Varying Font Densities in Letters and Words

  • Thread starter Thread starter McRolin
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McRolin

I have just purchased an HP a1740n with Vista. After unpacking, I found the
screen text very fuzzy. For example, a zero does not have uniform density
around it. Some letters in some word are dark with other letters in the
same word are dim.

I downloaded Office 2007 trial and started Excel 2007. When I type in a
number such as 1680, the 1 is dark, the 6 is faint, the top of the 8 is dark
but the bottom is faint, and the ending zero varys.

If you lower the screen resolution to 800 x 600, you can actually see white
spots in the letters where they should be dark.

I've loaded very drive the HP has suggested with no effect. Any ideas or
suggestions?

McRolin
 
Hi,

Perhaps you received a bad monitor with the system. Have you contacted HP
regarding this? After all, as it was just purchased it is still under
warranty. You can test this theory very quickly if you have another monitor
available to you, just swap it in and see if there is any improvement. If
not, then I would suspect next the video adapter. For that, check HP's site
for a driver update for your model.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
 
McRolin,

right click blank area on desktop
windows color and appearance
open classic appearance properties for more color options
effects
make modifications to 'smooth edges' area till you get satisfactory results.

Also see 'tune cleartype' in help and support

Michael
 
Thanks Rick,

I have tested another monitor and the problem still exists. If you reduce
the resolution to 800 x 600 where you can actually see the flaws in the type
and then move the window, you'll find that the flaws move with the
characters and are not specific to any location on the screen.

I've contacted HP's chat line 5 times, reloaded all the drivers, downloaded
Intel's updates, downloaded an HP w22 update from Microsoft, and the fonts
still have clearly varying densities. Excel 2007 is not useable. I've got
a new computer but have to do my work on the old one.

Vista also has a group of gadgets one of which is a clock. The numbers at 2
and 3 o'clock are dark but 10 and 11 o'clock are dimmer. It's strange. An
Adobe document is very clear and the fonts are uniform but the system fonts
are not. Long strings like URL's have clearly light and dark spots as you
read down the line.

McRolin
 
Do try the Cleartype Tuner -- it made an enormous difference to clarity
for me, both for XP and VISTA and on a CRT, not just an LCD monitor.
 
Thanks Hugh,

That made the fonts much better. I spent all day yesterday and today on
the HP chat line. They had me switched monitors, re-install drivers and
updates, run diagnostics etc... Finally, they wanted me to do a system
recovery which formats the hard disk and would have caused me a lot of
grief.
But, your advice saved me a lot of trouble. Thanks for the tip......

McRolin

PS: I was frustrated as hell and my wife suggested I use a newsgroup. I was
so pleased, I even told her about.
 
I'll second that suggestion, I had the same problem that your example
showed, and cleartype resolved it.
 
I have just purchased an HP a1740n with Vista. After unpacking, I found the
screen text very fuzzy. For example, a zero does not have uniform density
around it. Some letters in some word are dark with other letters in the
same word are dim.

I downloaded Office 2007 trial and started Excel 2007. When I type in a
number such as 1680, the 1 is dark, the 6 is faint, the top of the 8 is dark
but the bottom is faint, and the ending zero varys.

If you lower the screen resolution to 800 x 600, you can actually see white
spots in the letters where they should be dark.

I've loaded very drive the HP has suggested with no effect. Any ideas or
suggestions?

McRolin
Click to expand...


Are you using an LCD monitor? If so, try it at it's native resolution
and see if that helps. If you use an LCD monitor at something other
then it's native resolution you will get fuzziness.
 
I'm really glad it help you and avoided all that hassle.

If you haven't perhaps you'd tell an HP Chat supervisor that they ought
to include this in their troubleshooting script!
 
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