http://www.rockhopper.dk/linux/software/configuring-fonts-in-x.html

If you want to have anti aliased fonts, your graphics card has to support the Render extension of X. To check this run xdpyinfo | grep -i render in a console, you should get

RENDER

It should be enabled on every new system by default, but if you don't get anti aliased fonts try to set two variables, one for QT (KDE) and one for GTK+ 2 (you can also use the variables to disable anti aliasing):

export QT_XFT=true
export GDK_USE_XFT=1

If you have a LCD display, you might what to have a look at subpixel anti aliasing (see below for resources).

documented on: 2006.07.29