Enable Direct2D and Hardware Acceleration in Mozilla Firefox

[Capt.Jack Sparrow]

A little background for those who wondering what is Direct2D and DirectWrite Hardware Acceleration

Direct2D :

Direct2Dis a hardware-accelerated, immediate-mode, 2-D graphics API that provides high performance and high-quality rendering for 2-D geometry, bitmaps, and text. The Direct2D API is designed to interoperate well with GDI, GDI+, and Direct3D.

DirectWrite Hardware Acceleration:

Today's applications must support high-quality text rendering, resolution-independent outline fonts, and full Unicode text and layout support. DirectWrite, a new DirectX API, provides these features and more:

• A device-independent text layout system that improves text readability in documents and in UI.
• High-quality, sub-pixel, ClearType text rendering that can use GDI, Direct2D, or application-specific rendering technology.
• Hardware-accelerated text, when used with Direct2D.
• Support for multi-format text.
• Support for the advanced typography features of OpenType fonts.
• Support for the layout and rendering of text in all supported languages.
• GDI-compatible layout and rendering.

Note:

1. This will only work with Firefox 4 Beta and later
2. Some Add-ons may interfere with proper operation when they call a certain API prematurely. I had problems with ABP add-ons managed to find a link for developers build https://adblockplus.org/devbuilds/adblockplus/
3. Your Video Drivers should be updated to the latest version.

Here is how:

1. If you're not using Firefox 4 Beta download it from here. Firefox 4 Beta

2. On the Address bar type in about:config then click on "I'll be careful. I promise!"



3. Under Filter type in "gfx.font_rendering.directwrite.enabled" without Quotes and double click on it to change the value from False to True



4. Then under Filter type in "mozilla.widget.render-mode" without Quotes and double click on it change the value from -1 to 6



5. Now restart your browser to take effect

Hope this helps,
Captain

 

[Dinesh]

Well done Captain.

 

[Capt.Jack Sparrow]

Well done Captain.

Thanks Dinesh !

 

[severedsolo]

Well done Capt

Just a little word of warning: this might just be me, but when I turn on HW acceleration in 4.0b it crashes my graphics driver, im using a Geforce 210 and the latest drivers. Just be warned

 

[Capt.Jack Sparrow]

Well done Capt

Just a little word of warning: this might just be me, but when I turn on HW acceleration in 4.0b it crashes my graphics driver, im using a Geforce 210 and the latest drivers. Just be warned

Thanks for the Heads up Martin. Maybe just check here https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/ if it's some kind of bug. I use nVidia Geforce 6100 and it works fine for me.

 

[MilesAhead]

edit: I dunno' what's goin' on for sure. All I can say is using these settings with 3.6.8 makes for fuzzy fonts. I don't see much in the way of "snappy" either with the Minefield beta 5 or this browser. It all seems the same to me.

 

[A Guy]

Miles, from the Capt.'s post:

"Note:
This will only work with Firefox 4 Beta and later"

Good info Capt.

A Guy

 

[MilesAhead]

I installed the Minefield. Got about:support to show it was enabled. But I still didn't notice any difference. Then again, my systems don't have kick-ass GPUs either.

Just seems like if you set those settings on 3.6.8 you get grainy fonts. Just peculiar. Maybe it's the power of suggestion. FF has a tendency to do weird things with profiles. But iirc in a development version they claimed unless you set it up in isolation, the 2D rendering would not work no matter what settings you used. I dunno' anymore. I guess I've just lost patience playing with Minefield builds.

 

[tigresskat]

hello Captain I did everything you said up until the mozilla.widget.render-mode which is not list in my about:config so why isn't it listed?

 

[severedsolo]

Hi Tigresskat welcome to the forums,

FF4 now has Hardware Acceleration enabled by default, you should not need to change anything to get it working Cheers.