rMBP choppy UI

dj95 · Aug 13, 2014

Hello, I've just received my 2014 rMBP - what an amazing machine! Everything is perfect, and I don't mean to pick holes, but is there any fix for the laggy UI when using the three standard Hidpi resolutions? Its not horrendous, but a prime example is simply scrolling down my inbox on the Gmail website. It stutters quite a bit even at the best for retina setting. However, when i select actual 1440x900 non-hidpi resolution using SwitchResX (which obviously looks bad), all lag is gone in such examples, and the whole UI feels noticeably snappier. Is it possible apple will release a software fix for this, or is it down to the Iris graphics simply being too underpowered for the retina resolutions? I would've thought by now these GPUs would be able to handle it? Just looking for some advice

Thanks

Meister · Aug 13, 2014

dj95 said:
... is it down to the Iris graphics simply being too underpowered for the retina resolutions?

That's it.

What you are experiencing is normal. The retina is still very helpful for photos.

KimHansenDK · Aug 13, 2014

But is the laggy UI not supposed to be fixed/minimized with Yosemite?

Sheza · Aug 13, 2014

Meister said:
That's it.

What you are experiencing is normal. The retina is still very helpful for photos.

That doesn't sound very acceptable to me!

TechZeke · Aug 13, 2014

Sheza said:
That doesn't sound very acceptable to me!

I don't know what you expect. I saw this coming when they first announced retina displays.

On non retina displays, all the little animations here and there don't mean much. However, quadruple the resolution and the GPU is having a hard time just keeping up with the OS.

On my rMBP, if I use mission control with 20+ app windows on one desktop, the computer struggles, but if I spread those same apps across multiple desktops, then mission control is smooth as silk. This definitely means the GPU can't handle it, not that the computer itself can't.

Sheza · Aug 13, 2014

TechZeke said:
I don't know what you expect. I saw this coming when they first announced retina displays.

On non retina displays, all the little animations here and there don't mean much. However, quadruple the resolution and the GPU is having a hard time just keeping up with the OS.

On my rMBP, if I use mission control with 20+ app windows on one desktop, the computer struggles, but if I spread those same apps across multiple desktops, then mission control is smooth as silk. This definitely means the GPU can't handle it, not that the computer itself can't.

I thought Apple likes perfection, it doesn't seem right to me to come out with a computer equipped with a graphics chipset that can't even scroll properly on a webpage.

The Surface Pro 3 has even less powerful graphics and a similar screen resolution and I've heard no UI complaints there. Mind you I like having a small number of windows open at any one time, so should I be okay?

Meister · Aug 13, 2014

Sheza said:
That doesn't sound very acceptable to me!

It might not sound like it, but it is.

----------

Sheza said:
I thought Apple likes perfection, it doesn't seem right to me to come out with a computer equipped with a graphics chipset that can't even scroll properly on a webpage.

The Surface Pro 3 has even less powerful graphics and a similar screen resolution and I've heard no UI complaints there. Mind you I like having a small number of windows open at any one time, so should I be okay?

You have been on MR for four years.
Didn't you consult this forum before purchasing a very expensive laptop?
There are tons of threads on the UI lag. I always advise folks to get the mba if they want a snappier UI.

I am not sure it is caused by the Iris gpu not being able to handle it, since it only shows on certain apps.
:apple:

doesn't comment on it and I don't think it's a big deal, for me that is.

Sheza · Aug 13, 2014

Meister said:
It might not sound like it, but it is.

----------

You have been on MR for four years.
Didn't you consult this forum before purchasing a very expensive laptop?
There are tons of threads on the UI lag. I always advise folks to get the mba if they want a snappier UI.

I am not sure it is caused by the Iris gpu not being able to handle it, since it only shows on certain apps.
doesn't comment on it and I don't think it's a big deal, for me that is.

I'm not OP, I haven't bought a rMBP (yet). I joined MR when the iPhone 4 came out as that was my first Apple product bar an iPod Touch.

I wouldn't get the MBA, ever. Terrible screen on that so everyone says. Can't justify the price for the screen.

