> Despite that I get a crystal clear HD picture for all participants, but I'd happily sacrifice video quality (in fact I'd accept audio only in some cases) to get a more real time experience (disabling video doesn't seem to have any effect).

If you're really willing to sacrifice video completely, at least for Zoom, and probably for lots of other videoconferencing solutions, you can call into meetings with your phone. In fact, I think Zoom allows you to join with the computer for video and the phone for audio, which might be the best of both worlds.