Font Smoothing

It's probably in the Direct X 30 drivers, there are a few "bugs" that still need to be corrected, mostly in the video driver areas..

Thank you for your comment, stuart. You're corroboration brings me to the biggest DirectX bug of all: UNINSTALLATION. Even during the course of the installation, I was assured that an uninstall routine would be available in 'Add/Remove Programs' should problems arise. There is an option there but the app it runs (dxsetup.exe) only offers the options 'Restore Audio Drivers' and to enable/disable Direct3D Hardware Acceleration. I suppose my course of action now would be to find out how to get rid of DirectX. Any suggestions? Thank you again, Stuart.

I'm not sure I would totally blame it on DirectX yet.  I have both installed and have no current problems.  I too lost the 'smoothing', but just popped over to Microsoft's site and downloaded their latest version of Font Smoothing (Not the one in Plus, but a seperate program).  This fixed the problem immediately.There are also documents in the MS Knowledgebase on uninstalling DirectX.

If, by "their latest version of Font Smoothing (Not the one in Plus, but a seperate program)", you mean 'w95grey.exe', that's precisely the "portion of MS-Plus" I was talking about. If you'll notice in your Display properties, it adds a 'Plus!' tab. It is, indeed, part of MSPlus. If there is another program, a search of MS's website turned up only 'ws95grey' and no other font smoothing program. If there is another, you should provide me with an address because I can't find it. You'll notice, I've upped the "ante" to 200 to make it worth your while. BTW, I *did* download the latest version of 'ws95grey' and installed it but it was a no-go.

As for MSKB's instructions on uninstallation of DirectX, this is what they have to say: "If you experience problems with the DirectX video or sound drivers, you can remove them by running Dxsetup.exe. Dxsetup.exe is supplied by the product that installed DirectX." As anyone who's attempted this can attest, this does *not* remove a thing except maybe the sound drivers as there is only a "Restore Audio Drivers" button and a check box for "Enable/Disable Direct3D Hardware Acceleration." I stand firm on the suspicion that DirectX is the culprit and I'm sorry about the poor grade. Thanks anyway.

I would suspect that the DirectX install replaced your video drivers, as perhaps has already been established.  What kind of video card are you using?  You may want to check that company's homepage for a later driver version than the one included in DX3. Many manufacturers are now building their drivers to conform to DirectX specifications; I am using a version of the driver for my ATI card that is improved over the DX3 one.  So, check the company's site, and if you need help installing the driver, let me know.

Thanks for the effort, dogztar though I've already been through that. I use a Diamond Stealth 2000 (formerly 'Stealth DRAM') w/ 2MB. I downloaded the latest drivers and re-installed but I think the DirectX drivers are refusing to be overwritten. MS apparently doesn't like the idea of you removing their software. I may have to do this the hard way. BTW, I tried to increase the points of this question to 200 but it apparently didn't take. It says I have 215 total points and 115 available. I'll try to change it to 115 this time.

Yes..it is just about impossible to get rid of DirectX, though I did manage to do it by hacking my registry all to pieces.  I wiped all the references to ddraw* and anything else that was a directX-associated file, then deleted all the ddraw.*, d3d*.*, and so on from my windows\system directory.  It took forever and is a dangerous thing to do if you are not registry savvy, but it can be done.  I had to do this to get Diablo to work, since I had a previous version of DirectX installed and it didn't like that.  This is most likely "the hard way" you are talking about, and you were right...it is not fun, especially if you miss one of them in the registry but delete it in the windows directory.  Good luck resolving this, if I can think of another way, I'll post it up.

Yup! That's pretty much what I had in mind only I thought it might be easier to download the directx self-extractor again and simply make a note of all the files it puts in the temporary directory and go by that to perform my "surgery". And they wonder why Microsoft is so loathed...

This may be very simplistic but, font smoothing only works with 64K colors or more, is it possible that you have sliped back to 256 colors when you installed DirectX?

Nope. If I'm so anal about font-smoothing, how much more anal should I be about running in 256 color mode? I've tried switching to and from every mode possible including "Zooming" into my desktop just to make sure my eyes weren't missing the anti-aliasing. Sorry, rp and thanks for the response.

Adjusted points to 200

Please check the following
a) in display properties has the version number of your video driver changed?
b) if you run dxhelp.exe ( part of directx ) is the video driver component listed as certified?
c) what is the original date stamp on your directx 3.0b self extractor.  There are two versions.

a) My current version is 4.02.147 but I must admit I never made a note of the exact revision # before so I wouldn't know if it had changed.

b) My copy of DirectX comes with "setupx.exe" instead of "dxhelp" which reports "no hardware support" in the Display Driver field. Both "DirectDraw and Direct3D are certified and "Direct3D Hardware Acceleration Enabled" is checked.

c) The self-extractor is a DOS exe and the "Created" and "Modified" dates are April 30 but this isn't the version I installed first.  The self-exctractor was originally called "DIRECTX.EXE" but the one I downloaded most recently (and have since reinstalled with) is "DX3busa.EXE".  Are these the 2 versions you were talking about?

