Varying density of displayed text
 

I'm very new with 8.1, having only given up XP at Christmas. I have
noticed that characters along a line of text exhibit bands of higher and
lower density. It seems to affect all sorts of screens, system, Word,
Thunderbird, you name it. I have tried running ClearText (or ClearType)
which has improved things a lot, but I'm wondering if anyone else has
experienced it, in the hope I shall be able to get rid of it altogether.

PC is a Lenovo core7 with 12 GB. Monitor is an Acer 17-inch running
1280x1024

All advice appreciated, please.

--

John

www.weather.johnwnice.co.uk

Varying density of displayed text
 

John Nice wrote:
I'm very new with 8.1, having only given up XP at Christmas. I have
noticed that characters along a line of text exhibit bands of higher and
lower density. It seems to affect all sorts of screens, system, Word,
Thunderbird, you name it. I have tried running ClearText (or ClearType)
which has improved things a lot, but I'm wondering if anyone else has
experienced it, in the hope I shall be able to get rid of it altogether.

PC is a Lenovo core7 with 12 GB. Monitor is an Acer 17-inch running
1280x1024

All advice appreciated, please.


Even if you took a screenshot (shift-PrintScrn), we might
not see it. As it's possibly a monitor issue.

On some monitors, this is called "banding".

A reason would be, the usage of a 6bit TN panel,
dithered to give 8 bit color. It means the panel
doesn't have the colors to match the situation.

Your text characters could be rendered with ClearType,
which feathers the edges of the characters. But
I don't think typically a user would describe
that as an instance of "banding". You can see
some funny colors on the edges of characters
in that case. Usually Windows has a (tuning) panel
where you can adjust the mode of operation of
ClearType, to suit the pixel layout of the monitor.

Banding might normally show up on a large
solid-color object with a color gradient
across it. Monitors without deep enough
color representation, show you some bands.

Even expensive monitors have done this,
but for different reasons (usage of too many
digital processing steps, flashing a band of
black to increase the perceived monitor
response rate GTG, and so on).

And when you're doing an image quality test,
make sure the monitor is set to native resolution,
to make the test as fair as possible for the
monitor. It sounds like you're doing that, so
I don't think this is the issue.

If the Windows 8 computer doesn't have a driver
for the video card, the built-in fallback VESA
driver runs the screen at 1024x768. I eventually
replaced the card in my other Windows 8 computer,
so I no longer have to look at a 1024x768
distorted screen, on a 1440x900 17" Acer monitor.
It's reasons like that, you should be
looking into the Display resolution setting,
and make sure that it's actually the native
value for the monitor.

If you want further help, take a screenshot of
the LCD panel with a digital camera. This is not
the easiest thing to do, so don't be surprised
if it takes half the day to get a decent result.
You can post the image, on a site like tinypic.com.
Very few sites accept photo uploads without an
account, and that's one of the few remaining
sites. I don't like the advertising methods on
that site, but you'll learn about that when you
get there (kill Firefox in Task Manager, if
you have a problem after the upload is
completed).

Paul

Varying density of displayed text
 

On Sat, 07 Mar 2015 20:23:39 +0000, John Nice wrote:

I'm very new with 8.1, having only given up XP at Christmas. I have
noticed that characters along a line of text exhibit bands of higher and
lower density. It seems to affect all sorts of screens, system, Word,
Thunderbird, you name it. I have tried running ClearText (or ClearType)
which has improved things a lot, but I'm wondering if anyone else has
experienced it, in the hope I shall be able to get rid of it altogether.

PC is a Lenovo core7 with 12 GB. Monitor is an Acer 17-inch running
1280x1024

All advice appreciated, please.

What is the native resolution of the monitor? If it's not 1280x1024 that
might be the cause.

Or is it a CRT? That could have interesting effects.

It might be an interesting experiment in any case to try different
resolutions. Even LCD monitors can handle non-native resolutions, and
that might shed some light on the situation.

