Firefox display changed, zoomed in on websites
My Firefox on a windows 7 HP laptop updated today (June 25th) and the zoom adjusted, changing the font size, as well as icons and zoomed in on websites. I noticed in the list of changes for the program it says "improved rendering on high-res displays" is this the problem and is there anyway I can disable this? I was quite happy with the resolution before, and find this tacky and annoying...
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This post has been revised to include information about an add-on. A copy of the original post appears below the horizontal line.
Firefox now adjusts the page zoom level according to your Windows settings, to better support high DPI displays. For example, if Windows is set to 125% font size (120dpi), the content area will be zoomed by 25% compared with Firefox 21 and earlier.
The straightest line back toward the earlier style of display is the following two step approach:
Step 1: Install the Theme Font & Size Changer extension. Why? Because turning off the scaling affects the chrome area (menus, toolbars, and tabs) as well as the content.
After restarting Firefox, click the new "A" icon at the right end of the navigation toolbar and change the font size from Normal to 15.
Step 2: Change your global scaling in the about:config preferences editor.
(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter. Click the button promising to be careful.
(2) In the filter box, type or paste pix and pause while the list is filtered
(3) Double-click layout.css.devPixelsPerPx and change its value to 1.0 for Firefox 21-sized fonts in the content area.
This should take effect immediately without another restart.
Original Post
Firefox now tries to adjust the zoom level according to your Windows settings, as well as better supporting high DPI displays. It's not going to be to everyone's liking.
I still have Fx21 on this computer so I can't test it myself, but could you check the following setting and try adjusting it:
(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter. Click the button promising to be careful.
(2) In the filter box, type or paste pix and pause while the list is filtered
(3) Double-click layout.css.devPixelsPerPx and change its value to 1.0 to restore the appearance from earlier versions of Firefox for smaller fonts, or a larger ratio for larger fonts. For example, 1.25 corresponds to 125% font size in Windows display settings.
Does that help?
More info in this thread: How do I set the default font size to a lower value?
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Sure, the fix I made was first resetting my Firefox. When that didn't work I did the about:config suggestion and switched the layout.css.devPixelsPerPxto 0. When that was set, the view on that page looked good, but other screens (like google or facebook) requires me to zoom out two times before the view looks like it did before the update. I don't know how to get the view to be a universal set to 100%.
Hi Alanyka, here is my understanding:
- Using the default value of -1.0 is equivalent to matching your Windows DPI setting (commonly 100%, 125% or 150%), so the content will be zoomed to match.
- Using the value of 1.0 will use 96dpi for content, like earlier versions of Firefox, but also will scale down the chrome area (menu, toolbar, tabs) if your Windows DPI setting is higher than 100%.
- Other values will scale everything up or down (e.g., 1.25 in Firefox = 125% in Windows).
- Using the value of 0... I'm not sure what it does.
If you can't find a good size compromise using the preference setting, consider these extensions to adjust the size of either the chrome area or the content area:
- Theme Font & Size Changer - for menu, toolbar, tab area
- Default FullZoom Level - for content
- NoSquint - for content
I switched the scale to the default (-1.0). Then added your three extension suggestions and I'm still having the issue.
Hi Alanyka, with the default (-1.0), which areas look wrong?
To adjust the size of menu / toolbar / tabs then try setting a different font size in the Theme Font & Size Changer extension.
To adjust the size of the content area, set a lower-than-100% percentage in the Default FullZoom Level extension.
You only need one of the two extensions for content adjustments, so if the above works, you can uninstall NoSquint.
Hi, I have the same problem as the OP and have read a great number of threads on the subject now.
I have Win8 64bit version with a resolution of 1920x1080. My windows DPI settings are 125%, the computer default. I have noticed that several others with the same problem have had the same 125% zoom level.
As far as my testing goes there is no level of layout.css.devPixelsPerPx that makes everything look as before for me.
Logically, the 0.80 setting you recommended should make things the right size (125%*80%=100), but it makes the chrome and all areas tiny.
Using the 1.0 setting the chrome area still looks much smaller than it used to, but most websites look normal. However, sites such as http://forums.xkcd.com have much smaller font than before.
Putting the setting at 1.25 gives me the exact same size as the default -1.00 setting, which is very strange. This suggests that there is, like user MatsSvensson said to you in a different thread, a double action going on where using the -1.0 Firefox-setting and the 125% DPI Windows-setting means that Windows first zooms the browser to the desired level and then Firefox continues to zoom a further 25% since it derives its setting from the Windows setting, according to what has been revealed about this new HighDPI-system.
To me that suggests a programming error somewhere.
I hope this helps provide you with more detailed data about the problem.
Hi Coin, since your Windows DPI is 125%, it makes sense that 1.25 and -1.0 give you the same result. 1.25 matches the Windows DPI and -1.0 uses the Windows DPI. This is what is "supposed" to happen.
Unfortunately, there's no single setting for layout.css.devPixelsPerPx that will make everything look like Firefox 21 if your Windows DPI is anything other than 100%.
To use the 80% suggestion, with a setting of -1.0 or 1.25, you need to enter that into one of the two content-scaling extension as your global or default zoom level.
- Default FullZoom Level - for content
- NoSquint - for content
Or you could use 1.0 for the Firefox setting, to restore the content area to 96ppi, and use a different add-on to enlarge the chrome area.
- Theme Font & Size Changer - for menu, toolbar, tab area
I haven't researched whether anyone is thinking of splitting the setting for content from chrome, but lately I'm thinking that would be really helpful.
