Brightness and sound dialogue box don’t react to my input on MacBook Pro running macOS Sequoia

Hello Everyone! I have a problem with the brightness and sound dialogue

boxes that don’t react to my input. When I increase or decrease either, the appropriate

dialogues open OK but the sliders remain blank (see below). This happens on two Intel

MacBook pros running Sequoia. Both dialogues behave normally on an Intel iMac

running Ventura. It’s annoying me and I'm wondering if can fix it.

[Re-Titled by Moderator]

Original Title: Broken sound and brightness dialogues

MacBook Pro 16″, macOS 15.5

Posted on Jul 13, 2025 1:54 AM

Top-ranking reply

David Miller7 Author

Level 1

70 points

Posted on Jul 14, 2025 1:02 AM

Update! Brightness and dialogue boxes are now working normally (examples below)! While going through the EtreCheck report, it occurred to me that I use Marcel Bresink's TinkerTool utility to set up a 'hybrid' dark mode menubar and dock but with an otherwise light global appearance, just because I prefer it that way. Anyway, turns out that resetting that mode to the macOS default and then setting the hybrid appearance up again solves the issue. Note the dialogues appear dark in this mode too. So my apologies to those who tried to help me, but at least you got me thinking about what might be the root cause!

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27 replies

Owl-53

Level 10

107,199 points

Jul 14, 2025 2:33 AM in response to David Miller7

First report generated

EtreCheckPro version: 6.8.8 (68072)

Report generated: 2025-07-13 14:12:56

Second report generated

EtreCheckPro version: 6.8.6 (68056)

Report generated: 2025-07-14 10:09:45

Current version of Etrecheck application is 6.8.10 (68077

Arrive at ones’ own conclusions

Jul 14, 2025 4:01 AM in response to Luis Sequeira1

Sorry, that’s just nonsense. Lots of negative anecdotes but I’ve not found any good evidence that this software’s harmful. Admittedly, I’m not convinced it’s helpful either! It’s on a trial ATM and will probably be deleted.

BDAqua

Level 10

251,171 points

Jul 13, 2025 6:24 AM in response to Luis Sequeira1

Owl-53

Level 10

107,199 points

Jul 13, 2025 6:26 AM in response to Luis Sequeira1

Good catch 😀

Jul 13, 2025 7:44 AM in response to Owl-53

Thanks for the tip! I tried this and it definitely improves the granularity of brightness and sound but makes no difference to the blankness of the dialogue boxes!

Jul 13, 2025 8:59 AM in response to Owl-53

I'll bear that in mind. One caveat to the poor performance indicatoe; on macOS, I run this machine in low power mode to keep the fans from spinning up too much! Performance will be impacted....

Owl-53

Level 10

107,199 points

Jul 13, 2025 1:00 PM in response to David Miller7

Not to labour on the point but this current issue seems to be unique and a localized issue to both of your machines.

Jul 13, 2025 1:45 PM in response to Owl-53

So it seems!

Owl-53

Level 10

107,199 points

Jul 14, 2025 1:27 AM in response to David Miller7

We must be looking a 2 very different Etrecheck Report

The supplied report generated: 2025-07-13 14:12:56 has not such " Marcel Bresink's TinkerTool utility " listing

Jul 14, 2025 3:11 AM in response to Owl-53

Hmm yes; knuckles wrapped! Here's the report that's generated by 6.8.10. No record of a kernel panic or TinkerTool this time.

6.8.10

Jul 14, 2025 7:44 AM in response to Owl-53

I’ve sorted it as described earlier. Thanks for your input though.

Jul 13, 2025 6:43 AM in response to BDAqua

EtreCheck Report

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Brightness and sound dialogue box don’t react to my input on MacBook Pro running macOS Sequoia