On my system (WinXP SP2) I have ClearType enabled. It actually pleases my eyes on my Samsung SyncMaster 753DF monitor.

Anyway, my problem is that ClearType used to apply to all text in foobar2000, but now, after I tried changing the font from MS Sans Serif to Arial (and then back again), ClearType is applying to some areas but not to others! For example, it's applying to the titlebar and toolbars... but it isn't applying to the ColumnsUI playlist or column headers. And yet it is applying to the Default User Interface playlist. I'd like for it to apply to everything again.

Any ideas as to the root of the cause or how I can fix my problem?

(No remarks about ClearType being crap, please.)

Hey, I love Clear Type on my lovely screen too. For me it looks like foobar works fine with it... definitely working on Columns UI and pretty much everywhere else... hold on, I'll grab you a screenie...

Schping.

Nice, but doesn't help.

Have you got the ClearType wizard that you can download from the Microsoft site, or just the regular ticky box. The wizard had loads of extra settings and options for me... maybe thats it.

Unfortunately, ClearType doesn't actually work through screenshots, except on the original system where you took the screenshot. Other people viewing it might think it looks terrible, because it does, on their machines.

NeoRenegade: Try using the ClearType Control Panel wizard to set your ClearType prefs again. If you lack that panel, get it here: http://www.microsoft.com/typography/ClearTypePowerToy.mspx

It seems to have worked on the screenshots already posted...?

Cleartype does work in screenshots.

ClearTweak (free) does a better job than Microsoft's app for tuning it.

No, ClearType does not work in screenshots. His screenshot, for example, looks awful on my machine. Each machine is different. That's why there's a tweaking capability in the first place.


ClearTweak doesn't have any features that Microsoft's ClearType Tuning program lacks. The Advanced tab in Microsoft's app looks nearly exactly the same as ClearTweak's screen, with all the same adjustments.

Well it does have something Microsoft lacks for me: An easy download.

I don't want to go to the trouble of enabling cookies and javascript for IE just because Microsoft can't write standards-compliant pages and has to use fancy redirects for their downloads.

Thanks for the link, iStormy.

Well, ClearTweak didn't help any. I guess what I'm looking at is a bug in foobar. That would make sense, considering the ClearType stopped applying itself to certain parts of foobar2000 only after I tried changing fonts.

Resetting my foobar config will probably fix the problem. Any better ideas before I do that?

(Now I wish foobar's config was modular so I wouldn't have to lose ALL of my settings.)

Well, I just moved foobar2000.cfg from foobar's folder to my desktop.

Started up foobar2000, and ClearType is applying properly again.

Any ideas where to look/change foobar2000.cfg to fix my problem, rather than setting up Foobar2000 again from scratch?

Might be a bug in columns_ui, for all I know.

Huh? What fancy redirects? They have the link right on that page I pointed you to: http://download.microsoft.com/download/b/7...85aad/setup.exe

Straight http download, nothing special about it.

Why wouldn't Cleartype work? It's still just pixels; there aren't any magical pixies on yon monitor.

I think the problem is MS Sans Serif font it is a bitmap font and it's impossible to apply ClearType to it. Only scalable fonts can be used with ClearType. Default font in Windows is Tahoma and it is scalable. Foobar2000 uses Tahoma by default, not MS Sans Serif.

That's the point. It's *not* just pixels. ClearType is an implementation of sub-pixel rendering.

On an LCD monitor, a "pixel" is actually three dots. One red, one green, one blue. They are laid out next to each other. Different monitors have them in different orders, different sizes, etc. The reason you tweak it is to adjust both the pixel order and the contrast ratio between the various pixels. The upshot is that ClearType makes the screen effectively three times wider, for the purposes of text rendering, and then compresses that down using your ClearType tweaked settings to render it on your monitor.

So a screenshot captures the end result of this process on your monitor, but when I display that image on my monitor, with different optimal settings, then it doesn't match and looks like crap. I could go on, but you'd learn more simply by googling for sub-pixel rendering and figuring it out for yourself.

And though I hate Steve Gibson, he's got a great explanation of all this up on his page here: http://grc.com/ctwhat.htm

Oh... thanks for putting me right! I get too many things wrong on here. I thought you meant that Cleartype wouldn't be captured at all.

Something new for me to learn about!

Genius. That wouldn't have occurred to me.

Yes, he's right. Bitmapped fonts don't benefit from ClearType. Switch to a TrueType font instead.

Our differing definitions of "work" is causing the confusion.

Cleartype does work in screenshots, as in the antialiasing is recorded in the image.

Otherwise, screenshots with and without Cleartype would look identical--which they don't.

[edit: updated to reflect that we both have our own assumptions of "work"]

Well, that's interesting.

I guess this is what's going on, then:

Default font is Tahoma, which is a TrueType font, so Cleartype can be applied to it. But, default selected font in the config menu is MS Sans Serif, which is bitmap font, so ClearType can't be applied.

Good to know so "the next guy" doesn't have to nuke his .cfg if he wants his ClearType back.

Thanks for the help.