I disabled dithering on Apple silicon + Introducing Stillcolor macOS M1/M2/M3

Rikl It seems like it's "always" 0 until using the laptop outside or it sometimes gets stuck after going back indoors, then it shoots up to really high numbers and you start to see "moving blotches" across certain colors that change in response to moving the mouse (which become obvious because dithering is also disabled, which means the OS can't "hide" these artifacts). Sometimes I also catch it moving very slightly in some brighter indoor locations but around lower numbers

photon78s Maybe try DFU restore to earlier macOS version? Not just a reinstall but a full DFU restore - requires connecting to another Mac (or unofficially a Linux device) with USB-C - which is how you downgrade not only the OS but also the bootloader/firmware version

DisplaysShouldNotBeTVs

Too bad I returned the other mac mini. Will look into this. In the meantime, if I'm going to use it for long periods of time, I would remote in or the lossy capture card approach from a PC.

Ruoma I tried two M2 airs and one definitely had less yellow glow than the other, they had different panels so probably M3 has panel lottery too. Unfortunately though, if one of them is already giving you that feeling, I'm pretty sure that modern MacBook in general won't work for you as for example I still get the same feeling to a wide extent (mostly while using it indoors) on the M1 Air.

What laptop are you upgrading from?

Another thing to try is disabling brightness compensation (needs BetterDisplay installed and running). This made my M1 Air screen noticeably less yellow:

/Applications/BetterDisplay.app/Contents/MacOS/BetterDisplay set -namelike=built -framebufferBoolProperty=off -specifier=IOMFBBrightnessCompensationEnable

Weirdly enough, I've noticed that a lot of the yellow glow feeling is gone on my M1 Air while booted into Asahi Linux (even though I can still see temporal dithering), but of course can't really transfer that into macOS.

If you can't get things working for you within the return period I'd highly suggest you return, as in my case I've only ever had issues like this (in the case of laptops) on MacBooks, a lot of the problems come from the screen and not my eyes.

I've definitely seen some bad Windows laptops I also wouldn't want to use daily (mostly newer ones) but still nothing has that extreme disorientation and "your field of vision is continuously becoming more crushed down and constrained" feeling that is present within all new Mac internal displays/iPhones/iPads and can even slightly be felt in older Apple devices too.

Maybe try another M2 or M3 Air after that, since many ship with entirely different LCD panels from the last as I experienced.

Another one to try is the M2 Touch Bar Pro (but only units that have "000000" in their display EDID are good. If you end up getting one with "FMX" in the EDID or no zeroes, it's one of the really bad ones as confirmed by multiple people here. Definitely try one more if you end up with an FMX Touch Bar Pro panel.)

if still doesn't work after that, modern MacBooks are probably not for you and you should look for a different laptop.

DisplaysShouldNotBeTVs @aiaf I can definitely still vouch for the fact that there's something weird going on with macOS (or, specifically newer macOS DCP firmware, still haven't tried a DFU restore yet) aside from dithering, both in terms of backlight control and flicker

Installed a matte screen protector to get glare out of the equation entirely and I can notice this switching between macOS Ventura 13.6.6 (but on top of Sonoma 14.4.1 firmware) vs. Asahi Linux 40 (but on top of "temporarily loaded in" Ventura 13.2 DCP firmware)

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Let's split flicker into two separate beasts, the classic type of "FRC" temporal dithering that is definitely distracting and a big source of strain but doesn't really "mess with the position of things" - text and colors are obviously flickering, but every pixel despite this flicker still stays within it's correct place and it doesn't feel like the entire UI is twitching erratically in all four directions like you're trying to look at it on a moving boat.

Then, there's the really weird stuff going on inside macOS which I can only describe as a "disorientation pattern". This is the type of flicker that actually makes it feel like everything is moving around, no pixel ever feels "locked" to one location to my brain, your attention randomly jumps to small items on the screen, edges seem to "glow", and seems to be responsible for the really weird "false 3D depth" effect many people such as @async have discussed here. "When moving one item around it also feels like something on the entire other side of the screen is slightly changing too."

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On macOS, it feels like I can successfully disable "typical FRC" flickering with Stillcolor, but the weird "disorientation pattern" flicker remains. On the M1 Air it's tolerable enough to use outdoors, but indoors even with the matte screen protector on I get tired so fast looking at macOS even with Stillcolor and disabling as many IOMFB properties as possible.

The yellow glow that @Ruoma mentioned is here and even feels like it's shining through my matte screen protector. here are obvious shenanigans going on that are either coming from macOS or the newer Sonoma firmware.

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Meanwhile, while booted on Asahi, the "typical FRC" is currently unsolvable since there is no Stillcolor equivalent in Linux to interact with the IOMFB registry. I can notice flicker that feels similar to the type of FRC used on external monitors. The same "subtype" of flicker that is also present in macOS but can be disabled with Stillcolor.

However, the "disorientation pattern" flicker is not here at all. Even though I can still notice FRC which is definitely still a big issue… on the other hand, everything feels "locked into one location", images feel much flatter, the "false 3D depth effect" is significantly minimized. And very interestingly, the feeling of "backlight glowing" essentially stops.

When scrolling within one small scroll area, unlike macOS, it doesn't feel like "the rest of the screen is moving as well". Only the small scroll area feels like it's moving.

With the matte screen protector, I can actually use Asahi Linux indoors without the instant "tiredness and nausea symptoms" I get from my macOS install. I still get external monitor-esque FRC strain symptoms (which probably could be fixed if Stillcolor was ported to Asahi Linux ) causing the screen to still feel harsher than a FRC-free display, but it's so much better than macOS.

Web browsing on Asahi vs macOS feels like using two entirely different computers, and this is true even if I only focus on the solid colors and not the text rendering.

"FRC" flickering is still present in Asahi because I can't use Stillcolor, but the really weird "instantly recognizable Apple disorientation effect" type of flickering that Stillcolor can't disable, for lack of a better phrase, is temporarily gone while using Asahi until booting back into macOS.

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There is definitely a lot more to investigate aside from enableDither. If Asahi can still have "totally recognizable FRC flickering going on" to me while so many other symptoms are gone, there are definitely other types of flicker that macOS is adding in that make it much worse than just regular FRC.