Windows Fonts Issue

[Jeremy]

I recently uninstalled a PC Game (Left 4 Dead).

During this process I was told a font file was in use.

I used Unlocker to unlock the "handles" and successfully delete the file to remove all traces of the game.

I later rebooted to find that my fonts in Windows are incorrect now.

Mostly everything now is bold and italics.

Does anyone know of a program or command I can use to reset all my fonts back to the way they were / default?

Thanks,

Jeremy

Edit: Just to clarify, the font file in question was not in the WINDOWS\Fonts but in the Left 4 Dead directory, which is why I deleted it.

It has been several days since this happened so those of you who might feel compelled to suggest that I recover the deleted font file; this is no longer possible.

Edited December 7, 2008 by Jeremy

[CharlotteTheHarlot]

I recently uninstalled a PC Game (Left 4 Dead).

During this process I was told a font file was in use.

I used Unlocker to unlock the "handles" and successfully delete the file to remove all traces of the game.

I later rebooted to find that my fonts in Windows are incorrect now.

Mostly everything now is bold and italics.

Does anyone know of a program or command I can use to reset all my fonts back to the way they were / default?

Thanks,

Jeremy

Edit: Just to clarify, the font file in question was not in the WINDOWS\Fonts but in the Left 4 Dead directory, which is why I deleted it.

It has been several days since this happened so those of you who might feel compelled to suggest that I recover the deleted font file; this is no longer possible.

Bad uninstaller, bad uninstaller.

By any chance do you have a registry export from before that uninstaller was executed? If so it is a simple matter to restore the fonts registry key. Any physical font files that show up missing but are referenced by this good registry key can easily be restored later. Actually, this is one time that even an old registry export will be usefiul. Particularly if it precedes the installation of that game.

Try to find one (an existing registry export from your machine). If you cannot, then we could whip a generic Fonts registry key that includes the default font references for WinXP after a normal install.

On a side note, be sure to scold this programmer by sending the company some emails. Accountability is necessary. I know that I would be angry.

[Aloha]

Jeremy, have you checked the Fonts folder to see if the default fonts are still there? Are there normal MS Sans Serif, Tahoma, or Arial beside their bold and italic fonts? I am not sure what fonts are used as the system ones on your computer. I guess some normal fonts were deleted and only their bold and italic ones were left.

[CharlotteTheHarlot]

Here is a generic font registry pull from both WinXP Home and Pro (identical). I used snapshots taken immediately after full installs. I just grabbed the obvious Font keys in the normal location (so there may be others somewhere else). Jeremy, you could try running this script and reboot and see if you only had a registry screwup. BTW, do you know what to do with registry scripts?

What this will do: it will reset some font related registry values that deviate from the official settings from a normal install, as well as adding back in any that somehow got deleted.

What this will not do: well, it will not restore any fonts that have been deleted on your disk naturally! However, if any are missing they can easily be restored from a variety of places: your harddisk (i386 if you have it), your CDROM, Service Packs, or the internet.

REGEDIT4

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Font Drivers]
"Adobe Type Manager"="atmfd.dll"

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\FontDPI]
"LogPixels"=dword:00000060

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\FontMapper]
"ARIAL"=dword:00000000
"COURIER"=dword:00008800
"COURIER NEW"=dword:00008000
"FIXEDSYS"=dword:00009000
"MS SANS SERIF"=dword:00001000
"MS SERIF"=dword:00005000
"SMALL FONTS"=dword:00000800
"SYMBOL"=dword:00004002
"SYMBOL1"=dword:0000a002
"TIMES NEW ROMAN"=dword:00004000
"WINGDINGS"=dword:00000002
"WINGDINGS2"=dword:00008002
"DEFAULT"=dword:00000000

