Font Smoothing Bug?

[ajhaji]

I've discovered an interesting thing with Mac OS X and font smoothing.

When I have my 24" LCD hooked up to my MBP, all fonts look very crisp, sharp, and smooth: both on the external and internal LCD. However, when I disconnect the external LCD the fonts on my internal LCD appear very blurry and much stronger--not nearly as crisp as when the LCD is plugged in.

My font smoothing settings are set to automatic. I've tried manually setting the smoothing setting when the external LCD is not plugged in, but none of the available modes seem to sharpen the text as much as when the external LCD is plugged in. It's really boggling. I want my fonts to be sharp all the time!

Wondering if any of you have had a similar experience. Thanks in advance!

[MisterMe]

Quality font smoothing is highly dependent on two things:

1. The individual display

2. Personal preference

If you don't like the appearance of fonts on a display, adjust the settings in the Appearance preferences pane to something you like. Of course, MacOS X provides a spectrum of settings which may not be broad enough to include your personal preferences. If this is the case, then you only choices are either to learn to like one of the provided choices or get a new monitor that suits your personal preferences.

[ajhaji]

I've just done some more playing around and here's what I find:

When I have only ONE display active on my system (either the internal LCD only, or the external LCD only) the font smoothing is very blocky and it makes the text look very bold. When BOTH displays are active at the same time, the text looks very sharp and crisp. This is while keeping the font smoothing settings exactly the same.

Any ideas?