OK, so this is totally old news, but as mentioned in a previous rant, I sometimes like my fonts the way Apple intended. Software like Mac OS X, Safari and iOS use a different sub-pixel rendering algorithm to Windows when drawing fonts on LCD screens (or CRT if you are dumb enough to turn it on). Well you can now get this on Windows (works in 7 64-bit).
Download this package and run gditray.exe which will make all most of your Windows applications have sexy smooth fonts. The default setting is a bit “heavy” for my liking, so I scaled it back with the included gdixxTuner.exe.
For example, here is Word 2007 with ClearType
And the same screen with GDI++
Not much difference? Call me a pedant but it’s mostly about Arial. I really hate the way it looks on Windows at small sizes. I would love to see if anyone’s done any decent research into which is easier to read. Like when they said Serifs increase readability. Do they?
Why are you using Arial in the first place? Helvetica or bust!
It’s not me, it’s Google and every other man and his animated Office Assistant on the web who is using Arial.
But I looked into it and turns out the Helvetica font on my Windows is actually a renamed Arial. I can tell by the capital R. Why the hell would I have that installed?
So I can’t give you the “Helvetica 10 looks just as shit on Windows” rebuttal I was going to because I’m too lazy to install a proper version of Helvetica and compare.
But I installed Font Replacer on my Mac Firefox, which might come in handy for banishing Comic Sans once and for all.
I turned it on but I still prefer Arial for small-medium stuff. Helvetica looks “stressed” in italic. But on a Mac unless I’m looking for it I couldn’t tell them apart. Hmm. Now I realise this new blog theme is wildly inconsistent I should probably fix it.