true - usually sub-pixel rendering (including in OS X) is turned off for small fonts because it tends to make them more unreadable.
On desktop displays today at XGA or greater resolution,
the tradeoff in enhancing a bit in resolution is
outweighed by the added computation cycles needed to
filter the entire display so the eye sees "grey" on
average rather than red or green or blue.
Well you better rush and tell Apple to rip it out of OS X... because they seem to disagree with you as both anti-aliasing and sub-pixel rendering are included, and encouraged to be used, in OS X!
I'm sorry, but your statements are just plainly wrong and unconsidered.
Back to my - still unanswered, factual and valid question. The implementation of anti-aliasing + sub-pixel rendering in OS X does not appear, and I am stating this unbiasedly, to be as good as it could be (as I have seen in Windows). BTW this is not solely my finding as a number of very experienced Mac users have pointed out:
Here...
http://www.michelf.com/weblog/2006/subpixel-antialiasing-achilles-heel/
and here...
http://www.betalogue.com/2006/01/24/pages-20-does-not-fix-font-smoothing-issue/
and here...
http://mjtsai.com/blog/2006/02/04/font-smoothing-in-pages/
I gather from the replies I have received thus far, and from research on the Internet, that there is currently no way - going into Unix config files or by some utility - to address this issue. Hopefully it will be improved in a later version of OS X.
BTW - this does not stop me loving my new Mac!

Pages to DocX Export Makes Everything Bold

I'm using Pages 5.1 to email out my resume, and everytime I export the document into .docx for submission it makes everything on my resume Bold in the .docx version. I've tried changing the .docx with Pages but when I go to save the changes it will only let me save a new version of the .pages file. If I try to use the .pages document to overwrite the existing .docx file the new file it creates makes everying bold again.
I'm astonished that there appears to be no way around this. The font I'm using is Arial and everything is in a very standard format.
Please tell me there is something I can do.

That works, but there are jobs that specifically ask for certain formats, like docx.
Thanks though

Turn off font smoothing

I love thin clear fonts when they are not smoothed. Please FIND A WAY to turn font smoothing off.
I turn it off from windows 7 also. I don't know why are you so in love with the ugly font smoothing, which makes the fonts appear bloated and fuzzy.
PLEASE APPLE MAKE IT TURN OFF!

Thanks, I appreciate it, but I know that.
And it doesn't work. It doesn't deactivate it from menu, from XCode pop-up menus, that option is completely useless.
I think Mac fails miserably with fonts, and it just ruins an otherwise good OS.
It doesn't look as bad on retina displays, but that's only because you have twice as many pixels to work with.
And still it bloats the fonts unnecessarily.
It's just ugly.
I was so mad with fonts, I wanted to write my own kerner driver just to turn smoothing off.
It's just horrible, and for a company that takes pride in being the first to bring truetype fonts and graphic user interface, having tasteless fonts is just bad.
Windows also tried to follow you, they added an ugly Segoe font and some other font to their Outlook. Luckily I can redirect them into Arial or Verdana through registry. With Mac it's really built into their OS. This ugly Lucida Grande... What's so nice about this font?
I may sound like I am trashing or ranting, but I speak this way in hopes that somebody notices and makes a normal update to the otherwise normal OS. Their font is just ugly. It looks ugly. There is nothing nice about the way Mac makes fonts smoothing. It would be much better off if it could have been turned off.
Just because the developers of Mac OS is used to seing their font uglyfied by smoothing, and sees no harm in it, doesn't mean everybody shares their preferences. I am a developer too, and I also produce software for sale, It's the user who they should listen, they will be surprised to learn how wrong they are...
Dan

Force font smoothing when open

Hi all,
I am trying to make a portofolio pdf, which has some fonts embeded.
Is there any way to force user's Acrobat Reader to turn on font smoothing when the file is opened?
Fonts are so ugly without smoothing, I don't want to let users to see them.
Thanks in advance.

Hi George,
Yeah I hope its unusual to turning the smoothing off.
For some reason my Reader have that turned off as default, I just afraid possibility that users see that ugly fonts.
OK, I'd never mind.

Internet browseing, FONTS LOOK VERY WEIRD (BLURRY) NEW TO MAC!

hey everyone, adam here...just switched from windows to mac last week and still have a lot of questions... one thing that ive been wondering tho is why a lot of the fonts when browseing and such now seem to look very blurry, as well as some pictures...fonts that didnt look this way in windows..is there some way to change this, or is this just something i dont know about..
it does this only on firefox,and i cant figure out why, it looks fine on safari?
adam harrison

adam,
Sounds like font smoothing.
In System Preferences>Appearance what "Font smoothing style" is selected?
Also what is the size set for turning off font smoothing? You might try selecting a higher number.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?path=Mac/10.4/en/mh838.html
Matt

How do I completely turn off font smoothing on my MacBook pro?

I am at a loss. I've seen dozens of people complain about this, but I'm still hoping there's a solution: How do I turn off font smoothing on my MacBook pro? I've toggled the anti-aliasing options every which way, and no matter what I do, the text is always slightly blurry (there's always a slight halo of grey around the characters to smooth them out). This would be the perfect computer if I could just turn that dang feature off completely, but as it is it's so hard on my eyes I can't use it for reading or writing for any extended period.

DigiLloyd posted some aditional info on this subject, here:
"Apple abandoned useful font smoothing user interface support in Mac OS X Leopard for a “moron setting” in Mac OS X Snow Leopard, leaving those with non-Apple displays high and dry with unattractive text display.
You’ll need to use Terminal to set things right (or at least better, which is not to say optimal)."
MPG - Mac Trials and Tribulations - Font Smoothing in Snow ...

Font smoothing issue between built-in display and external

Ok, this one is a bit tricky to explain, but here we go. I have a Macbook 2.2 C2D and a 24" FHD2400 Gateway LCD which I connect using the mini-DVI port. My problem is that any applications I start with the external display plugged in have slightly "thinner" text (on both displays), like the font smoothing is different. But, applications that were already running look smoother and thicker on both displays. Further, even after disconnecting the external display, the thinner text persists until I restart the application.
As a real example, I was running Safari with just the main LCD. I plugged in the external, and it looked fine. I restarted Safari (now with the external plugged in) and the text appears thinner. Unplugging the external, the text still appears thinner on the main LCD until I restart it again.
Here is a photo, where the left side is the thinner text, and the right is the normal, thicker text:
Any insight/advice on this would be much appreciated.
* Note: I run the main LCD in native resolution (1280x800) and the 24" in native (1920x1200)
Message was edited by: Chris Scharf (added screen resolution information)

Under System Preferences, Appearance, try setting "Font smoothing style: to "Medium - best for Flat Panel" and see if that helps.

Font in GTK2 apps are not using font smoothing in cinnamon. GTK3 does.

Hi,
My GTK2 apps like GIMP, chromium fonts are not really using font smoothing but GTK3 apps look fine.
Any help is appreciated.

Chazza wrote:Does the following application help at all? Link: http://qt-apps.org/content/show.php/Qt5 … ent=168066
Yes, unfortunately this did not fix the problem. I did put the environmental variable in .profile and relogged, the result was unfortunately the same. I've managed to fix fonts in Clementine using qtconfig-qt4 after some fiddling, but applications like Docky and Chromium still have the monospace font.
cedeel wrote:Eh, Chromium isn't a Qt application.
Ah, my bad. Do you know of a way to fix that problem anyway?

Font Smoothing makes everything blurry

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