Um, I think this is the other way around: removing the FT_LOAD_NO_HINTING flag from the FT_Load_Glyph() call does in fact enable hinting.
Currently font hinting is disabled in Blender, and the patch re-enables it.
So, I’m surprised we get better performance when enabling hinting. Need to be investigated 
(Source: Freetype reference, http://www.freetype.org/freetype2/docs/reference/ft2-base_interface.html#FT_LOAD_XXX)
I’m not sure I get the issue… I’m mostly working full screen and looking at the model though…
It doesn’t matter what task I do I just don’t end up looking at a lot of text in blender…
is it a resolution thing? at 1920*1200 the blender default looks crystal clear to me!
I must say I’m just a little surprised by the strength of feeling in this topic…
(Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying there’s not an issue… just that I’ve not experienced it myself and so am mystified)
Load v2.49 and v2.5. Compare the clarity of the text displayed. Scale the windows and notice the difference. It’s pretty clear (pun intended).
Edit:
Also, notice the letter spacing is a bit too small in 2.5. Couple that with the AA and the legibility starts to become an issue.
When 2.5 was first released, I didn’t have a problem with this at all. But, over time it has become an issue for me.
Hi all,
I couldn’t agree more. I noticed a clear difference from the first seconds I opened 2.5.
Honestly, it is a relief if I open 2.4 after a while. For me this anti-aliased version is really harder on the eyes.
I do understand other people like anti-aliased fonts.
Although, I believe that the option to render the fonts as in 2.4 should be available.
I have been working with blender for a couple of years now, its a great piece of software, and development has been greatly appreciated.
Looking at all the improvements over the years, it seems to me that it shouldn’t be that hard to provide this (previous) “non anti-aliased” version ?
I really hope this option will be available soon.
Kind regards.
I think that the font in particular is problematic, since the distance between some letters annoys some people (particularly windows and mac users). Hinting them makes a huge diference (way more readable in CRT and LCD), but also makes seem them a little less professional (subjetive, there’s no strict rule to define a “proffessional” font from a “amateur” font) mostly due to the distance between fonts and the relation vertical/horizontal for every font (hinting them makes evident that the font wasn’t designed with metrics in mind)… although how the font is defined right now, looks very unpolished compared with the rest of the software out there.
One thing that Blender 2.4 has and 2.5 don’t have is the possibility to select what font you want to use and be happy with it. Maybe this would end this discussion.
And thanks Michael Fox, for trying to do something about it.
You are being quite aggresive. However, I experimented with this a bit. You can compare this third option, the same font, with hinting (seriously needed), but no smoothing.
My code is quite ugly, so I don’t post it anywhere yet. Also, there is no switch in the settings; you can choose the rendering mode only when you compile.
If you would like to use this, here is the patch on Paste all.
I am going to try some more, and I hope I will find out where to enable my beloved sub-pixel smoothing. It’s mainly a matter of reading the documentation carefully 
AFAICT subpixel smoothing is turned off by default in freetype because of a (bogus) MS patent, probably just a matter of rebuilding the freetype lib and setting it to render using subpixel smoothing with some environmental setting.
A page on the Freetype.org web states, how I understand it, that these are no problems anymore. My freetype does not throw any error, and I think I already used some of the “patented” features. But I admit i am not sure about this thing.
Btw, it would be cool to implement kerning too. That would require a bigger piece of code, but, well, I think the result will be worth it. It might fix the a-little-too-big spacing the font has when hinting is enabled.
EDIT: I take this paragraph back. Interestingly, the font already uses kerning. Without it, the spacing is even bigger (in some cases).
Sorry about that. I wasn’t feeling agressive, just a bit annoyed about being told what I should like.
Thanks for trying to make smoothed font rendering better, but it’s no use for me. What I like is this (make sure to view full size):
I like this really crisp font much better than any smoothed font trying (and failing) to look crisp.
I get those fonts as described in these three posts, so I’m currently happy with my really crisp non-AA fonts and much faster UI.
Edit: image host gone, reupload.
Love the font, Sanne.
Really, way easier on the eyes.
@sanne
Just for clarity, when you say “much faster UI” are you referring to things such as scrolling the properties panels and pulling verts?
Glad you like it also, FreeMind. 
kernond, yes, basically all actions feel snappier, like moving objects in the 3D view, scrolling panels, moving window borders. I guess using a pixel ttf font like the one I used and setting the font size to the recommended value puts the font perfecty onto the pixel grid, so the font engine doesn’t need to interpolate between pixels. This is just an amateurish guess, though, I’m no programmer, but it certainly has a considerable effect, at least on my machine.
sounds promising, thanks!
Looks amazingly clear Sanne !
I hope to see something like this in future Blender development instead of the “blurry when i zoom” font.
On the subject of UI speed, Campbell just committed this:
Minor speedups for 3D view text drawing ~10-15% improved frame-rate with particle display.
- ascii text drawing functions, slightly faster since they dont have to do hash lookups & utf8 conversions for each char.
- used ascii drawing functions for the view3d’s number display.
- each text item was using fixed 128 chars, now only allocate the string length needed.
Hmm, text is pretty small by default on a large display, so I never zoom it out…
so yes, the difference is immediately obvious when going from 2.49-2.5, but in my experience in a very good way.
the only reason I’m posting is because for an “unknown” number of users the text drawing in 2.5 is a big improvement… (I find anti aliasing easier on the eye for reading from a screen, not harder)
Again, it seems that many users are having an issue, when zooming out or on low resolution displays.
reading this thread it sounds like everyone has a major issue with this, but I wonder how many people like the updated tech and are not replying.
not trying to turn this into a vote or anything and it does sound like headway is being made to resolve things for those having trouble… so winners all around I guess!
Yeah… that’s a really good setup!! (YMMV, but for me is great!). Thanks for sharing!
I agree with you. This week i’ve tested 2.5 in a 1920x1080 display and blender looks awesome in hi-res displays, the text is very readable.
At low-res displays we have some issues like font readability, too big buttons and panels, long scrolling.
With 2.49 we had the flexibility to zoom-out a panel and show more info in a low-res display without losing readability.
But 2.5 seems to be designed mainly for hi-res displays and I confess it look very nice on them! So maybe this is a reason for a solution for this issues with low-res displays not being a priority.
And that’s why a font choice in the user preferences would the best possible solution :
-people with their large display could keep this antialiased font and resume work happily
-people with smaller display, who needs to zoom the panels to avoid the -very annoying- fact of dragging panel constantly each time they need to change some settings (problem that didn’t existed in 2.49b) would be able to work as happily.
