There is a complete fix for the white space nodes when using inline-block which we documented about 5 years ago over at Sitepoint.

It's a combination of negative word-spacing for old browsers plus using display:table on the parent to kill white space nodes between children.

The link is old but the information still valid.

http://community.sitepoint.com/t/css-test-your-css-skills-number-35-inline-block/6665?u=paulob

Hope you fond it useful.