--
Gene E. Bloch (Stumbling Bloch)

Varying density of displayed text
 

John Nice wrote:

I have noticed that characters along a line of text exhibit bands of
higher and lower density. It seems to affect all sorts of screens,
system, Word, Thunderbird, you name it. I have tried running
ClearText (or ClearType) which has improved things a lot, ...

PC is a Lenovo core7 with 12 GB. Monitor is an Acer 17-inch running
1280x1024

What is the *native* resolution of the screen? Use that. Anything else
results in artifacts in the display (tinging, less focus, etc) due to
interpolation required across multiple pixels. This does not apply to
CRT monitors (which would have a different cause for banding).

You may have masked some of the non-native resolution artifacts by using
Cleartype. By setting ClearType to use a fuzzier interpolation, the
artifacts may be less visible.

"Acer 17-inch" doesn't identify the actual monitor. That means you will
have to read its documentation to determine what is the native
resolution for your monitor (if it is not a CRT monitor).

On LCD monitors, use their native resolution. Even if everything looks
smaller because you bought a larger monitor, you should use the native
resolution. Larger monitors often result in smaller text because the
DPI setting in Windows is still used at that smaller resolution of the
larger screen. The same number of pixels get used so smaller pixels
(for larger screens) means smaller text. You can up the DPI to make
text more legible. Long ago I changed the default DPI (96) to 125.
This made the text much easier to read; however, although Microsoft
published DPI documentation on how applications should handle different
DPI settings, still only a few programs are DPI-aware. The result is
that you may see truncated or out-of-dialog-window text. I had one app
that opened huge (was fixed) to fill almost the entire screen and I
couldn't get at the title bar to move the window up to get at the text
at the bottom. The author didn't bother to make his program DPI aware
but instead move the buttons from the bottom to the top of his window.

Varying density of displayed text
 

John Nice wrote:
I'm very new with 8.1, having only given up XP at Christmas. I have
noticed that characters along a line of text exhibit bands of higher and
lower density. It seems to affect all sorts of screens, system, Word,
Thunderbird, you name it. I have tried running ClearText (or ClearType)
which has improved things a lot, but I'm wondering if anyone else has
experienced it, in the hope I shall be able to get rid of it altogether.

PC is a Lenovo core7 with 12 GB. Monitor is an Acer 17-inch running
1280x1024

All advice appreciated, please.

Hi John,
- I know that many 19-inch screen (standard ratio) typically have and
supoort 1280 x 1024 pixels

You mentioned 17"...Does your monitor have a proportion width to height
of 4:3, 16:10, or 16:9


--
....winston
msft mvp consumer apps

Varying density of displayed text
 

On 07/03/2015 20:23, John Nice wrote:
I'm very new with 8.1, having only given up XP at Christmas. I have
noticed that characters along a line of text exhibit bands of higher and
lower density. It seems to affect all sorts of screens, system, Word,
Thunderbird, you name it. I have tried running ClearText (or ClearType)
which has improved things a lot, but I'm wondering if anyone else has
experienced it, in the hope I shall be able to get rid of it altogether.

PC is a Lenovo core7 with 12 GB. Monitor is an Acer 17-inch running
1280x1024

All advice appreciated, please.

I went to advanced system settings, selected the best performance
option, restarted and the problem was gone. It also cleared the nasty
dropped shadow type on the icons. A few ligatures ( ff, ffi, fl ) still
showed up darker, but Clear Text sorted them out. The monitor is
1280x1024 native, by the way. When I've an hour or two to play I'll try
more digging in the advanced system settings to isolate it.

Thanks for all the ideas.

--

John

www.weather.johnwnice.co.uk

Varying density of displayed text
 

John Nice wrote:

On 07/03/2015 20:23, John Nice wrote:
I'm very new with 8.1, having only given up XP at Christmas. I have
noticed that characters along a line of text exhibit bands of higher and
lower density. It seems to affect all sorts of screens, system, Word,
Thunderbird, you name it. I have tried running ClearText (or ClearType)
which has improved things a lot, but I'm wondering if anyone else has
experienced it, in the hope I shall be able to get rid of it altogether.

PC is a Lenovo core7 with 12 GB. Monitor is an Acer 17-inch running
1280x1024

All advice appreciated, please.

