My original comment was for free_electron, who seemed to imply that there are no DACs to be found anywhere in an LCD panel.
And that is correct. The LCD is driven using a stepped control voltage. A master step generator feeds the step voltages to the column drivers. The column driver selects a range in the step and potentially subdivides it. The steps are not linearly spaced but follow an S-curve tuned to the lcd material used. the light intensity follows a sinusoid behavior as it is a 90 degree rotation angle of the crystal that blocks the light. As temperature changes the step generator adapts the step voltages as well.
Once the base step voltage is switched in ( note that all these steps are a big bus with over a thousand independent , static , voltage levels. There is no DAC involved. ) using a multiplexer under control of the pixel data word the selected step voltage is loaded on a capacitor .
Depending on the phase of the backplane the cap is connected forward or reverse to the pixel. So when the backplane changes phase we reverse the polarity of the capacitor (lcd pixels need to toggle, they cant remain static....) there is a simple buffer opamp between cap and pixel line.
There are two capacitors. One holds the current 'value' of the pixel being applied while another is being loaded with the charge for the next line ( this example assumes the active drivers are column based ) . When the next line begins all caps have been charged and we do it all over again ..
No dacs have been harmed in driving the LCD panel. It's all pure digital.
Every column driver chip controls maybe 256 columns. For advanced panels that have matrixed backlighting that is controllable per tile ( whether white backlight or full spectrum RGB backlight ) they can actually reprogram the Step-curve to be in sync with the background RGB setting. This way they can 'boost' pixels and create larger dynamic range. The DCD technology from Faroudja is the absolute king in this. They now have full RGB backlight controllable per tile.
You could consider the step-generator and multiplexer a form of switched-cap DAC , but it really isn't .. the base principle is totally different. using a true dac per column driver would require a massive amount of silicon area , be a nightmare to trim them all identically, keep them tracking under temperature , and they would need fast settling times. the required logic would be immense... it's not feasible.
But, for the laymen the marketing bullshitters use the terminology 'DAC' because this is the highest level the 'layman' understands (they have been pavlovianly conditioned to drool when they hear technobabble) and 12 is higher than 10 so it must be good ... no ?
In reality it is nonsense.