Meister · Aug 13, 2014

Sheza said:
I'm not OP, I haven't bought a rMBP (yet). I joined MR when the iPhone 4 came out as that was my first Apple product bar an iPod Touch.
I wouldn't get the MBA, ever. Terrible screen on that so everyone says. Can't justify the price for the screen.

I mistook your post for his. The lower part of the post was adressed at him. My apologise.

Mba and rmbp are by far the best laptops on the market. People who call the screen on the mba terrible don't know what they are talking about.

TechZeke · Aug 13, 2014

Sheza said:
I'm not OP, I haven't bought a rMBP (yet). I joined MR when the iPhone 4 came out as that was my first Apple product bar an iPod Touch.

I wouldn't get the MBA, ever. Terrible screen on that so everyone says. Can't justify the price for the screen.

They are over exaggerating. The Air has a nice screen. However, the retina display is VAST improvement. If you are still used to non-retina displays, the Air will be fine. Once you go retina, you can't go back.

Seriously, this forum would make you believe that you need 16GB of RAM to run Chrome, a dedicated GPU to play minecraft, and that any display other than retina will make you go blind.

Atomic Walrus · Aug 13, 2014

Didn't Anandtech originally (2012 model review) conclude that the bottleneck was actually single-threaded CPU performance, not the GPU? Basically all of the UI pre-rendering work was being done by the CPU, leaving the GPU with nothing to do except render the finished frame (something it can definitely handle, even if you're talking about HD4000).

"Next-generation GPUs should do a better job of driving these ultra high resolution displays, but today it looks like our biggest bottlenecks are software and single threaded CPU performance. In every situation where UI frame rate drops significantly on the rMBP, the offending application usually ends up consuming 100% of a single CPU core. This is true in Safari, Mail and other applications where I notice drops in scrolling frame rate." -http://www.anandtech.com/show/6409/13inch-retina-macbook-pro-review/5

Mavericks improved this situation by moving more of the animation, scaling, etc. to the GPU, reducing the CPU load. I can't say how much more software improvement can be made in the future (and Anandtech never went back to address the state of this issue post-Mavericks).

What you need to do is look at the relative load on the CPU and GPU when the UI slows down. If the CPU is still the bottleneck then there's likely more that can moved to the GPU, however if the HD5100 is already running at capacity making software improvements falls to general optimization.

TechZeke said:
They are over exaggerating. The Air has a nice screen.

I disagree... The panels used in the MBA are, in my experience, bad even for TN panels. Maybe not compared to cheap Windows laptops, but compared to the TN panel monitors I've owned (including a 2010 17" MBP with a 1920x1200 TN panel) they're just low quality.

Sheza · Aug 13, 2014

TechZeke said:
They are over exaggerating. The Air has a nice screen. However, the retina display is VAST improvement. If you are still used to non-retina displays, the Air will be fine. Once you go retina, you can't go back.

Seriously, this forum would make you believe that you need 16GB of RAM to run Chrome, a dedicated GPU to play minecraft, and that any display other than retina will make you go blind.

Oh I definitely don't need 16GB of RAM, but as I said I can't justify the price difference and I have seen the MBA in person and wasn't hugely impressed.

jennyp · Aug 13, 2014

Hang on - I was thinking of buying one of these ... but is this right, that we kind of "expect" this great notebook's UI to be all stuttery ? What am I missing here?

DJJAZZYJET · Aug 13, 2014

I see lag in a couple of spots, especially when scrolling down through Facebook or opening the apps utility tray.
On the whole its actually very smooth and impressive.

Im pretty sure Yosemite will have some updated graphics drivers and whatnot, something that will improve the graphics performance.

Right??

Meister · Aug 13, 2014

DJJAZZYJET said:
Im pretty sure Yosemite will have some updated graphics drivers and whatnot, something that will improve the graphics performance.

Right??

I have to disappoint you there. No fix for the scroll lag.

----------

jennyp said:
Hang on - I was thinking of buying one of these ... but is this right, that we kind of "expect" this great notebook's UI to be all stuttery ? What am I missing here?

It's a known "issue". Please let's not blow this out of proportion.
I rather have the retina for photo editing and a bit of stutter with certain pages and apps than no retina at all.

Nr123*123 · Aug 13, 2014

I really can't say I've noticed this on any of the rMBPs I've had. It all looks fine to me.

The only time the computer lagged between switching windows and scrolling was yesterday. I put that down to the battery being at 3% and getting ready to sleep.

KimHansenDK · Aug 13, 2014

Even on the MBA, that does not have to drive that many pixels, you see some lag when scrolling on facebook.

But shouldn't Yosemite improve the lag that sometimes happen when switching spaces/desktops and resizing windows etc?

jennyp · Aug 13, 2014

Meister said:
It's a known "issue". Please let's not blow this out of proportion.

"Out of proportion" ? Why doesn't Apple increase the spec to take care of it? There's obviously at least one person here who's not happy with it.

I seem to remember Craig Federighi talking recently about a "buttery scrolling". OK that was supposed to apply to Yosemite, but I bet the OP still sees it on the new OS.

I guess it's all down to mercantile math.

DJJAZZYJET · Aug 13, 2014

Meister said:
I have to disappoint you there. No fix for the scroll lag.

----------

Isn't that a bit contradictory as to what mavericks did with the scrolling for retina macbook pros?

Scrolling lag isn't that bad anyway, and for what the laptop GPU has got to push out it does an impressive job. Im still sure it can be improved as I hear a lot about Apples negligence with updating graphics drivers.

Meister · Aug 13, 2014

jennyp said:
"Out of proportion" ? Why doesn't Apple increase the spec to take care of it?

Because increasing the specs doesn't take care of it.
It's a software issue and maybe they will be able to fix it.

jennyp · Aug 13, 2014

Meister said:
Because increasing the specs doesn't take care of it.
It's a software issue and maybe they will be able to fix it.

There's no increase in spec on the GPU that would fix it?

Meister · Aug 13, 2014

jennyp said:
There's no increase in spec on the GPU that would fix it?

some folks here reported less stutter with dgpu.
I believe that, like most issues, it's software related. Throwing specs at it is an expensive and unefficient temporary fix. :apple:

traditionally focuses on the software part. Increasing specs to mask bad programming is Microsofts job. Just look at MS office ...

watchthisspace · Aug 14, 2014

Atomic Walrus said:
Didn't Anandtech originally (2012 model review) conclude that the bottleneck was actually single-threaded CPU performance, not the GPU? Basically all of the UI pre-rendering work was being done by the CPU, leaving the GPU with nothing to do except render the finished frame (something it can definitely handle, even if you're talking about HD4000).

"Next-generation GPUs should do a better job of driving these ultra high resolution displays, but today it looks like our biggest bottlenecks are software and single threaded CPU performance. In every situation where UI frame rate drops significantly on the rMBP, the offending application usually ends up consuming 100% of a single CPU core. This is true in Safari, Mail and other applications where I notice drops in scrolling frame rate." -http://www.anandtech.com/show/6409/13inch-retina-macbook-pro-review/5

Mavericks improved this situation by moving more of the animation, scaling, etc. to the GPU, reducing the CPU load. I can't say how much more software improvement can be made in the future (and Anandtech never went back to address the state of this issue post-Mavericks).

What you need to do is look at the relative load on the CPU and GPU when the UI slows down. If the CPU is still the bottleneck then there's likely more that can moved to the GPU, however if the HD5100 is already running at capacity making software improvements falls to general optimization.

I disagree... The panels used in the MBA are, in my experience, bad even for TN panels. Maybe not compared to cheap Windows laptops, but compared to the TN panel monitors I've owned (including a 2010 17" MBP with a 1920x1200 TN panel) they're just low quality.

Wow, hard to think that my RMBP is 2 years old now.. Mavericks definitely helped cut the UI lag down, it's still persistent, but I put that down to the fact I notice it coming from FPS gaming.

UBS28 · Aug 14, 2014

Meister said:
Because increasing the specs doesn't take care of it.
It's a software issue and maybe they will be able to fix it.

My machine doesn't lag like that with the 750m. I have seen the lag on those rMBP machines in the Apple Store, was very easy to spot.

mr.bee · Aug 14, 2014

I thought the lag was because of the low clock speed. Once you start doing the same UI action several times, it will up the clock speed and the UI lag dissapears.

rMBP choppy UI

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