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How to disable sub-pixel anti-aliasing in cleartype for one monitor in a multi-monitor setup

Hi.
I'm running two monitors on a Windows 7 system, one portrait and one landscape. I like cleartype, however as one on my monitors is running in portrait mode (rotated by 90deg) cleartype ruins text giving it a nasty afterimage (as the subpixels are now vertically arranged rather than horizontally)

The cleartype text tuner illustrates that cleartype can have different setting on different monitors. I'd like to set my primary monitor to use the normal sub-pixel (colour based) rendering and my secondary to use the older opacity based whole-pixel anti-aliasing.

Or if Windows can do cleartype based on vertically stacked sub-pixels that would be fine too.

BTW I'm happy to hack the registry. I doubt the UI is capable of handling this setup.

Hello CurtisMF,

a)     Who is the graphic card manufacturer?

b)    Have you tried disabling this particular option in graphic card controller?

Unfortuanetly, you cannot disable sub-pixel anti- aliasing within windows, however you may have to change this in graphic card controller if your graphic drivers support this particular option. If you not find this particular option in graphic card controller, then I would suggest you to contact your manufacturer.

In addition, you can refer to the links mentioned below:

http://blogs.msdn.com/e7/archive/2009/06/23/engineering-changes-to-cleartype-in-windows-7.aspx

Make text easier to read using ClearType

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Make-text-easier-to-read-using-ClearType

ClearType: frequently asked questions

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/ClearType-frequently-asked-questions

Tips for making Windows easier to use

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Tips-for-making-Windows-easier-to-use

I hope this information helps. Please get back to us if you have any more questions about this issue.

Thanks
Mir - Microsoft Support                                                            
Visit our http://social.answers.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/answersfeedback/threads

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This "answer" from Microsoft Support is not helpful and misleading - first of all the original poster did not ask about disabling standard sub-pixel anti-aliasing. He is asking if ClearType could be disabled on the monitor that's running in portrait mode. You can disable ClearType for all your monitors in Control Panel > Fonts > Adjust ClearType text > and unchecking "Turn on ClearType". This same wizard allows you to fine tune the settings independently for each monitor so it certainly seems like you should be able to disable it for a monitor. Secondly, what does this have to do with our graphics drivers? I can reproduce the issue using standard SVGA drivers, NVIDIA drivers or ATI drivers - none of which have any kind of settings for font anti-aliasing ClearType or otherwise.

The ClearType registry settings are documented here:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa970267.aspx

I added the "PixelStructure" key to my portrait display with a value of 0 but it doesn't seem to have an effect.

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I ran procmon and noticed that cttune was changing registry settings for DISPLAY2 even though my portrait monitor identifies itself as "3" - after setting pixelstructure for display2 and rebooting I now have ClearType on two monitors and standard AA on the 3rd! w00t :)

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I thought it was working but it's not, the per monitor settings don't appear to have an effect whatsoever. The settings from DISPLAY3 are used for all 3.

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I second the comment about multiple displays.  As far as I can tell, it lets you adjust it for one display, but then it takes effect on both.  Can someone from Microsoft clarify what registry settings control the font smoothing settings on each individual display?  If I manually adjust them in the registry, do I need to log off to have them take effect?  Can I change it to use B&W font smoothing on one monitor but use LCD cleartype RGB on another monitor?

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I'd like more info on this too.  as i have a laptop and a portrait monitor as secondary.

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I'm having a similar issues with ClearType Text Tuner in Windows 7 [my request]

It would be great if we could just turn off the sub-pixel rendering as this will enable one to have anti-aliased fonts on all displays (regardless of pixel stacking, LCD / CRT etc.)

I'm really starting to believe there is a bug in ClearType Text Tuner in Windows 7; It seems that the problem lies in the fact that even though I select the grayscale rendering (the right most selection in screen 3 of 4), it still renders with sub-pixel sampling.

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Hi

Thank you for visiting the Microsoft Windows Community site. In an effort to focus more attention on your particular situation create a new thread here.  This will mitigate confusion caused by more than one posting about similar   topics, allowing us to focus on each customer individually

Dena

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Last updated March 29, 2024 Views 18,205 Applies to: