Wouldn't be surprised though if the original channel ran on a much tighter budget than the half channel we have today.
I'm not sure on that one but I remember that they spent quite a bit of money on the 1999 re-brand/re-launch.
But that relaunch also included the BBC1 news, and even the regions for the first time ever. Only Newsnight escaped.
Newsnight did actually have a refresh in 1999, although it was earlier in the year than the national news bulletins in the May. The 1997 titles were dropped and it received an updated set. Pretty much everything across BBC News was refreshed in 1999 or 2000.
I'm pretty sure I remember reading somewhere that there were different classes of programming that didn't come under the BBC News umbrella which is why they deliberately had a different look, such as Newsnight and Newsround.
Not sure if it is officially under the BBC News umbrella but your evidence is 6 years out of date - the BBC News logo is definitely not on the endboard any more.
Speaking of that era of Newsnight titles, for the first time in a
looong
time they played the full theme tune out at the beginning of the programme a few days back, which they haven't done since either the titles seen above, or the era before that!