I went to advanced system settings, selected the best performance
option, restarted and the problem was gone. It also cleared the nasty
dropped shadow type on the icons. A few ligatures ( ff, ffi, fl ) still
showed up darker, but Clear Text sorted them out. The monitor is
1280x1024 native, by the way. When I've an hour or two to play I'll try
more digging in the advanced system settings to isolate it.

Thanks for all the ideas.

I usually first set to "Best performance" to turn off all that glitzy
crap and then just select the features that I really want. Sure is nice
to have a snappy UI instead of one scrolling, fading in/out, and other
useless glitz.

If you enable each feature one at a time and retested, you'd probably
find the glitz feature that caused the unwanted banding in the display.
Probably a waste of time, though, since it's likely most of those glitz
features aren't needed by you (but a few are handy).

Varying density of displayed text
 

On 08/03/2015 18:18, VanguardLH wrote:
John Nice wrote:

On 07/03/2015 20:23, John Nice wrote:
I'm very new with 8.1, having only given up XP at Christmas. I have
noticed that characters along a line of text exhibit bands of higher and
lower density. It seems to affect all sorts of screens, system, Word,
Thunderbird, you name it. I have tried running ClearText (or ClearType)
which has improved things a lot, but I'm wondering if anyone else has
experienced it, in the hope I shall be able to get rid of it altogether.

PC is a Lenovo core7 with 12 GB. Monitor is an Acer 17-inch running
1280x1024

All advice appreciated, please.

I went to advanced system settings, selected the best performance
option, restarted and the problem was gone. It also cleared the nasty
dropped shadow type on the icons. A few ligatures ( ff, ffi, fl ) still
showed up darker, but Clear Text sorted them out. The monitor is
1280x1024 native, by the way. When I've an hour or two to play I'll try
more digging in the advanced system settings to isolate it.

Thanks for all the ideas.

I usually first set to "Best performance" to turn off all that glitzy
crap and then just select the features that I really want. Sure is nice
to have a snappy UI instead of one scrolling, fading in/out, and other
useless glitz.

If you enable each feature one at a time and retested, you'd probably
find the glitz feature that caused the unwanted banding in the display.
Probably a waste of time, though, since it's likely most of those glitz
features aren't needed by you (but a few are handy).

You're right: so many functions now are so fast. I'm perfectly happy
with the way things are, so any investigation is going right to the
bottom of the job jar. Actually, I've just downloaded a little (117
MB!) update for Intel graphics. Who knows if that might have an effect?

--

John

www.weather.johnwnice.co.uk

Varying density of displayed text
 

John Nice wrote:

I've just downloaded a little (117 MB!) update for Intel graphics.
Who knows if that might have an effect?

New code: might fix old bugs, might not, and can introduce its own new
bugs. Newer isn't always better, just different.

Varying density of displayed text
 

VanguardLH wrote:
John Nice wrote:

I've just downloaded a little (117 MB!) update for Intel graphics.
Who knows if that might have an effect?

New code: might fix old bugs, might not, and can introduce its own new
bugs. Newer isn't always better, just different.

Or the same. A graphics update can be for multiple devices yet changes
only applicable to specific devices.

--
....winston
msft mvp consumer apps

Varying density of displayed text
 

"...winston‫" wrote:

VanguardLH wrote:
John Nice wrote:

I've just downloaded a little (117 MB!) update for Intel graphics.
Who knows if that might have an effect?

New code: might fix old bugs, might not, and can introduce its own new
bugs. Newer isn't always better, just different.

Or the same. A graphics update can be for multiple devices yet changes
only applicable to specific devices.

And, in the vein of "same", some updates are merely to reflect a change
of ownership of the code, like when Skydrive got renamed to OneDrive.
The new owner wants their new acquisition identified as their property.

Varying density of displayed text
 

VanguardLH wrote:
"...winston‫" wrote:

VanguardLH wrote:
John Nice wrote:

I've just downloaded a little (117 MB!) update for Intel graphics.
Who knows if that might have an effect?

