After installing Internet Explorer 7.0 on one of my test computers, I noticed that all the text was a bit blurry.  I had thought it was just something to do with my LCD screen, but adjusting the settings did nothing.  So I decided to uninstall IE7 and see if things went back to normal.  They did.

Come to find out, when you install Internet Explorer 7.0 you are also installing something they call ClearType.  This is supposed to render text on the screen clearer, but in my case it didnt at all.  It only got worse and it was so bad that my eyes even started to water after about 5 minutes of looking at the screen.  Not good seeing as how I have to look at the computer all day for work.  There is a solution though.  You can do this one of two ways.

1. Turn off ClearType through Internet Options.  Go to Start -> Control Panel -> Internet Options (or Tools -> Internet Options within IE) and then click on the Advanced tab.  Once there, you need to scroll down to where it says Multimedia and unckeck the option for Always Use ClearType for HTML*.  Now click OK and restart Internet Explorer.  You should see the font goes back to normal after that.

2. You can download the ClearType PowerToy from Microsoft.  This PowerToy helps you turn off ClearType when it effects everything on your system and not just Internet Explorer.  I recommend downloading this tool as well and turing ClearType off.

My experience with this has proven that you should actually use both methods to turn off ClearType because if you start IE and the setting is turned on it uses the setting in everything that is IE based.