That does fix it, though I was getting used to the client side fonts :( What version of XFree86 is needed to get a good xrender? I am running version 4.1.0.
You need 4.2.0. You can also just build libXrender.so, which is not that hard to pull out of CVS and build by itself.
Finally, I have attached the king daddy of all kludges that may let you use your Xrender without modification, but use at your own risk... (you'll probably also need to hand assemble the patch, it's a delta from our internal tree and is not likely to apply).
Jer