As a developer this is pretty crappy. Why change the zoom level. By default now on 2 upgrades on different zooms both default to a +2 zoom level.
This is by far the worst update I have seen from Firefox, so much so that I had to create an account to reply to this.
This is really annoying mates - after an update my Firefox just turned into a pumpkin. Really why to mess with people zoom levels? Same problem here - Firefox is zoomed out - blurry icons and every website is zoomed out - like every website. I'm feeling like a blind man here.
I'm now trying to adjus this zoom level (which is something what USERS don't have to do when they are using browsers - it will mess up everything).
I'm currently rolling back my browser to older version - peace.
Honestly, what were they thinking?!? I'm a website developer, and it's critical that I know *exactly* what my customers are seeing on their websites. I've rolled back to 21, but I'd prefer to stay current with security updates and such.
Please! Undo this idiocy. Offer the ability to do this as an option. Don't force such changes on everyone.
Rolling back to v21 here. THis is utterly the worst, and most unneeded update to Firefox yet. I shouldn't have to install extensions for it to behave 'normally'
If I want the font on the tabs and the menus to appear normal, I have to have it at stylesheet thing -1.0 or 1.25, which makes the fonts on the pages too big. Setting it to 1.0 makes the web pages normal but the menu fonts too small. Firefox fail!
Edeziri
Clearly this was a bit of an experiment which is fine.
What is clearly wrong is there should be an easy way to enable/disable the experiment and provide feedback before forcing the default on everyone.
Please consider issuing a hot fix with a way to disable this "feature", but still stay up to date on security fixes.
The other problem is the zooming affects just the content area and leaves the chrome unzoomed. The configuration change suggested here changes both the content size and the size of the chrome so it is impossible to get things back to where they were.
If you need people to vote in support of this please provide a pointer to where you'd like feedback.
After instalation newest FF version (22) all pages are rendered with bigger font size than with previous FF (21) version. It is very annoying as at every page I'm visiting I need manually adjust ("Ctrl" -) proper font size.
I found this information: "firefox 22 is now respecting the pixel density you've set on a system level in the windows control panel > appearance > display."
I don't understand why it was done. I have bigger than default (120%) pixel density because I want to have bigger fonts in UI, but only in UI, not in the web content.
Changing property "layout.css.devPixelsPerPx" to 1.0 isn't solution as I don't want to change FF UI font size but web content font size!
I'm asking how may I get web pages looking correctly with FF22?
hello rcterzi, just as general pointer: if you want to test changes & new features before they land in firefox release versions and want to give feedback you might want to consider using the beta version: https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/channel/
Why do you release versions that do not work correctly? Each web page seems to have its own size, some way big, some just right, some too small.
How do I fix this please? Firefox currently is annoyingly unusable!
Edeziri
I can't work with change made in FF22 affecting both:
- UI fonts size
- content (web pages) fonts size
the same time, it should be controlled separately.
If I change "layout.css.devPixelsPerPx" to 1.0, I will get proper content look but also too small FF UI. Where may I download previous version of FF? I need to return to 21.
Edeziri
mozilla is asking us to do their programming work for them with this update...we shouldnt have to be self programmers to enjoy firefox.
Hi enchant, two topics here: (1) what you see, and (2) what visitors see.
Your Settings
I suggest setting your global scaling within Firefox back to 96ppi. This probably will make the font in the chrome area (menus, toolbars, and tabs) too small. Therefore, I suggest the following approach:
Step 1: Install the Theme Font & Size Changer extension.
Then click its icon at the right end of the navigation toolbar and change the font size from Normal to 15.
Step 2: Change your global scaling in the about:config preferences editor.
(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter. Click the button promising to be careful.
(2) In the filter box, type or paste pix and pause while the list is filtered
(3) Double-click layout.css.devPixelsPerPx and change its value to 1.0 for Firefox 21-sized fonts in the content area.
This combination will give you the familiar view you had in Firefox 21 and earlier, but that's not necessarily what others will see.
Your Site
The baseline DPI has changed for many Firefox users on newer versions of Windows from 96ppi to 120ppi (100% to 125%) and there probably will be some with higher levels as well. On average the default "zoom level" on your site likely will be higher for Windows users than before. However, different users have always had different zoom preferences depending on their display so there's no way to know "exactly" what your client and its visitors are seeing...
It might be interesting to learn what zoom levels your typical visitor is using. Firefox has a property of the window object named window.devicePixelRatio you can use to gather than information. (As far as I can tell, the property isn't supported in other browsers.) For example, in the following page I'm using it to compute the actual screen dimensions from the dimensions reported by the JavaScript screen object:
http://dev.jeffersonscher.com/resolution.html
You can use Ctrl+ and Ctrl-, or Ctrl and the mouse wheel, to see how it varies with the zoom level. In theory, you could log this value. (I think capturing a value at the start of a session and keeping track of the final value during the session could be interesting.)
Edeziri
The above does not work. On some sites the pics are too small some sites pics are too big and blurried.
Try again
@jscher2000
I think it was bad idea to add this "feature" (support for high DPI displays) to FF. If somebody has high DPI display, should change/correct DPI setting in own system. Why so many people who has normal displays must be annoyed by "feature" which isn't really necessary?
Edeziri
Yeah all the provided solutions do not seem to work 100%, as in they are not able to restore the same display and level of zoom FF had prior to using this DPi scaling thing.
Please make a hotfix and make it optional.