Wasn't that a Windows issue, though? I feel like font-rendering on Windows, in general, is far inferior to font-rendering and aliasing on the Mac. Especially with the new HiDPI displays popping up, Apple's stuff looks far better to me than any display I've ever seen on Windows.
font-rendering on Windows, in general, is far inferior to font-rendering and aliasing on the Mac
That's because Windows has to deal with so many more differences in hardware. E.g. look at these pixel-level variations in LCD screens. http://www.digitalversus.com/tv-television/screen-technology... I don't understand how it would be possible to support subpixel rendering on some of those. IIRC when I last used Windows (XP?) it let you choose from 8 different schemes. But that still wouldn't nearly be enough!
OS X and IOS can be tweaked to support a much smaller subset of that mess.
That's interesting because 'back in the day' the IT department accidentally installed safari on my win XP box and as a long time mac user I thought 'finally some font rendering done right'. I guess it's down to taste or it perhaps it didn't work well for screens with low pixel density or people who like really small text and ui settings.