Discussion on:

Get a better view in Windows 7 by adjusting DPI scaling

What have you set as your current DPI? Is it still at default? Lately I have been setting my DPI settings at around 115% - it is just easier on my eyes on a high resolution LCD monitor.

There is a much shorter and easier way to reach the DPI scaling app. Right click on the desktop, click 'Personalize' in the menu and then choose 'Display' from the left Panel menu.

There is another way too: Click the Start button, Click on Control Panel, choose Appearance and Personalization, then under Display choose 'Make text and other items larger or smaller'. The first method, however is the shortest way to the app.

Be sure to test that all your applications display correctly after changing DPI.

I've seen buttons and text disappear when changing the DPI to anything over 100%. This was on a .net based application.

The feedback from the application provider is that they only support 100% DPI.

With the user having a 1920 x 1080 native screen on their new laptop with 15.6" screen and with them not having the best eyesight, the only option available to us has been to furnish them with a 23" widescreen.

THANK YOU !! For not freezing us to that Slide Show. It is much appreciated.

I'd almost forgotten that dpi trick. Thanks!

But Too Many Programs are not Compatible with DPI Scaling

For years, I've been using the 120DPI setting in WinXP & enlarged fonts in my web browsers. But find that more & more programs - and more & more websites - only work properly when the PC's display is set to 96DPI; when the web browser is set to use the designers' choices of fonts, sizes & colours.

Young designers with sharp eyesight and large monitors (and their managers who should know better) now seem to regard medium sizes fonts as "non professional" and also seem to believe that their creations should be treated as "works of art" rather than act as useful tools.

Apparently, these designers (and their managers) cannot imagine that people with poorer eyesight, tired eyes, or smaller displays might need to customise their PCs & web browsers so as actually to use these "works of art" productively.

Although these matters are covered by USA / UK / EU disability legislation, such laws are widely ignored and poorly enforced. Previous generations of designers (and manager) usually produced compatible programs & websites. Apparently, the current generation will act only when the laws are actually enforced properly.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dots_per_inch

The problem is that a lot gets defined in "pixels", so when you monkey with the DPI, it screws up the size of a pixel.

J.Ja

Quality of LCD panes vary a lot. Some DO actually give a good image, with other than the "default" screen resolution, - and different resolution should therefor be tried first, because its also faster to do/test. All the alternatives of adjusting the desktop are more or less the same in both XP and Win7.

Then its often so, that we use icons at the desktop more by "recognition", than actually reading the text under it. This gives the alternative of choosing small/large icons instead, and by that, maintaining "normal fonts" in programs. The annoying fact that several Windows icons look very much same as another, is another proof that designers dont really care much about people with sight problems. Though one can of course change startup icons.

As for reading web pages after a DPI/PPI change, there are still a proper "zoom option" in most web browsers today (like Internet Explorer, easiest at its status bar, or "view" menu).

As with other commenters here, my experience is that many applications are not properly "DPI aware". Changing the DPI has unwanted side effects such as overlapping controls, failing to display scroll bars when needed, use of inappropriate font sizes.

I don't tell my users about DPI settings and if I knew how to disable them I would - every now and again someone finds the setting and loses control of their otherwise perfectly usable apps. My advice is to stick to 96DPI and use other options if text is too small.

I also try to purchase monitors on a size/resolution ratio (more resolution = more size) so the average joe user always gets the same visual experience. Only people with special requirements and good eyesight/glasses get small screens with high resolution.

The best solution to this issue is to just buy the proper monitor but if you just use the Internet and many common programs this is really not necessary to do. By holding down the control key on the keyboard and rotating the scroll wheel on the mouse it is possible to "zoom in" making the text larger in many programs (e.g. Word, Excel, Internet Explorer, etc). This also works for the desktop in Windows 7 where icons are very small on a 1920x1080 laptop monitor. There are many common programs such as Quicken or Access where this doesn't work.

Adjusting DPI isn't the whole answer. Some programs in WIN 7 have tiny print regardless of DPI changes or tool changes. The print on on new Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 is too small to use the program! Control+ won't change the tool size either. I want my XP back.

My attempts at using larger fonts have been frustrating due to programs that are dependent on the default 96 dpi. Embarrassingly, some of these programs are mine from VB6 days.

nothing good has come of monkeying with DPI settings. The text is actually less readable (to me) as it runs off the edge, so to speak. And it just looks odd. I've had users that did that and it made it more difficult to work on their systems. Even on my 1920x1200 monitors, I find the default to be just fine. I have to wear glasses for reading so I just wear them for the computer as well and everything is fine. If I need to see something larger, I use the Ctl+scroll wheel method. I value space more than size.

Increasing the DPI to its medium setting is saving me big bucks in eye exams and prescriptions. If that increase is too much for a program, just adjust back temporarily, no big deal.

Thanks for the tip

Can we pass the word to stop using gray color fonts? Did I miss the meeting where we decided that was classy? Many web pages use wispy gray type. Windows Explorer now uses it on the file details (and I haven't spotted how to override it).

I'd like to decrease DPI below 100% but vista and win7 doesn't allow that (it was possible in older windowses).
don't you know why?
don't you know any trick how to overcome this?

In XP and later versions...

At the DPI/PPT scaling dialog box. Choose "custom...". There one can click and drag the size ruler to minimize or increase the font size. Generally from 20% till 500% of the original 96 DPI/PPT.

Since I bought the HP w1907 four years ago, I have always used the Hewlett Packard utility that came with it, HP My Display, to adjust the monitor to what I want to see while using its native resolution of 1440 x 900 pixels. I previously used the Windows XP desktop DPI scaling options which resemble the ones for Windows 7 as described in the article. I don't expect to use the Windows 7 DPI Scaling feature.

That said, any text and/or icon size problems that I encounter mostly appear with 32-bit software running on my 64-bit computer system. This is revealed by the difference in appearance between 32-bit Internet Explorer (that the Win7 Pro installer created!) and 64-bit I.E., which I can launch from the Start Menu. Text and icons displayed by 64-bit I.E. are much larger and more comfortable to read while text and icons displayed by 32-bit I.E. cause eye strain.

Curiously, website icons and text that 32-bit Firefox 8 renders (such as TR) are ordinarily much larger than its own UI text & icons, which are significantly small, though legible. The difference is mostly immaterial insofar as I spend about 90% - 95% of my time and attention on the content, not on the Firefox UI. I suppose that the difference has something to do with HTML5 but I'm not expert on that subject, so please don't quote me.