

Firefox 4.0 beta 5 (out today) has Hardware Acceleration - sp332
http://hacks.mozilla.org/2010/09/firefox4beta5/

======
simonsquiff
Unfortunately, the hardware acceleration makes the text rendering horrid. Text
is less sharp, black text looks dark grey, the spacing of small fonts is
compressed...I really found it unpleasant. Fortunately turning off the
acceleration makes it look normal. I hope they can sort it out as it, as it
sounds like a good move, but not at the expense of everyday readability.

Here is a comparison shot - not the best example, granted - normal is left,
accelerated is right. Look at the H on line 5 - it fits the pixel grid
normally, but doesn't with acceleration on.

<http://a.imageshack.us/img291/9493/firefoxbeforeafter.png>

~~~
sp332
I can barely see a difference on my monitor. Maybe it's not reading your
ClearType settings correctly, or not compensating for gamma or something.

~~~
simonsquiff
It's a pretty poor example. I'll try and put some others up. But look at
'sebastianmarshall.com' on line 4 - it's so much more compressed. In fact,
before it is 139px wide, with acceleration it is only 132px wide: it's not
just the look, it's actually changing the dimensions of the text!

~~~
cheald
Here's a good example: <http://i.imgur.com/zpjPl.png>

I added the white lines in Photoshop - with acceleration on, the "Reports in
September 2010" gets both narrower AND bolder, resulting in a very squished,
very ugly presentation. The calendar headers are likewise far less clear.

<http://i.imgur.com/gVFYk.png> is from Basecamp - note the vast difference in
navigation width, and the width of the "Comment" in the blue box.

<http://i.imgur.com/LgGOJ.png> is the Basecamp nav item blown up - the box on
top is accelerated. It's thicker, more narrow, and it's got all those crazy
colored artifacts.

