Windows Desktop Scaling and Game Resolutions

It's hard to talk about but I'm losing my sight. About to have my second Vitrectomy which is an unfortunate eye operation due to diabetic retinopathy. Even with that it won't fix my sight. I use a 27" 1440p monitor and used to be able to use it no problem but now most things in windows are too small for me to be able to read.

I could lower the desktop resolution which would enlarge all apps relatively, but I still want games to render at 1440p (for now anyway). Alternately I know there are scaling options in Windows 10 but I have had mixed success using them, especially trying to increase the UI size in individual apps that have lots of small text. I use Discord internal scaling at 200% and chrome at 150% currently.

(Also I'm only 32, please take care of your health, don't end up like me)

TLDR: What is the best option to increase UI scaling in Windows without sacrificing video resolution? Any ideas and explanations of how to do it would be much appreciated. Can someone also explain to me how to properly increase the scaling in individual apps? 1password for example is impossible to use right now.

I don't know how much of what I'm going to type is obvious. Also, there will always be some kind of issue with scaling.

I'd like to drop this one up-front - UI designers, I know that smaller text looks nicer and cleaner, but you gotta design your stuff such that people who need larger text can still comfortably use your program. I would go so far as to say that your default should be a few pixels larger than you think it should be. That bucks UI design trends that have cropped up over the past decade plus, but usability trumps aesthetic all the time, every time. I also use a 1440p monitor and Giantbomb, at 100% magnification, is much smaller than it should be.

For games... it's sort of on a game-by-game basis, and unfortunately not every developer takes this into account. I have no umbrella answer for games. On PC, anyway, the Xbox One/Series consoles have a magnifier program you can use.

In web browsers, CTRL + and CTRL - will zoom in and out respectively.

On your Windows desktop, go to Scale and Layout and under "change the size of text, apps, and other items", you can raise that percentage to change the size of everything in the whole OS. This is hardly perfect, but it's a lot better than it used to be. If you click on "advanced scaling options", there's an option to let Windows try to fix apps such that they aren't blurry. This does not change the resolution you're running, but does make everything bigger.

This probably sounds like a really depressing suggestion, but is there a way to hotkey some kind of text-to-speech program so that you can hover your mouse over something and push something like "CTRL-T" or whatever to have text-to-speech start?

EDIT: I should have read your post closer, you seem to already know about the Windows scaling thing. That's unfortunately the best thing you can do on a system level without lowering resolution.

Dang that's a real drag.

This is a huge wake up call for myself to eat healthier.

@alistercat: I don't have a lot to suggest, beyond what was said above but I wanted to offer some support for your situation. I've worked in public and academic libraries in America for about 15 years so most of what I suggest below is from that perspective. Internationally, your mileage may vary. Many public libraries offer low-vision resources. Everything from a variety of pocket magnifiers that you can select from and keep to closed-circuit, screen-based magnifiers used by vision-impaired folks to fill out paperwork, sign checks, etc. Of course, some of those needs can also be served by technology now, but most libraries will bend over backwards to put you in touch with other local services that you may not be aware exist. Most states also have specialized libraries dedicated to low-vision or blind services. They specialize in acquiring, or in some cases creating, material that is otherwise hard to get in large-print, audio or braille (things like textbooks, niche publications, etc.) I know I've helped get magnifiers for people who have said it's changed their lives and made them able to function more independently.

Anyway, hopefully you don't need those services for a long time, but now you know they're there.

I don't know much about this; but on my 4K 32" monitor I scale everything to 150% and don't use teh small icons. I'm guessing for Windows you could boost that as much as you want. But, you are right that woudl affect games too.

However, in some cases you can set custom DPI or "DPI awareness" either by adding an entry in the registry, or by using "Disable Display Scaling on high DPI" in exe's properties. This will take some searching with each game in some cases, but likely for each game the "forums" at the publisher might help.

Since I don't do this, I'm not sure if they game need to be set to a "unaware" state for eeach game, or if you need to set a level of DPI (like 100) to adhere to by ignoring Windows.

Thank you for all your suggestions. I just had further eye surgery and will be reading them once I have recovered.

I'm sorry you're going through this with your eyesight because of that damned disease. As someone who sees the eye doctor every year, I can only suggest getting specialty made glasses with reading lens inside them. They also have specialty contact lens for people with bad eyesight which makes reading small print a lot more easy, they also have digital coding which makes it easier to look at a monitor screen without getting eye fatigue. The downside, as you might have guessed already, is that these addition to glasses are pretty expensive, but if you can afford it, it might make your situation better to where you don't need to adjust the monitor for reading text and which might throw everything else out of place. I wear prescription glasses and the text on my 27'' monitor at 100 DPI is also very small. In fact, if you do a browser search, most people have this problem with 1440p monitors, even people with good eyesight, because 1440p is a resolution a lot of programs outside of gaming aren't optimized for. I use a DPI of 150 on Windows 10 so I can read the screen better myself. I wish you a safe recovery.

@justin258: I spent the better part of a week squinting at the damn UI in Greedfall while in the hospital, and (this isn't a brag) I have better than 20/20 vision. I also get that small looks nicer but my god it was terrible and I spent a fair enough amount of time just trying to find a fix for it which seems counter-intuitive at the very least.

In other words it seems less than ideal if multiple people are searching for ways to fix your UI.