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Lunar – macOS utility to set brightness and volume on external monitors

lunar.fyi

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Re: Lunar – macOS utility to set brightness and volume on external monitors

#111

Post by car »

car wrote: post #25

I've been using this every day for a couple of months. My monitors are a Dell P2715Q and LG 32UD59-B. The only issue was with the "Read external monitor brightness periodically" preference, which froze the system. But there is a fair warning. If you feel like supporting the author, here is his Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/alinpanaitiu

I should add that both monitors are connected via DisplayPort. Also, I found that cheap DP cables can really mess things up. Eventually I found via the VESA website which manufacturers have their cables certified. My go to is called Accell, very solid ever since using their cables.

https://vesa.org/displayport-developer/certified-components/

Re: Lunar – macOS utility to set brightness and volume on external monitors

#113

Post by chenxiaolong »

herf wrote: post #17

There is a problem with "cheap" monitors and DDC/CI: some of them use EEPROMs to store brightness settings, and this limits you to about 100,000 writes. Worrying about this is the main reason we don't ship DDC/CI with f.lux. (I know that some more modern monitors use NAND and don't have limitations like this.) Anyone know if these fears are overblown?

Not related to monitors, but this is how I bricked my old Lenovo Thinkpad W520 4 times. I switched between the Intel and Nvidia GPUs via the BIOS setting enough times to wear out the BIOS chip. I didn't figure out what was going on until my 3rd replacement.

Re: Lunar – macOS utility to set brightness and volume on external monitors

#114

Post by andy_ppp »

dublin wrote: post #91

I'd settle for the Mac being smart enough to let me resize each external display to its actual physical size, so dragging between them works. Apparently, Apple thinks it's perfectly OK to assume that all your displays have the same pixel density as your laptop screen - FAIL!

I seem to be able to set scaling on both of my monitors separately... so not sure what you mean. Actually I think on the external display there might be a keyboard shortcut to set common resolution equivalents for the scaling even on lower dpi screens.

Re: Lunar – macOS utility to set brightness and volume on external monitors

#115

Post by jtl999 »

chenxiaolong wrote: post #113
herf wrote: post #17

There is a problem with "cheap" monitors and DDC/CI: some of them use EEPROMs to store brightness settings, and this limits you to about 100,000 writes. Worrying about this is the main reason we don't ship DDC/CI with f.lux. (I know that some more modern monitors use NAND and don't have limitations like this.) Anyone know if these fears are overblown?

Not related to monitors, but this is how I bricked my old Lenovo Thinkpad W520 4 times. I switched between the Intel and Nvidia GPUs via the BIOS setting enough times to wear out the BIOS chip. I didn't figure out what was going on until my 3rd replacement.

Attempting to switch GPUs from userland, or?

Re: Lunar – macOS utility to set brightness and volume on external monitors

#116

Post by arkanslaw »

snowwrestler wrote: post #8

This is a great example of why I like the Touch Bar on my Macbook Pro. When it is connected to an external monitor, I tap the brightness icon in the Touch Bar and get two sliders: one to control brightness on my laptop, and one to control brightness on my external monitor. This seems to be a native feature; I did not install anything to do it.

See, my granny would have a hard time with this because while us young folk can control two sliders at once with ease, she would go as crosseyed as dead ol' Bessie was when we found her out back last year. Apple seems to expect more and more of us - soon we'll all be forced to be DJ's just to use our cell phones (har har!)

Re: Lunar – macOS utility to set brightness and volume on external monitors

#117

Post by hashmap »

JamesBrooks wrote: post #104
wanghq wrote: post #13

Got a MacBook Pro (16-inch, 2019) weeks ago and bought a LG monitor ( https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07YGZ7C1K ). The brightness setting bothered me for 2 weeks as neither the Mac OSX nor LG's onscreen control software can set the brightness for the external monitor. The external monitor brightness changes every time I open/close the macbook lid. Thanks to both ddcctl and MonitorControl, I can finally set a fixed…

How have you found MacOS' font rendering on the 1440p display? I've been having all sorts of trouble in some applications having terrible font rendering while others are perfectly fine running at the monitor's native resolution.

This may be of help https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/guide-fixing-external-m...

Re: Lunar – macOS utility to set brightness and volume on external monitors

#119

Post by alin23 »

toasterrepair wrote: post #112

Love the utility! Been using it for a few months now. I’m curious, but is it possible to have the tool change inputs as well? For example, to change from DisplayPort to hdmi, and back from a keystroke.

Only part of that is possible, changing from the current input to another. But as soon as the monitor is on another input it doesn't accept DDC messages on the first input anymore so Lunar wouldn't also be able to change back.

I plan to implement just the first switch along with a brightness/contrast reset to some default values so you can easily switch the monitor to another input.

Re: Lunar – macOS utility to set brightness and volume on external monitors

#120

Post by alin23 »

car wrote: post #111
car wrote: post #25

I've been using this every day for a couple of months. My monitors are a Dell P2715Q and LG 32UD59-B. The only issue was with the "Read external monitor brightness periodically" preference, which froze the system. But there is a fair warning. If you feel like supporting the author, here is his Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/alinpanaitiu

I should add that both monitors are connected via DisplayPort. Also, I found that cheap DP cables can really mess things up. Eventually I found via the VESA website which manufacturers have their cables certified. My go to is called Accell, very solid ever since using their cables. https://vesa.org/displayport-developer/certified-components/

Hey thank you so much for posting this! I didn't expect this to get so much attention.

Also that VESA page is golden, now I know where to point people when they ask me for advice on what peripherals to buy.

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