Erm, no, the capacitor fix (across the AD8400 pins) *will* fix the dim-at-bootup problem.

The capacitor fix smooths out any glitches in the AD8400 (digital pot controlling the divider on the VFD main PSU feedback) chip select line. A glitch will affect both adjustments of the dimmer and the initial setting - basically, any time the PIC tries to set a dimmer level. It does this both at startup and when a dimmer command is received from the main board.

Hugo