Enable Direct2D And DirectWrite Hardware Acceleration For Better Graphics Performance In Firefox

With a few about:config tweaks, you can turn on Firefox’s built-in hardware acceleration and improve both graphical performance and the look of your fonts.

If you have a decent graphics card (DirectX 10-capable) and Windows 7 (or Windows Vista with the Vista Platform Upgrade), you can make graphics processing a bit more efficient with these tweaks:

1. Type about:config into your address bar and promise Firefox you’ll be careful.
2. Type render in the search box, and find the following two keys:
   gfx.font_rendering.directwrite.enabled

   mozilla.widget.render-mode

3. Double click on the gfx.font_rendering.directwrite.enabled entry so that it’s set to true.
4. Double-click on the mozilla.widget.render-mode entry and set the value to 6. If you can’t find this key, right-click anywhere in the window, hit to New > Integer, set it’s name to mozilla.widget.render-mode, and value to 6.
5. Restart Firefox

Now, you should notice that your fonts look a little bit nicer, and certain pages (like Google Maps) move a little bit smoother. To revert back, just go back into about:config, disable gfx.font_rendering.directwrite.enabled, and set mozilla.widget.render-mode to -1. Hit the link below to read more.

How to Enable Direct2D & DirectWrite Hardware Acceleration in Mozilla Firefox [Tweaking with Vishal]