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Fonts]
"Roman (All res)"="ROMAN.FON"
"Script (All res)"="SCRIPT.FON"
"Modern (All res)"="MODERN.FON"
"Small Fonts (VGA res)"="SMALLE.FON"
"Arial (TrueType)"="ARIAL.TTF"
"Arial Bold (TrueType)"="ARIALBD.TTF"
"Arial Bold Italic (TrueType)"="ARIALBI.TTF"
"Arial Italic (TrueType)"="ARIALI.TTF"
"Courier New (TrueType)"="COUR.TTF"
"Courier New Bold (TrueType)"="COURBD.TTF"
"Courier New Bold Italic (TrueType)"="COURBI.TTF"
"Courier New Italic (TrueType)"="COURI.TTF"
"Lucida Console (TrueType)"="LUCON.TTF"
"Lucida Sans Unicode (TrueType)"="L_10646.TTF"
"Times New Roman (TrueType)"="TIMES.TTF"
"Times New Roman Bold (TrueType)"="TIMESBD.TTF"
"Times New Roman Bold Italic (TrueType)"="TIMESBI.TTF"
"Times New Roman Italic (TrueType)"="TIMESI.TTF"
"WingDings (TrueType)"="WINGDING.TTF"
"Symbol (TrueType)"="SYMBOL.TTF"
"Symbol 8,10,12,14,18,24 (VGA res)"="SYMBOLE.FON"
"Verdana (TrueType)"="verdana.TTF"
"Verdana Bold (TrueType)"="verdanab.TTF"
"Verdana Italic (TrueType)"="verdanai.TTF"
"Verdana Bold Italic (TrueType)"="verdanaz.TTF"
"Arial Black (TrueType)"="ariblk.TTF"
"Comic Sans MS (TrueType)"="comic.TTF"
"Comic Sans MS Bold (TrueType)"="comicbd.TTF"
"Impact (TrueType)"="impact.TTF"
"Georgia (TrueType)"="georgia.TTF"
"Georgia Bold (TrueType)"="georgiab.TTF"
"Georgia Bold Italic (TrueType)"="georgiaz.TTF"
"Georgia Italic (TrueType)"="georgiai.TTF"
"Franklin Gothic Medium (TrueType)"="Framd.TTF"
"Franklin Gothic Medium Italic (TrueType)"="Framdit.TTF"
"Palatino Linotype (TrueType)"="pala.TTF"
"Palatino Linotype Bold (TrueType)"="palab.TTF"
"Palatino Linotype Bold Italic (TrueType)"="palabi.TTF"
"Palatino Linotype Italic (TrueType)"="palai.TTF"
"Tahoma Bold (TrueType)"="tahomabd.TTF"
"Trebuchet MS (TrueType)"="trebuc.TTF"
"Trebuchet MS Bold (TrueType)"="trebucbd.TTF"
"Trebuchet MS Bold Italic (TrueType)"="trebucbi.TTF"
"Trebuchet MS Italic (TrueType)"="trebucit.TTF"
"Webdings (TrueType)"="webdings.TTF"
"Estrangelo Edessa (TrueType)"="estre.TTF"
"Gautami (TrueType)"="gautami.TTF"
"Latha (TrueType)"="latha.TTF"
"Mangal (TrueType)"="mangal.TTF"
"Mv Boli (TrueType)"="mvboli.TTF"
"Raavi (TrueType)"="raavi.TTF"
"Shruti (TrueType)"="shruti.TTF"
"Tunga (TrueType)"="tunga.TTF"
"Sylfaen (TrueType)"="sylfaen.TTF"
"WST_Czec (All res)"="wst_czec.FON"
"WST_Engl (All res)"="wst_engl.FON"
"WST_Fren (All res)"="wst_fren.FON"
"WST_Germ (All res)"="wst_germ.FON"
"WST_Ital (All res)"="wst_ital.FON"
"WST_Span (All res)"="wst_span.FON"
"WST_Swed (All res)"="wst_swed.FON"
"Courier 10,12,15 (VGA res)"="COURE.FON"
"MS Sans Serif 8,10,12,14,18,24 (VGA res)"="SSERIFE.FON"
"MS Serif 8,10,12,14,18,24 (VGA res)"="SERIFE.FON"
"Tahoma (TrueType)"="TAHOMA.TTF"
"Microsoft Sans Serif (TrueType)"="MICROSS.TTF"

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\FontSubstitutes]
"Arial CE,238"="Arial,238"
"Arial CYR,204"="Arial,204"
"Arial Greek,161"="Arial,161"
"Arial TUR,162"="Arial,162"
"Courier New CE,238"="Courier New,238"
"Courier New CYR,204"="Courier New,204"
"Courier New Greek,161"="Courier New,161"
"Courier New TUR,162"="Courier New,162"
"Helv"="MS Sans Serif"
"Helvetica"="Arial"
"MS Shell Dlg 2"="Tahoma"
"Times"="Times New Roman"
"Times New Roman CE,238"="Times New Roman,238"
"Times New Roman CYR,204"="Times New Roman,204"
"Times New Roman Greek,161"="Times New Roman,161"
"Times New Roman TUR,162"="Times New Roman,162"
"Tms Rmn"="MS Serif"
"Arial Baltic,186"="Arial,186"
"Courier New Baltic,186"="Courier New,186"
"Times New Roman Baltic,186"="Times New Roman,186"
"MS Shell Dlg"="Microsoft Sans Serif"

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\GRE_Initialize]
"FIXEDFON.FON"="vgafix.fon"
"FONTS.FON"="vgasys.fon"
"OEMFONT.FON"="vgaoem.fon"
"DisableRemoteFontBootCache"=dword:00000000

To all lurking WinXP Experts: If you can think of any keys that I missed that should be in there, PLEASE say something. I will get them from those fresh-install registry exports and then edit that registry script accordingly.

[PC_LOAD_LETTER]

this occurs if you copy files into the C:\WINDOWS\FONTS folder without using explorer.exe to do it (command line, admin shares, 3rd party copy utilities, etc) it occurs because when a font is installed properly (by explorer.exe) registry keys are created that tell windows which face to use by default. if these keys dont exist, but the file exists in the fonts folder, windows will use it but it just uses the first set of character it finds in the file. in some cases thats the bold/italic face.

yours has occurred because your game registered fonts in the registry to an alternate location (Ive seen this before on machines with cracked steam engine games on them.) when you uninstalled the game, it removed those entries. your fonts are likely still in C:\WINDOWS\FONTS but have no entries in the registry and therfore default to the first typeface found in their file. the reg sections that CTH posted might resolve your issue, they may not register all your missing fonts correctly. this process will register every (valid) font that is still installed on your system

1. navigate to C:\WINDOWS\FONTS (yes the font that was deleted wasnt in this folder but its where you need to go to fix it)
   
2. right click and select Install New Font
   
3. browse to C:\WINDOWS\FONTS
   
4. Click Select All
   
5. Click Install
   
6. Reboot/logout/login may be required
   
7. SFC /SCANNOW might be able to restore missing core fonts but the fact that they are showing at all suggests they are still there.
   

[Jeremy]

Thanks for all the advice guys, I know some of you went out of your way to provide it. I appreciate it.

I have fixed it. I ran Dial-A-Fix to fix the fonts issue. I had to reboot as well.

Cheers!