Alan321
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CRC44 wrote:
First posting. Have been trying to research and understand color bit depth and am confused. LR edits my 14 bit canon files in 16 bit space but only outputs 8 bit to my 10 bit monitor which is powered by Radeon HD 7850 graphics card which I still don't know if it is 8 or 10 bit. Did I waste money by getting a 10 bit monitor and do I need to upgrade to a pro graphics card. And what do I do with all the extra bits?
I thought your first posting might have been a bit longer given that it took you 19 months 
Welcome to FM.
Your graphics card has lookup tables that are used in the translation of colours and tones as part of the colour management process. Whether 8-bit or 10-bit, I don't know, but Lr will only be feeding it 8 bits. I don't know how clever the card is but some of the better monitors have their own lookup tables and their own internal processor to convert 8-bit (or maybe 10-bit) colours into 10-, 12- or 14-bits for the purpose of colour profiling (producing the right output colour and tone for whatever input it receives). Because the monitors LUT data and the profile conversion calculations are done at more than 8-bits, more precision is retained and the displayed results are better. i.e. the colours are more like they should be and the brightness of the screen is more uniform throughout.
Up-market NEC and Eizo monitors seem to have the highest internal precision, and those that can handle 10-bit inputs usually have more than 10-bit internal precision. That's not always the case with other monitors. My Dell can handle 10-bit precision maximum and even that may be reduced when screen uniformity is on.
Chances are that you have not wasted your money. One day, probably a long, long time from now  we'll get operating systems and software that do a good job of using 10-bit colours all the way to the monitor.
- Alan
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