[Mike]

Is that definitive info? It certainly looks better on my somewhat more modest 5+ year old Hitachi telly.

Apps wise they are still on old infrastructure (a given if they're using CasparCG as opposed to the Ross solution). You can see the PQ change when they soft opt on the iPlayer stream along with the telltale black bar.

From being nosy with Amy Garcia's X feed I can see that since at least May they've had the newer Sony cameras, which are native HD. The last technical upgrade they got in the gallery not linked to Caspar replacing the Aston and the new set was in 2017 when they got a new multi-viewer and monitor stack but the VM stayed the same.

It may be that some kit has been relocated from other parts of Nations and Regions to replace failing or aging kit (they were still on a GVG Zodiak in July), they may have wound up with Norwich's old mixer for instance which may help? I don't actually know - but they haven't switched to HD or the IGS yet.

Interesting. Look North's headlines have definitely changed in the past few days. I'm wondering if the dark gradient has been made more transparent, as it's still there, but seems more subtle – and then they've added the stroke/drop shadow to keep legibility.

I'd have assumed a change like this was someone in Leeds doing their own thing, as the regions tend to do with generic looks after a while. But odd that it's on Midlands Today as well. Is it possible that someone in Leeds/Birmingham/wherever would have access to change the universal Caspar template, affecting multiple regions?

I don't think they would; the templates are stored on the Caspar server at each site and are almost standalone from the other kit. As I said the strange outline has been there since at least 2019 on Midlands Today:
www.youtube.com 

Weirdly the first day they were able to do multi-line headlines

and this video shows Leeds had the shadow/outline in September

www.youtube.com