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I just started using a laptop with a 3k (2880 x 1620) 15" display (MSI GS60 2QE).

I've hooked up my FullHD 22" display as a secondary screen and would like to use that side-by-side with the laptop.

I've set the Windows 8.1 scaling slider to the 'recommended size', which is about 2/3 of the way to the right. To be clear, I'm not using the legacy 'one scaling level' option.

Things are working as well as can be expected on the 3k display, however the FullHD has a problem where DPI aware apps have fuzzy fonts, while non-dpi aware apps look fine.

So, Skype, which looks all fuzzy on my 3k looks fine on the FullHD, but Explorer, Sublime and any other app which scales correctly on the 3k, has distinctly fuzzy fonts.

Here's a screenshot:

enter image description here

The other problem is that some things are still scaling on the FullHD screen, like desktop icons or the UI for Windows Photo Viewer.

I've done a bunch of Googling about this, but unless I'm looking for the wrong keywords, I can't find anything relevant.

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    BTW, just a general comment that I'm thoroughly disappointed by the poor HighDPI support in both Windows and many mainstream apps. To name and shame a few: Skype, Spotify, Evernote not to mention a number of inbuilt Windows tools (Computer Management).
    – AndyCNX
    Commented Nov 30, 2014 at 14:39

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I think I might try to answer my own question for posterity's sake.

So after more research, even though I haven't found any conclusive sources of information, it looks like there's not much that can be done about this in Windows 8.1.

As far as I can figure the 8.1 scaling will first scale UP all UI elements and fonts to match the required DPI of the highdpi screen, and then when those elements need to be shown at 'normal' 100% on the FullHD monitor it does pixel re-sampling to make the element smaller. Hence the fuzzy fonts.

I would guess the problem lies in the fact that re-sizing fonts and elements in the current versions of Windows cannot be done on the fly and requires the user to log in again. Hence why they have to use pixel resampling instead.

There are a few solutions I've thought of: 1) My 3k monitor does a decent job of displaying things in 1920x1080px. Using Windows legacy scaling (i.e. one scaling level) I set the scaling to 125%, which gives acceptable scalat this res and helps overcome the slight blur of the non-native solution. Far from perfect, but it works a hell of a lot better than the native Win 8.1 scaling.

2) With native 8.1 scaling the secondary monitor is useless for any HighDPI aware application, but if you can run something that doesn't scale (Skype, Spotify etc) then it's fine.

3) You can run a VM on the secondary monitor.

4) There is a hack for Windows, which allows for 'concurrent Remote Desktop Sessions'. I imagine it should be possible to login to a second user account on the host PC using RDP, where DPI scaling is disabled.

If anyone has any other ideas, or experience with how Linux handles multi-monitor HighDPI scaling, I'd love to hear about it.

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