Gurm was this a 13in or 15in model?
Found a Method for checking for Dithering on Mac
Gurm I see. Would you mind making a list of MBPs you tested with ratings of "eyefriendlyness" from 1 to 10 or something? Would be really interested in your findings.
Currently I was using a 2018 13'' model that I cannot stand anymore after looking at it for some seconds. Really bad. Now I am trying my 2015 13'' model again which seems to be better.
Not to rain on this or anything, but be aware that Apple does issue firmware updates in addition to software updates. A used system from years ago would have had an update or two along the way. It's not enough to identify a model, it is also required to identify a point in time as well.
- Edited
JTL Hi, no I don't have evidence, but, I remember from my old Macbook that firmware updates included EFI updates and to the SMC as well. They did not come fast and furious, but they existed and as such represent a material change separate from that of an OS. You can see a list for older models here, https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT201518
Apple probably never touches the vBIOS, but if they did, it would probably be bundled into something like the SMC.. SMC stands for system management controller, and is the logic board. You just don't know, unless one has a tool that can query the system at a low-level in some manner and compare before and after.
OS updates include the firmware updates.
a month later
Gurm Deep within the depths of the 10.14 installer DMG.
(Still on 10.11 here, looking to upgrade soon because 10.11 is getting long in the tooth.
jtl-macbookpro:AMDFirmware jtl$ pwd
/Volumes/jtl/10.14 firmware/extract/Scripts/Tools/AMDFirmware
jtl-macbookpro:AMDFirmware jtl$ ls
total 472
drwx------ 1 jtl staff 16K 20 Sep 21:27 .
drwx------ 1 jtl staff 16K 20 Sep 18:13 ..
-rwx------ 1 jtl staff 179K 17 Aug 15:47 AMDvbiosupdater.efi
-rwx------ 1 jtl staff 2.9K 20 Sep 21:15 AMDvbiosupdater.efi.j132ap.im4m
-rwx------ 1 jtl staff 2.9K 20 Sep 21:15 AMDvbiosupdater.efi.j137ap.im4m
-rwx------ 1 jtl staff 2.9K 20 Sep 21:15 AMDvbiosupdater.efi.j680ap.im4m
drwx------ 1 jtl staff 16K 20 Sep 18:13 PayloadsI'll see if I can find anything else interesting.
2 months later
- Edited
Have anybody tried SwitchResX app? It has the switch labeled "Millions of Colors/Billions of Colors". Should be a 8bit/10bit switch.
When I set it to millions — screen starts to look much more "static" for my eyes and gradient banding appears.
Is this related to the recent font smoothing changes?
I do use SwitchResX to pick non retina resolution on my MBP 13''. Also have Air''. The millions is selected by default (8bit).
Maybe the billions(10bit) was picked on the 15inch laptops or for the 27'' desktop.
I keep it on millions, I had tried the billions in the past but I did not feel any difference.
poliakov
Hei, dusted off my 2500€ paperweight and tried it out 
(test image: spotify discover weekly background gradient)
I pulled samples into one big screenshot with some additional info - check it out.
Looks like SwitchResX outputs the same result as having an older color profile (AdobeRGB 1998) and NightShift: On.
Wierd thing is that my daily OK work computer Lenovo T440s 2015-ish with 50Hrz Intel HD raphics family is having also this finer mesh like gradient (like MP default first setting) but is perfectly normal for me to look at. Comparing these two just by looks the Mackbook screen has a lot more ghosting going on when I move my mose around (so it might be lower in refresh Hrz?)
Anyway, will try to do some longer work with the settings of adobeRGB, nightshift and SwitchResX on and report back how it went.
Also to note when the Mackbook Pro Radeon Pro kicks in then nothing matters, its all really smooth gradients no color settings or SwitchResX affect that.
Definitely interested in staying in the loop. I've had largely the same issues with new displays, and swore for a while that it was some sort of dithering to do with 8-bit color. Just ordered a 15" MBP 2018 after upgrading to Win10 on my old work computer started to make me feel funny much the way my purchase earlier this year of a PC w/an 8700k/1070 did. Thought it might be a Win10 thing. Maybe not...
There's an extensive Intel thread on the issue here: https://forums.intel.com/s/question/0D50P0000490Nm4SAE/eye-strain?language=en_US
They allegedly did tons of testing and couldn't find anything, which is really discouraging. It seemed like they even took in the hardware of some users having issues and had it third-party tested. Really impressed with the diligence, if disappointed by the result.
Things that do seem to make things worse for me:
- 8 bit color depth
- Win10 (maybe that just =newer Intel drivers?)
Things that don't bother me at all:
- My iPhone X
- My old iPad Air (OG)
- My HP Zbook G3 before Win10 upgrade / with 6 bit default color depth. PWM for brightness reduction didn't even bug me here
I continue to feel like white screens look like they're moving on these newer machines. It's like looking at colorful static. I briefly see the same thing when looking away from them at a "normal" screen before my eyes settle. It's like something is preventing my eyes from properly focusing and forces squinting, drives headaches. A familiar tale, I know - just wanted to join this discussion here, as I type this on my day-old MBP that I want to love :c
JTL fair enough. I wish there was transparency from Intel on stuff like this. Sometimes, testing is the simplest solution. Others, though, I’d think would be better solved by addressing major changes in the drivers. Feels like “patch notes” should be available for that.
Also, I’d imagine color used in testing matters. White screens are the worst for me, as I assume they have the most depth of color?
Separately, do we know if image rendering has changed in the case of dedicated GPUs? Is there some sort of Intel passthrough / post-processing still happening on modern machines? Is there a way to disable the internal graphics entirely?
8 days later
Now I have done 3 consecutive days of work on my 2018 15"MBP with the following settings:
Color profile: AdobeRGB1998, NightShift: ON-first setting, Screen brightness at 100%, That brightness software-lowered with Iris brightness settings (all other settings untouched).
Oh and taped over the keyboard-screen-strip-thingy as well so it wouldn't be a factor.
Worked with resource-light apps, vscode and such (so that the added ATI graphics would'nt start up) and I can almost say that right now its usable. Can't say that my eyes are totally relaxed, but its manageable - and doing code work has always been more stressful for my eyes.
The ATI radeon Pro 555X is still a partystopper though (nerveous system strain can be felt within 15 minutes of use) and it kicks in every time something resource heavy is run so I can't use any of the adobe design programs or online apps that hardware-accelerate like Figma.
Also official apple accessibility support (not the regular support) actually wrote me back and suggested to run the screen at max brightness and disable all the true tones and night-sifts and such. But night shift is somehow a helping factor as it prevents the integrated intel UHD graphics from dithering that hard.
Cheers to you all and Merry Holidays