Text Clarity - Firefox v IE7

[None of the above]

I realise I'm probably missing something that is blatantly obvious to everyone else, but I am experiencing poor text resolution when using Firefox and can find no solution to the problem.

Text on Firefox is poorly rendered in comparison to IE7 - it isn't blurred, it simply has a somewhat 'broken' appearance.

I've tried changing the text size, screen resolution, DPI etc., but there's no improvement.

Any ideas Gentlemen, please?

Thanks,

N o t a

[BLUE SKY THINKER]

Strange. Obviously a problem with the actual program, or the interaction of this particular program with your computer. A couple of suggestions maybe, to cover both eventualities.....

1. Firefox > Tools > Options > Content > Fonts and Colors > Advanced...

i) Check to see if 'Fonts for Western' (top)
ii) Check to see if 'Default Character Encoding: (Western ISO-8859-1)' (at bottom).
iii) If 'yes' to above, try experimenting with a few different fonts and colours. Maybe likewise with the 'Allow pages to choose their own fonts.....' option.

2. Uninstall/reinstall

3. Try downloading FirefoxPortable version - http://portableapps.com/apps/internet/firefox_portable - and see how that interacts with your computer.

NB: Although designed for flash drives etc (where you could trial it from, provided the main edition of Firefox on your PC is not running), it also works perfectly well installed on the computer (again, provided the other one is off). Being portable, it's fully self contained within its folder, so wont affect or write any settings to your machine (or interfere with the main edition).

Good luck.

[None of the above]

Thanks for your response, BST.

I checked all the settings as you suggested and found them to be OK.
I think that the problem arises from an unfortunate combination of things, not least the quality of the monitor.
I purchased a new flat panel screen for my main system at the same time as installing Firefox, with the intention of relegating the first monitor to my back up system.
I spent an entertaining afternoon swapping monitors and running them both on different resolutions, refresh rates etc without any improvement. In the end I set them both to factory defaults (identical) and found that my old screen when used on the secondary (and lower spec) system, was giving better performance than the new monitor on my, more capable, primary system.
Ref my first post: I ought to point out that while Firefox was poor in comparison to IE7, that wasn't any great shakes either, on the new screen.
So, if you haven't lost the will to live by now, the system will be: old monitor + primary system and new monitor + back up system.

All things considered, a bit disappointing really.

Thanks again,

N o t a

[JamesT73J]

Something to bear in mind is that IE7 uses an algorithm called cleartype to display HTML pages; this is on within IE7 by default, but I don't understand why Firefox would display relatively poorer fonts. It is a finishing effect on fonts to enhance them on flat screen and TFT monitors. Ironically it looks pants on a CRT!

Cleartype is also available as a global option in Windows - perhaps something to try...

Control Panel>Display>Appearance>Effects and choose 'cleartype' from the dropdown.

Rgds


James

[Tarq57]

No graphics expert here (or anything particularly expert, really) but did the new monitor come with its own cd?
You could maybe try going to the manufacturers website and updating drivers for it.

[None of the above]

Cleartype is also available as a global option in Windows - perhaps something to try...

Control Panel>Display>Appearance>Effects and choose 'cleartype' from the dropdown.

Nail - hammer - hit - head!

Nirvana has been achieved.
I can now make yet another entry in the rapidly expanding file headed: "Why didn't I think of that?"

You'll have noted that I didn't name the manufacturer of the the two monitors, which is perhaps just as well, but both are performing equally well.

Thanks for your help, JamesT73J.

You could maybe try going to the manufacturers website and updating drivers for it.

Thanks for that tip mj. I did try the driver route as I wasn't convinced that the original install routine was successful.