The 'outdoor unit that looks awful' is an interesting quirk especially with US equipment - most Japanese and European residential units actually look fine, I'm not sure why American ones have tended to look especially ugly.
I notice this with electrical stuff too - things like switchboards etc. in residential and light commercial installations we have quite neat stuff that's usually quite streamlined and in light white/grey/cream colours, whereas the switchboards and conduits and thigns I see in videos of US home installations look like grey chunky metal stuff that you'd only see in heavy industrial sites here!
Electrical panels are installed in mechanical/electrical rooms or outdoors, there’s zero point in having a cream colored panelboard cover or enclosure. The coating is to protect the metal, not for aesthetics.
Colored conduit is available, but it’s more expensive and specifically used for different low-voltage (under 50V) control wiring, like red for fire alarm wiring, blue for BAS wiring, and so on.
Buying the panel box which is unchanged from the last 70 years and costs $50 less than a nicer new style, but also our houses are big enough the panel is nearly always in a mechanical room so who cares what it looks like.
The ones I think they are referring to a more like industrial control cabinets with DIN mounted breakers, which are indeed (paradoxically) less ‘old industrial’ looking. That Leviton board has a similar look, but with the standard bus bar type mounting in a heavy metal box.
The metal box does serve a useful purpose, which is protecting the flammable wood framing typical in North American construction from fire, where most European and Asian boxes are either much thinner metal, or plastic. Because their construction is often concrete and fire danger is much lower.
I notice this with electrical stuff too - things like switchboards etc. in residential and light commercial installations we have quite neat stuff that's usually quite streamlined and in light white/grey/cream colours, whereas the switchboards and conduits and thigns I see in videos of US home installations look like grey chunky metal stuff that you'd only see in heavy industrial sites here!