The names of my folders and the menus are not displayed correctly (even the tabs names in firefox). A lot of letters are missing. When cross over with the mouse pointer, part of them are correctly displayed. Contrary, the content of askubuntu site, for example, is displayed correct. It does not always happens, usually a restart solve the problems for a while. I have Ubuntu 14.04. I don't know how to tag this question, so I'll mark it as display related, even though is not really this.
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2Seems similar to this missing letters question. I gave up trying to fix it on 14.04 and I'm installing 14.10 now, for which there's an Intel Graphics installer.– Dan DascalescuMar 30, 2015 at 11:49
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Seems to be a known bug for the Intel HD5500 card: bugs.launchpad.net/linux/+bug/1432194– robApr 6, 2015 at 16:01
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I think this one should definitely be duplicated to askubuntu.com/questions/584922/…. What do I have to do around here to be able to propose a dupe instead of having to leave comments like this?– vorburgerJun 1, 2016 at 9:44
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@vorburger - just click the "flag" link at the bottom of the question– LambartAug 9, 2017 at 18:58
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4Possible duplicate of How do I fix fonts not rendering and missing letters?– LambartAug 9, 2017 at 18:58
6 Answers
There seems to be a (bad) fix for this problem as described here
The problem seems not to appear by using the old UXA hardware acceleration for for the Intel graphic cards.
Edit the following section of the /etc/X11/xorg.conf
file such that AccelMethod
is set to "uxa"
or create the file if it does not yet exist:
Section "Device"
Identifier "Intel Graphics"
Driver "intel"
Option "AccelMethod" "uxa"
EndSection
Reboot or restart X.
The problem went away for me, but I only restarted a couple of times since I changed the file so it might still come back. Also, note that UXA acceleration is considerably slower!
edit: There is a fix for this in the repository by now. If you still experience this issue you either did not update your system for a while or it has a different cause and I suggest filing a new bug.
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Why not use the officially supported 4.2-lts kernel? Because apparently this didn't happen before Linux 4.4.– NoBugsMar 17, 2017 at 2:36
As mentioned in the comment above regarding the missing letters link, I have this specific problem (on 16.04, usually after returning from suspend), and so far, using unity/gnome tweak and switching fonts to greyscale anti-aliasing is working: https://askubuntu.com/a/633435/172307
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While this link may answer the question, it is better to include the essential parts of the answer here and provide the link for reference. Link-only answers can become invalid if the linked page changes. - From Review– Pilot6Jun 1, 2016 at 8:39
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Agree with @Pilot6, but he's linking internally. There is a wealth of information in that thread. Jun 1, 2016 at 20:01
This fixed the problem for me, Updated and Optimized Open Graphics Drivers
https://launchpad.net/~oibaf/+archive/ubuntu/graphics-drivers
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:oibaf/graphics-drivers
sudo apt-get update
I had the same issue. I fixed it on my Chromebook Pixel LS (booting into 14.04 w/ Gnome DE) by not using any Ubuntu family fonts. YMMV
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1I've had this issue for years on my Dell Latitude E5530 on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS and 16.04 LTS nearly every time I unplug from external monitors. Changing the font from the default Ubuntu fonts has been the first thing to work for me. Feb 2, 2017 at 19:10
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That's a bad "solution" as Ubuntu is the font everyone will know and love if they are used to Ubuntu default. Why not use the proper Linux 4.2?– NoBugsJul 16, 2017 at 5:20
According to https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?pid=1633207#p1633207 this bug is caused by some unindentified change in Linux kernel version 4.3 or 4.4. Workaround is to use kernel version 4.2 or older, or update to version 4.6 or later. I don't know if kernel version 3.x has this bug.
For Ubuntu 16.04 the fix is simple:
sudo apt install linux-generic-hwe-16.04
or (to get better performance as a side-effect)
sudo apt install linux-lowlatency-hwe-16.04
Some hardware may not be compatible with lowlatency kernel so you need to test if your system works.
Installing unofficial development drivers from https://launchpad.net/~paulo-miguel-dias/+archive/ubuntu/mesa or https://launchpad.net/~oibaf/+archive/ubuntu/graphics-drivers may also fix the issue.
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Since it used to work, and doesn't with latest linux kernel 4.4 on 14.04, that makes sense. On 14.04 you can run
sudo apt-get install linux-image-generic-lts-wily
, andsudo apt-get remove linux-image-generic-lts-xenial
– NoBugsMar 17, 2017 at 2:25 -
- and afterward you will probably have to use Synaptic to search for linux-generic and remove ONLY the 4.4.x kernels.– NoBugsMar 17, 2017 at 2:38
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It's getting annoying that the updater keeps asking you to upgrade the new kernel... then it's on 4.4. I guess we have to wait for a 4.6 update for 14.04?– NoBugsJun 29, 2017 at 4:28
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Not quite sure if compatibility is the only issue which should be considered, when installing
-low-latency
. Or make it the other way around, why not recommending-rt
or-realtime
to "get better performance as a side-effect"? Refering to UbuntuStudio RealTimeKernel you should only do this, if you really need this. From my point of view, you should elaborate more on the differences between both modes.– MurmelOct 25, 2017 at 22:45 -
Yeah,
-lowlatency
kernel may affect your power saving features (I have yet to see any real world data about this, though).-rt
or-realtime
kernels are often inferior to-low-latency
because those are not based on vanilla kernel. As a result,-rt
or-realtime
kernels (if available at all) are usually much older kernels than-lowlatency
. In my experience, unless you know better, newer kernel release is better than older kernel with RT patches. I'm personally using-lowlatency
kernels in old laptops, too. Oct 27, 2017 at 7:22
I fixed this problem with a very easy solution , just go to ubuntu settings>universal access> large text turn on. log off from ubuntu or restart, log back in and again go to settings>universal access >large text and turn off. hope it helps.