- Edited
One and a half weeks later of regular use.
When this specific Windows OS+old driver combo is used, this 2018 Retina Macbook Air is still basically the most comfortable, sharpest, and crispest "high resolution" screen I've ever used. Basically zero strain.
The only other "retina" devices I've used that rival this in comfort/clarity are:
- 2013 iPad mini 2 (16GB, WiFi) with iOS 10.2
- Surface Pro 4 (i7, 256GB) with Windows 8.1 (through unofficial downgrade method) and old Intel drivers
- iPhone 5 with iOS 6.1.3?
This is crazy because if I boot back into macOS, the screen on this same 2018 MacBook Air is suddenly terrible again, regardless of macOS version, color profile, bit depth, resolution scaling, font smoothing strength, hardware vs. overlay dimming, BetterDisplay dummy displays, boot-args, even with Safe Mode or HW acceleration disabled through Quartz Debug (which gives a slight improvement, but I can still notice moving dither patterns on static content and white backgrounds). Even "viewing Windows screenshots while booted into macOS" looks bad, so ClearType is not a factor.
But then I boot back into Windows and the screen is amazing!
Of course, the current ~2022 Intel Windows driver also has forced color management and temporal dithering too, even with ditherig.exe. But the old 2018 driver that is provided by Mojave's Boot Camp is able to eliminate both.
(As an update to my first post, I've realized that ditherig.exe does have to be open to 100% eliminate dithering and the "shimmering colors" effect.)
I'm bewildered how what appears to me as two different LCD panels can "exist" within one laptop and how much JUST software can completely change perceived display quality.
The nicest thing is that this working setup runs Windows 10 22H2(!!), and even though Windows color management is disabled and """supposedly""" less color accurate, the native 8-bit sRGB LCD still displays beautiful and realistic colors, there are basically no "aesthetic" compromises except for banding in shadow/blur effects.
T2 chip means Apple's official Precision Trackpad driver upgrade is supported, which is incredible, it provides true macOS-quality trackpad smoothness on Windows which is a laptop user's dream come true. This laptop still has pretty good battery life, runs quiet, and web browsing is snappy.
Extremely fast 113600Hz PWM does not affect me, and the display is PWM-free when at high brightness anyway.
For now, I think I've found my endgame, at least for a Windows environment.
(I have disabled Windows Update. Just to be safe, I am also not connecting this laptop to any external displays, since everything is working perfectly right now.)
When I need to use macOS apps, I am screen sharing from this Windows setup into another Mac via NoMachine. This has some quirks and lag but is currently my best "workaround" to use Mac apps strain-free.