IE9 Fuzzy & Duplicated Text

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scuwp

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Topic # 82720 4-May-2011 18:47

Just upgraded to IE9 on my Vista Pro lappy.

Straight away noticed text of web pages now has a kind of fuzzy appearance, and when scrolling often text is duplicated on top of itself several times. Makes searching Trade Me interesting!

Found and turned the 'compatability mode' on which cured the duplication, but the fuzzy text remains.

I can't see the 'clear type for HTML' setting in the advanced options which I understand may cure these issues??

Any ideas otherwise I'will wind back to IE8.

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richms

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Reply # 465385 4-May-2011 19:01

Found the same thing with IE9 here on windows 7 - ignored my system preference of cleartype off, and many issues with graphical glitches.

Richard rich.ms

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Reply # 465395 4-May-2011 19:13

are you on 100% zoom, or have you inadvertently zoomed in or out? i've never noticed 'fuzzy' text with IE9 and i'm working on different screen sizes quite often..

actually, even when i zoom in/out the text looks ok.

some postings on the net seem to suggest that some screens/gpus do a poor job of rendering cleartype - obviously mine are not in that group.

this thread has a long discussion on cleartype and ie9 - looks like the only way to disable is a poor hack: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en/ieitprocurrentver/thread/01c447b1-5c78-4d2f-9968-6eeab...

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richms

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Reply # 465400 4-May-2011 19:19

Cleartype = fuzzy text, which causes me eyestrain. I dont know how people can put up with it. I can see that it may be helpful on an LCD with its oversized pixels, but here on the CRT it just makes for eyestrain in all modes.

Richard rich.ms

scuwp

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Reply # 465424 4-May-2011 20:18

Regs: are you on 100% zoom, or have you inadvertently zoomed in or out? i've never noticed 'fuzzy' text with IE9 and i'm working on different screen sizes quite often..

actually, even when i zoom in/out the text looks ok.

some postings on the net seem to suggest that some screens/gpus do a poor job of rendering cleartype - obviously mine are not in that group.

this thread has a long discussion on cleartype and ie9 - looks like the only way to disable is a poor hack: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en/ieitprocurrentver/thread/01c447b1-5c78-4d2f-9968-6eeab...

Yep, 100% zoom.

No display issues with any other browser, including IE8 or any other program.

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ChrisNZL

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Reply # 465426 4-May-2011 20:27

Does it happen in other web browsers (that support DirectX GPU hardware acceleration)? I assume IE9 uses it...

I know in Firefox 4, you can enable or disable the acceleration. With acceleration on, text is blurred like you describe. With it off, text is fine.

Same thing with Chrome. Couple of chrome://flags let you enable/disable hardware acceleration; same blurry text issue occurs if it's enabled.

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scuwp

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Reply # 465434 4-May-2011 20:43

Regs: are you on 100% zoom, or have you inadvertently zoomed in or out? i've never noticed 'fuzzy' text with IE9 and i'm working on different screen sizes quite often..

actually, even when i zoom in/out the text looks ok.

some postings on the net seem to suggest that some screens/gpus do a poor job of rendering cleartype - obviously mine are not in that group.

this thread has a long discussion on cleartype and ie9 - looks like the only way to disable is a poor hack: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en/ieitprocurrentver/thread/01c447b1-5c78-4d2f-9968-6eeab...

After reading Regs' link above, and some others, I have given up and gone back to IE8....ahhhhhhh I can see clearly again!!!

Seems the 'clear type font' option was removed from IE9 for some reason, there seems to be a lot of backlash so hopefully MS will wise up quick and fix the problem. Until then I am sticking with IE8

The good thing is IE9 installs as an update rather than a program, so just need to remove the update and presto...back to IE8.

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heretohelp

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Reply # 472383 22-May-2011 15:10

This is a work around and i hate putting a band aid on things. but try forcing compatiblity mode on IE for all web pages restart IE let us know how you get on.

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scuwp

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Reply # 472966 23-May-2011 14:02

heretohelp: This is a work around and i hate putting a band aid on things. but try forcing compatiblity mode on IE for all web pages restart IE let us know how you get on.

Tried that. It fixed the duplicate images I was originally getting but didn't alter the font at all. Looking at international on-line forums MS seemingly is getting quite a bit of backlash over this decision. Watch this space I guess.

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richms

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Reply # 473045 23-May-2011 15:51

Its almost like it is rendering the font at whatever size it would be at 100% and then scaling the resulting image to the zoom setting, not natively changing the font size when rendering the text. Going down to 100% makes it better but then has the problem that lazy fixed width websites are wasting half my screen width.

Richard rich.ms

heretohelp

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Reply # 473112 23-May-2011 18:19

scuwp:
heretohelp: This is a work around and i hate putting a band aid on things. but try forcing compatiblity mode on IE for all web pages restart IE let us know how you get on.

Tried that. It fixed the duplicate images I was originally getting but didn't alter the font at all. Looking at international on-line forums MS seemingly is getting quite a bit of backlash over this decision. Watch this space I guess.

ya thought it would fix duplicate text but didnt think it would fix the fuzzy text

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scuwp

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Reply # 473125 23-May-2011 19:05

Just to be clear it is nothing to do with zooming or any other settings. It is simply the 'clear type font' that MS believes is better, so they removed the option to turn it off like you can in every other MS application.

Personal preference, but by the on-line backlash they have got this one wrong.

Other MS comments are that 'clear type' font is designed and is best on the latest LCD screens. IME thats a load of horse manure as well.

Just google 'clear type font IE9' and you will get dozens of hits. MS are definitely taking a battering on this one and it is likley to turn more away from IE to the the opposition browsers.

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richms

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Reply # 473130 23-May-2011 19:20

Cleartype and the more basic anti aliased fonts are worse on LCDs IME since you can see the grey or whatever pixels quite clearly as they are so damn big. At least on a fuzzy CRT the grey edges just look like part of the fuzz and not a huge square.

Richard rich.ms

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Reply # 504288 10-Aug-2011 12:23

Microsoft released an optional update for this in today's (or maybe last months) windows update list.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2545698

KB: Text in some core fonts appears blurred in Internet Explorer 9 on a computer that is running Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7, or Windows Server 2008 R2.

Assume that you install Windows Internet Explorer 9 on a computer that is running Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2. In this situation, text that is displayed in the following core fonts in Internet Explorer 9 appears blurred compared with the same text and fonts in Windows Internet Explorer 8:
Arial (font style: Regular; font size: 8-point, 9-point, and 10-point)
Verdana (font style: Regular; font size: 8-point, 9-point, and 10-point)
Tahoma (font style: Regular; font size: 8-point, 9-point, and 10-point)
This issue occurs because of a design change to how Internet Explorer 9 renders text. By default, Internet Explorer 9 uses sub-pixel positioned ClearType to render text by using DirectWrite, whereas Internet Explorer 8 uses whole-pixel positioned ClearType to render text by using the Microsoft Windows graphics device interface (GDI).

[Grr..] Many Microsoft updates have some informative text associated with them in update manager. Many just have generic text like 'this resolves a security issue' or 'this resolves issues in windows'. These many are a pain in the *** because you have to click the 'more info' item (for each one) to get the KB article to find out exactly what the effect might be on your system. Although my guess is this situation will inevitably occur when they release an update before completing the KB documentation for it, it doesn't need to happen nearly as often as it does and could easily be resolved for all but a few updates. [/Grr...]