New code: might fix old bugs, might not, and can introduce its own new
bugs. Newer isn't always better, just different.

Or the same. A graphics update can be for multiple devices yet changes
only applicable to specific devices.

And, in the vein of "same", some updates are merely to reflect a change
of ownership of the code, like when Skydrive got renamed to OneDrive.
The new owner wants their new acquisition identified as their property.

That does occur..though in the case of SkyDrive and OneDrive the owner
and Team were one and the same though as 'OneDrive' matures more Office
Team co-ownership and development is central to its long term
applicability and evolution.

--
....winston
msft mvp consumer apps

Varying density of displayed text
 

"...winston‫" wrote:

VanguardLH wrote:
"...winston‫" wrote:

VanguardLH wrote:
John Nice wrote:

I've just downloaded a little (117 MB!) update for Intel graphics.
Who knows if that might have an effect?

New code: might fix old bugs, might not, and can introduce its own new
bugs. Newer isn't always better, just different.

Or the same. A graphics update can be for multiple devices yet changes
only applicable to specific devices.

And, in the vein of "same", some updates are merely to reflect a change
of ownership of the code, like when Skydrive got renamed to OneDrive.
The new owner wants their new acquisition identified as their property.

That does occur..though in the case of SkyDrive and OneDrive the owner
and Team were one and the same though as 'OneDrive' matures more Office
Team co-ownership and development is central to its long term
applicability and evolution.

The name change wasn't Microsoft's choice. Sky, and ISP, sued and won
on the name inference. So Microsoft, despite the owner and team were
one, had to change the product name. They made code changes to reflect
the product name change although you can still see references in the
program and description where Skydrive is mentioned.

Users had no reason to update the Skydrive local client except due to
the product name change. To users, there was no change in functionality
between the two versions for just a name change. The court ruling was
back in June 2013. I don't remember when Microsoft eventually came out
with a new version just to change product identity. Microsoft didn't
make a public announcement about the name change until Jan 2014.

The new version was just a re-branding. My example of "change of
ownership" should've been "change of ownership or change of name". The
point was that the change(s) for the new version were trivial.

Varying density of displayed text
 

VanguardLH wrote:
"...winston‫" wrote:

VanguardLH wrote:
"...winston‫" wrote:

VanguardLH wrote:
John Nice wrote:

I've just downloaded a little (117 MB!) update for Intel graphics.
Who knows if that might have an effect?

New code: might fix old bugs, might not, and can introduce its own new
bugs. Newer isn't always better, just different.

Or the same. A graphics update can be for multiple devices yet changes
only applicable to specific devices.

And, in the vein of "same", some updates are merely to reflect a change
of ownership of the code, like when Skydrive got renamed to OneDrive.
The new owner wants their new acquisition identified as their property.

That does occur..though in the case of SkyDrive and OneDrive the owner
and Team were one and the same though as 'OneDrive' matures more Office
Team co-ownership and development is central to its long term
applicability and evolution.

The name change wasn't Microsoft's choice. Sky, and ISP, sued and won
on the name inference. So Microsoft, despite the owner and team were
one, had to change the product name. They made code changes to reflect
the product name change although you can still see references in the
program and description where Skydrive is mentioned.

Users had no reason to update the Skydrive local client except due to
the product name change. To users, there was no change in functionality
between the two versions for just a name change. The court ruling was
back in June 2013. I don't remember when Microsoft eventually came out
with a new version just to change product identity. Microsoft didn't
make a public announcement about the name change until Jan 2014.

The new version was just a re-branding. My example of "change of
ownership" should've been "change of ownership or change of name". The
point was that the change(s) for the new version were trivial.

The reason for the name change is old news.

Apparently you're unaware that the update included code modification for
integration across all other MSFT capable OneDrive/SkyDrive products
including compatibility and a few security improvements for connecting
to local OneDrive Desktop installed pcs via the web UI OneDrive option
for Win7 Trusted PC's which coincided with a hardening of the
Outlook.com web UI for security proofs.

i.e. More to it than (just branding).





--
....winston
msft mvp consumer apps