Windows is so full of fonts that they’d fill a warehouse if they were cast-metal typesets, but it doesn’t go out of its way to make them easy to manage. That’s where tools like AMPsoft’s AMP Font Viewer come in. Font Viewer can install and uninstall fonts, sample them, and organize them into categories. This lightweight freeware is compatible with nearly every version of Windows still in use, even 9x releases from the 1990s. Regular updates are logged on the program’s Web site. We tried Font Viewer in 64-bit Windows 7 Home Premium SP1.

Font Viewer is light and fast, and it opened almost the instant we clicked its desktop shortcut. The ReadMe file serves as Font Viewer’s Help file, with installation and usage tips, recommendations for users of various Windows versions, and a list of known issues related to certain font types.

All our fonts were displayed in a browserlike screen overlaid by a window, the Interchange Window, which resembles an enhanced Save File dialog box. The main view has separate tabs for managing installed and not-installed fonts. A file menu accesses all functions: Edit, Format, View, Options, and so on. A scrolling fonts menu next to a preview pane displays each font in two sentences containing each letter of the English language alphabet, as well as buttons for Bold, Italic, Underline, Size, Color, and ANSI characters. Font Viewer displays information about each font, including its type and any available subfamilies. The Not Installed fonts tab has a complete tree view for quickly finding and installing new fonts. We really appreciated being able to install fonts temporarily, not to mention the option to remove all temporary fonts at once.

AMP Font Viewer is excellent for getting an overview of your fonts as well as adding new fonts and removing unnecessary ones. It won’t change the fonts Windows and your other programs use; you’ll have to do that on case-by-case basis. But Font Viewer certainly makes it easier to view, sample, and install new fonts.