Windows XP Fonts Differ in Parallels and Native Install

M

mailman0

Bit poster
I am running Windows XP and I have to have a coworker on Windows render things in Wink when I am finished with them because Parallels renders the font I am using very poorly. Notice that neither of them are using Cleartype. Each example is using Standard font smoothing in Windows XP. See attached image.

Is there any way to control to settings in Windows about font smoothing other than Cleartype? The font still looks bad with cleartype enabled anyway. It seems like Windows isn't properly reading the hinting information for the font. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.
 

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Hi mailman0,
can you please provide us with step-by-step instructions on how the issue can be reproduced? What settings are done, where, etc.
 
Version and steps to reproduce

It does the exact same thing on 4.0.3848 and a colleague's Parallels 5. We are both using the same Windows XP image (version 5.1.2600)

The font I am using to test is ITC Franklin Gothic Book Condensed (ITCFranklinGothicStd-BkCd.otf). This is an opentype font (.otf). One thing I've noticed is that the Mac shows one font and gives me all the different variations, whereas Windows sees each font file as a separate font. I don't know if this is normal behavior.

Go to Control Panel > Display > Appearance > Effects
Select Use the following method to smooth the edges of screen fonts:
Select Standard
Click OK
Try to use at point size 11 with white text on a dark background.

If you do not have the same font, you can try Corbel 11pt for a similarly craptastic effect. Try them both on a Windows install that is native on a PC and the fonts will look different (take screenshots and compare).
 
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