PSA: Using a high resolution does not make things small

[yhelothar]

It's small because windows is set default at 96dpi, which is accustomed for low resolution displays. To make everything look normal, you will have to set it to the proper dpi that you're using. To do this, go to display settings, and then click the advanced button. Once you do that, you'll see a pulldown menu labeled DPI setting: Select custom setting from the menu, and you will be presented with an onscreen ruler. You can use this ruler to calibrate the proper DPI setting, or you can make things bigger or smaller depending on your tastes.
Everything looks a lot sharper with a high DPI/high resolution setting.
Hope that clears things up for some of you.

 

[Elfear]

This is probably a dumb question, but is there any way to make all text bigger? I can make Windows look great but any time I jump onto a website the font is usually a bit too small (must be getting old I guess).

 

[Greenman]

The problem is that it screws up the display with some apps.

 

[yhelothar]

It makes all of the text bigger for me. The only thing that will be smaller are pictures.
If you want website text to be bigger, you can change the text size by holding control and moving your mouse wheel.

 

[yhelothar]

Originally posted by: Greenman
The problem is that it screws up the display with some apps.

I personally never ran into any in the 4 years I've been using high res/high dpi. You have to reboot for it to look right, otherwise it'll look screwy.

 

[rise]

Originally posted by: Elfear
This is probably a dumb question, but is there any way to make all text bigger? I can make Windows look great but any time I jump onto a website the font is usually a bit too small (must be getting old I guess).

thats the problem i have, including the system tray text and task bar.

 

[us3rnotfound]

Yet another Windows feature I have never used

 

[Cheesetogo]

Originally posted by: Elfear
This is probably a dumb question, but is there any way to make all text bigger? I can make Windows look great but any time I jump onto a website the font is usually a bit too small (must be getting old I guess).

In firefox, you can press ctrl + and it increases text size. In IE, go to the View toolbar, text size, and then change it.

 

[Eureka]

All it seem to do was change font size... Where's the benefit?

Norm

 

[aatf510]

Originally posted by: Cheesetogo

Originally posted by: Elfear
This is probably a dumb question, but is there any way to make all text bigger? I can make Windows look great but any time I jump onto a website the font is usually a bit too small (must be getting old I guess).

In firefox, you can press ctrl + and it increases text size. In IE, go to the View toolbar, text size, and then change it.

Is there a way to save the text size in firefox, so that I don't have to do it everytime?

 

[xtknight]

Originally posted by: cevilgenius
All it seem to do was change font size... Where's the benefit?

Norm

Only in Opera does it increase the size of images. But then if you increase everything at a higher resolution, what's the use of even switching to that higher resolution (unless you have an LCD in which case this is a clever more vector-esque way of avoiding the raster supersampling)?

 

[jiffylube1024]

Thanks virtualgames. I've been doing this for years for people who find text too small, but not everyone knows these simple fixes .

 

[xtknight]

Originally posted by: jiffylube1024
Thanks virtualgames. I've been doing this for years for people who find text too small, but not everyone knows these simple fixes .

I don't use it because it does screw up windows (not Windows) very often.

 

[n7]

For those of you wanting to permanently increase font size in Firefox:

Tools > Options > General > Fonts & Colors > Minimum Font Size (& increase it to whatever you want) or Display resolution (& adjust DPI).

 

[aatf510]

Originally posted by: n7
For those of you wanting to permanently increase font size in Firefox:

Tools > Options > General > Fonts & Colors > Minimum Font Size (& increase it to whatever you want) or Display resolution (& adjust DPI).

I set it to 381dpi already, and it doesn't seem to change anything??

 

[Regs]

And for MS Explorere it's Menu option

View-->Text Size.

 

[n7]

Originally posted by: toattett

Originally posted by: n7
For those of you wanting to permanently increase font size in Firefox:

Tools > Options > General > Fonts & Colors > Minimum Font Size (& increase it to whatever you want) or Display resolution (& adjust DPI).

I set it to 381dpi already, and it doesn't seem to change anything??

I've never touched the DPI settings myself, but setting a minimum font size sure works.