Do a file search on your system an make sure that you either do or do not have dxhelp.exe on your system.  If you do in fact have both delete dxhelp.exe.  You should how not delete dxsetup.exe.
Usually in program files\directx.

Direct3D and DirectDraw are enabled as is Hardware acceleration but you do not have hardware support.  Check with the maker of your video card for newer and more compatible directx drivers.  If they exist, install them. Run DXsetup.exe.
This will update driver version tables.  If all entries are certified you should no longer have a problem.

I do not have dxhelp.exe on my system.  I've already tried installing the latest drivers for my card which, BTW, is a Diamond Stealth 64 DRAM.  My card must be incompatible.

How can it be incompatible, since someone I know had the same problem with this card.  Certifing all directx drivers did solve te problem.  It could be that a combination of system hardware (unlikely) is causing the problem or its a different revision of the card bios/rom.

Regarding your question: "How can it be incompatible", I'm merely grasping at straws (not to mention wads of hair) in an attempt to explain this.  Sometimes hardware *is* the issue.  If, as you stated, it's either "a combination of system hardware" or "a different revision of the card bios/rom", then doesn't that lead us right back to my conclusion that there's a hardware incompatibility issue?  

The last driver updates for the Diamond Stealth DRAM were released in May of last year so I'm stuck there.  There is no "dxhelp.exe" as I told you before.  I even searched for it a second time to settle the issue (not that I had any doubts).  As for running "dxsetup", this is the same program called upon in the Add/Remove Programs section of control panel.  Running the program brings up a simple window with a rundown of my DirectX subsystem with all components "certified" except 'Display Driver: no hardware support' (again, the issue of hardware comes up) and 'Old Direct Play: not installed'.  Below this rundown is a check box for "Direct 3D Hardware Acceleration Enabled" and two buttons to "Restore Audio Drivers" and "Restore Display Drivers" the latter of which is greyed out and there is nothing else that can be done with dxsetup.exe.  There is certainly no way to "certify" the drivers from this interface.  

If you could kindly walk me through this certification process, I will increase the value of this question to 300 points and make sure they are awarded to you.  It may be important to note that I've had *no* problems running directx games on my system.  Thank you for your time and effort.

Adjusted points to 300

Sorry it's taken so long to comment on your proposed answer but I've had no luck in locating a version of DX 2.0.  Any suggestions?

It would be a good idea to check HTTP://www.Microsoft.com
They have version 1, 2, and 3.
Whenever you are having trouble finding versions of a program, it's usually best to visit the web site of the program's creator.

Actually, my experience suggests that the developers' own site is the *last* place you'd expect to find older versions of the software.  It would be quite remiss of me to not at least try Microsoft's web site.  However, I've been unable to find a version older than 3 not that finding something specific on MS's web site is unlike finding a needle in a haystack.  If you could kindly provide me with a specific URL, I'd be happy to evaluate your answer.  Otherwise, I must unlock this question to accomodate a more plausible solution.  I really don't think installing version 2 over 3 will remedy the problem (and would thus be a waste of time to "hunt down") but I feel I owe it to you to at least try it.  Thanks again.

I've just noticed that Experts Exchange has accepted your answer when all I did was add a comment to the proposed answer.  I've had this happen before with EE where *I've* actually been awarded points for questions I did *not* answer successfully.  Apparently there are some bugs in the software.

Try http://www.microsoft.com/msdownload/directx3.htm.
It contains the bug fix for DX3.

I've already tried the bug fix dx3busa.exe.  Don't guess you had any luck locating DX2 either?  I've written Experts Exchange to try and have this thread reinstated.  I was just about to up the "ante" to 400 points when I noticed the error.

I have the install for DirectX 2.  If you'd like it, send me an E-Mail.  JINX@Prodigy.net

I know this is a very old thread but, did you ever solve this problem?

How to certify a directx entry?  What is certification?
A driver is said to be certified by directx and listed as such if it has been tested by the Windows Hardware testing labs.  An entry is placed in directx( as well as drivers ) that a certified.  
Some drivers are only certified with some versions of directx.  Eg.  my video card is certified and works well with directx5 if i use the dx5 drivers from the manufacturers site.  If i step up to dx6 and use dx6 drivers they are not certified.  So there is a hardware issue in broad terms, but is more a case of directx and the card drivers.  There's no way i know to force certification.  You would undoubtedly have a number of drivers.  The originally supplied ones, updated drivers from the manufacturer, windows own internal drivers and the drivers in directx.

Installing old versions over newer versions now becomes the problem.  A method that I found that works generally.  When you want to reinstate an older driver the "update driver" doesn't help you.  Install the Standard VGA driver and reboot.  Then change the driver, select "have disk" and point it to the older driver.  Check with directx to see if its certified.  If not, reinstall directx from the dx interface, reboot if necessary and check again.  If still not, repeat for your series of drivers that you have.  And to confirm you do have a Stealth 64 Dram?

I have an ATI Rage 11c.  I am having lots of problems but I don't think it is because the card is bad.  I get wavy scrolling in 24bit only.  The font smoothing gets out of wack when I switch resolutions.  The fonts in general are not quite as good as when I had my STB Nitro.