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

NewDwarf video capture card can only ever record the processing that macOS uses for external display output. it can't record whatever changes are occurring for internal display.

for example, uniformity2D is a parameter that controls a "fade to black" effect at the edges of specifically the internal XDR display. when toggling this, you can clearly and obviously see the brightness of the screen edges changing on the MacBook screen itself.

however, this parameter will not change anything for external display output including any HDMI/DisplayPort capture card recording. (even though capture cards are a good way to measure the quality of external monitor output, and still provide way more information about how external video signals are being messed with than e.g. a basic QuickTime screen recording which will tell you nothing)

for example, trying to tell external output to turn uniformity2D on won't make a black fade ever show up on an external monitor, the property only ever controls the internal miniLED panel, which can't be captured through video out.

aiaf interesting, actually very surprised if it's a true 10-bit panel

do you suspect the M2 MacBook Air with "support for billions of colors" is also a true 10-bit panel?

given that in comparison, the M1 MacBook Air specs say the internal screen only supports "millions of colors", despite macOS still forcing desktop bit depth to 10 bpc on both Airs

on the other hand, the other possible scenario is the M2 Air uses FRC on the panel to achieve "10-bit", like how some 10-bit capable external monitors work, and the M1 Air simply chops off the last 2 bits of precision

aiaf i notice the banding gets more significant/less precise on some transparency effects and shadows, especially when Software Brightness is lower. (BetterDisplay feature, controls brightness of the color profile/gamma table for reference.)

there are also some very specific shades of gray where when VUCEnable is default (on), my brain will feel like they are not totally solid and have some blurry reddish blotches. when VUCEnable is off, this will become obvious — the parts i suspected were more reddish will have more obvious reddish "blocky irregular pattern of larger squares" filling those areas. you can find these shades by slowly moving the Software Brightness slider while looking at a solid gray background, some levels will cause this pattern to immediately appear.

(i say "more obvious" but you still have to look closely to see them, it's just that an actual pattern of squares that always remain at the same position is visible now)

i did notice and do agree that leaving VUCEnable at default (on) actually did make me feel the best, despite the increased banding with it off. just disabling dither and uniformity2D seemed to create the most comfortable screen so far (relatively, still a lot worse than other laptops lol). i did feel like i noticed some strange flicker with VUCEnable off.

https://ledstrain.org/d/1111-external-graphics-egfxegpu/8

From @Seagull

When turning dithering off you'll only see the difference on a laptop screen. Desktop monitors do their own dithering in addition to any graphics card dithering. Laptop screens are dumb, and rely on the graphics card to dither for them.

Emphasis mine.
But then this is Apple...