I have mine set @ 15 pixels (minimum font size), on my 1600x1200 LCD, & it's great for reading (not too small like default is).

 

[imported_BikeDude]

Originally posted by: virtualgames0

Originally posted by: Greenman
The problem is that it screws up the display with some apps.

I personally never ran into any in the 4 years I've been using high res/high dpi.

Consider yourself lucky. With a dialog-heavy application, this is a major design consideration and it certainly bogs down QA. Bottom line: There are plenty of software developers who are too lazy to bother. Maybe some get it right by accident, but not all do.

That said, it is the only way forward (panels with higher resolutions makes perfect sense, right?), and I think you'll see this addressed in Avalon. (meaning GUI design will be less pixel oriented in the future, yet still look appealing)

 

[yhelothar]

Originally posted by: BikeDude

Originally posted by: virtualgames0

Originally posted by: Greenman
The problem is that it screws up the display with some apps.

I personally never ran into any in the 4 years I've been using high res/high dpi.

Consider yourself lucky. With a dialog-heavy application, this is a major design consideration and it certainly bogs down QA. Bottom line: There are plenty of software developers who are too lazy to bother. Maybe some get it right by accident, but not all do.

That said, it is the only way forward (panels with higher resolutions makes perfect sense, right?), and I think you'll see this addressed in Avalon. (meaning GUI design will be less pixel oriented in the future, yet still look appealing)

What is a dialog heavy application, and how does it get screwed up?

 

[imported_BikeDude]

Originally posted by: virtualgames0
What is a dialog heavy application, and how does it get screwed up?

Well, you start with a dialog box 400 pixels wide, put a bunch of edit controls on it, and you set the font to ms sans serif (the wrong font to use btw). Then you run the thing on a large fonts enabled system, and half the controls will be partly obscured after the unforseen change in font size. That's about the gist of it.

It isn't impossible to avoid, nor is it rocket science. It is, however, extra work that isn't particulary interesting. I.e. it tends to get improperly done. (atleast that used to be the case, most of us are hopefully more aware now)

 

[CrispyFried]

Originally posted by: BikeDude

Well, you start with a dialog box 400 pixels wide, put a bunch of edit controls on it, and you set the font to ms sans serif (the wrong font to use btw). Then you run the thing on a large fonts enabled system, and half the controls will be partly obscured after the unforseen change in font size. That's about the gist of it.

It isn't impossible to avoid, nor is it rocket science. It is, however, extra work that isn't particulary interesting. I.e. it tends to get improperly done. (atleast that used to be the case, most of us are hopefully more aware now)

true.. i run large fonts and run into that also.

 

[yhelothar]

Originally posted by: BikeDude

Originally posted by: virtualgames0
What is a dialog heavy application, and how does it get screwed up?

Well, you start with a dialog box 400 pixels wide, put a bunch of edit controls on it, and you set the font to ms sans serif (the wrong font to use btw). Then you run the thing on a large fonts enabled system, and half the controls will be partly obscured after the unforseen change in font size. That's about the gist of it.

It isn't impossible to avoid, nor is it rocket science. It is, however, extra work that isn't particulary interesting. I.e. it tends to get improperly done. (atleast that used to be the case, most of us are hopefully more aware now)

That's why you have to reboot as I said.

 

[imported_BikeDude]

Originally posted by: virtualgames0
That's why you have to reboot as I said.

I'm fully aware of that requirement, and I did also notice you pointing it out.

But you'd be surprised of the number of apps that just don't... work well. MS Office is fine, Adobe apps too. But from then on... You're frequently on your own.

Keep in mind that "large fonts" isn't anything new. (Windows 3.1 I believe?) But it was never the default setting, so many developers simply disregarded it (and still do). I know I often do... (not because I don't know better; read what I wrote about being "lazy" earlier)

I believe this is the major reason we don't see much demand for higher dpi panels. Laptops are starting to address this issue, but laptops are usually devices you sit close to, so... If this was easily solvable (for all apps) by simply tweaking a dpi setting, then reviewers wouldn't bemoan high dpi laptops... (I've certainly seen such reviews -- wish I hadn't)