Since recently, text in some apps and the Windows start menu renders incorrectly. Initially when opening an app it renders correctly, but immediately after the text begins curling and twisting in on itself (like coordinates in a vector graphics file being rotated…) until the text is largely illegible. I gotta say, it looks kinda cool, but it’s mostly inconvenient and a bit unsettling as I don’t know which apps will be affected and rendered unusable as a result.
This happened in the Qobuz app (which I think is a containered web app, or whatever you call that, not a native desktop app) and also the Windows start menu.
The main apps I use on my laptop are not affected and seem to all be native desktop app, so I can still do the important stuff.
Searching online and with the help of the AI genies I am not able to find much usefull info.
I updated / reinstalled all firmware and drivers and did not (consciously) make changes that could explain this behavior, though it’s possible I am not remembering something important.
Anyone have any idea what this could be or similar experience?
The way you describe it, it sounds like some kind of deliberate web-based text effect, maybe some kind of prank? It’s hard to imagine that being a bug. Maybe some screenshots would help, if there’s any web designers in the forum.
I heard that Windows 11 puts web tech into the Start Menu now. I’ve been thinking of writing an essay: “All Big Tech Executives Deserve Life Sentences in Prison”.
Years ago there was an option for “ClearText” adjusting in Windows for what at the time was aimed toward LCD displays. The looks of the text resembles similarities if the options chosen were really skewed.
Though, it does look like something that is being overridden on the default CSS formatting for the computer. Curiously, installing Chrome or FireFox should not produce the same result as I thought they have their own rendering engine for web pages.
It appears to be web formatting that is giving the odd display. Defaulting everything in Edge might fix it, it would be interesting to know what modified the default look though. There is some malware that does hijack some display settings making the user think the machine is “infected”.
If restore points have been turned on, rolling the system back when it was known to be working correctly may fix it. It is likely a user based formatting though tied to that login profile. To test if it is tied to the user profile: create another user on the computer and logging in as that person.
If the rendering goes away then it is tied to the original user profile. If it can not be fixed then deleting the profile may be a solution (presuming the default profile for users is not affected the same way). Just some thoughts that came to mind when reading the original post.
