RE: LCD monitors/CLEAR TYPE

[Bill Troop billtroop@xxxxxxxx]

To everyone even thinking of using an LCD.

There's much pro and con, but there's one really significant PRO.
IF you are using an LCD, you can take full advantage of Microsoft's
brilliant CLEAR TYPE technology, which MS has done everything to publicize
but which most people still know nothing about.
CLEAR TYPE is a brilliant invention (actually invented by Wozniak for the
Apple 2!!!) which, only on LCDs, virtually triples the resolution of text.

There is SOME system overhead, and by default it is turned off.
Ideally, it should be customized, and the tools have to be downloaded.
(Search MS for ClearType and it's all there.)
What you get, on text, is, instead of 150 dpi resolution on a really good
LCD, the very near equivalent of 600 dpi resolution.

This is PHENOMENAL.
What it also means is that if you have an LCD, you are CRAZY if you are not
using XP, because ClearType is only available under XP.
MS has never done anything more valuable for users than ClearType - an
initiative that came out of the eBook group - and thanks to wonderful
people like Greg Hitchcock and Bill (I forget his name, but the fellow who
always wears a skirt - I mean a kilt. He was once photographed with Al Gore
and they had to crop the photo so the skirt wouldn't show.)
There is very slight value to using ClearType on a CRT, but it really only
shines with an LCD for reasons which are obvious when you look at the issue
in any detail. A marvellous, marvellous service. (I believe Apple's OS X
also now offers something similar, as well it should considering that Apple
invented the technology - but they only did it in response to MS's
publicity assault with ClearType.)
One caveat: I rather doubt you will see any advantage in full screen mode
with XyWrite. You would have to be using a Windowed box. But who wouldn't
do that, when you can use Lucida at 26 POINTS on a 1600x1200 screen and
still get 43 vertical lines in your XyWrite window? That is a level of
clear, readable text that is just outstanding and cannot be compared to any
of the full-screen custom-font alternatives. The reason is that the custom,
bitmapped fonts are not capable of being anti-aliased or 'ClearTyped'.
ClearType as I understand it only works for scalable fonts.
(And yes, I believe it _is_ possible to come up with a custom, anti-aliased
bitmap font, but I don't think anyone has generally done this - the amount
of work involved would be an impractical investment.)