Preview - PDF sharpness (Yosemite vs El Capitan)

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Level 1

1 points

Preview - PDF sharpness (Yosemite vs El Capitan)

I'm an extensive user of Preview (mostly for mathematical texts in PDFs).

Yesterday, I upgraded to El Capitan. To my surprise the text quality in PDF opened in Preview worsened compared to Yosemite. The text in Preview (El Capitan) is a little blurry (not crisp) compared to Yosemite (or even Mavericks) and is much less comfortable to read. As my work is 90 % PDF reading/writing in LaTeX , this is a very bad suprise for me and so I had to do a rollback to Yosemite.

I'm just curious why this occurs all over again. Very similar issues were with the early release(s) of Yosemite (blurry text in Preview compared to Maverics). See the link here https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6607274. Later it was fixed. I hoped Apple has learnt a lesson but probably not.

On the screenshot below there is a comparison of the same text in El capitan (left) and Yosemite (10.10.3)

Is someone noticing the same problem?

MacBook Pro with Retina display, null

Posted on Oct 3, 2015 3:22 AM

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Answer 1

yoda39

Level 1

0 points

Oct 12, 2015 10:35 AM in response to vcxv

YES it seems to be that whenever I resize a PDF to a smaller window in OS 10.11, like in early 10.10, The font becomes so blurry that it is unreadable. I frequently put two windows up side by side (one a PDF) to extract data from the PDF and enter that information into an accounting app window. When I reduce the window size the only way I can make it readable is to go up to the top left of the Preview window and hit the zoom + icon followed by the zoom - icon which results in a readable document. I have about given up on Preview and gone to adobe! It is a shame that Apple has let Preview degrade this way! I am using an Apple Mini and Apple 24 inch non-retina monitor.

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Answer 2

gregmuc

Level 1

0 points

Oct 15, 2015 7:22 AM in response to vcxv

Same here. Every PDF in Preview or Safari looks awfully blurry in El Capitan (MacBook Pro 17"). Terrible

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Answer 3

vcxv Author

Level 1

1 points

Oct 15, 2015 7:45 AM in response to vcxv

I would understand that it might happen once, with a new release. No one is perfect. However, they released Yosemite with this bug (then they fix it) and then they release El "blurry" capitan with the bug striking back. This is becoming strange. The first thing I did in El capitan is I checked the PDF sharpness and I was very badly surprised that the bug returned. If one makes a mistake he should learn from it.

Can you report the bug here? http://www.apple.com/feedback/macosx.html

I think when more people report the same issue, something will happen.

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Answer 4

drebr

Level 1

0 points

Nov 25, 2015 12:15 PM in response to vcxv

I got a Macbook air 2014 and I have the same problem.

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Answer 5

Nov 25, 2015 12:35 PM in response to vcxv

Try viewing the same document with, and then without System Preferences : General : Use LCD font smoothing when available — checked on Yosemite, and then El Capitan.

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Answer 6

TegarKC

Level 1

12 points

Mar 3, 2016 2:35 PM in response to vcxv

Using OS 10.11.3 and Preview 8.1 (877.7)

When a page first opens it is sharp and then just to this fuzzy state. If I place my fingers on the trackpad the image returns to the sharpness that you would expect.

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