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If anyone has both a 4K display and a 2013 retina macbook pro please do this test!

jbg232

jbg232

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Oct 15, 2007
1,148
10
Like the title states, if anyone has a 4K display and a late 2013 retina macbook pro with thunderbolt 2 please let us know if the display will output at 60Hz when connected through the thunderbolt/mini display port. Apple only comments on the HDMI output on their official support page on 4K displays and the macbook pro.

Thanks
 
jbg232 said:
like the title states, if anyone has a 4k display and a late 2013 retina macbook pro with thunderbolt 2 please let us know if the display will output at 60hz when connected through the thunderbolt/mini display port. Apple only comments on the hdmi output on their official support page on 4k displays and the macbook pro.

Thanks
Click to expand...

+1000
 
Just picked up a LG 4k display (27EA83R LG Display at Newegg) to go along with my new rMBP. I have the late 2013 15" with a 2.3 i7 and NVIDIA 750M. I connected it using a mini displayport to displayport cable and perfect - 2560 x 1440 @ 60 Hz. Apple never documented this would work, so I took a chance assuming it would and perfect! I'm surprised Apple doesn't promote this capability. FAR better than the 2560 x 1440 @ 30 Hz they document can be achieved using the HDMI port. It also works perfectly when booted to my BootCamp partition running Windows 7 64 bit.

There you go - for anyone interested, tested and working. Run out and buy one! Or even two, why not? They look great!
 
From Apple :

HDMI video output
Support for 1080p resolution at up to 60Hz
Support for 3840-by-2160 resolution at 30Hz
Support for 4096-by-2160 resolution at 24Hz
 
Beelzebubba666 said:
Just picked up a LG 4k display (27EA83R LG Display at Newegg) to go along with my new rMBP. I have the late 2013 15" with a 2.3 i7 and NVIDIA 750M. I connected it using a mini displayport to displayport cable and perfect - 2560 x 1440 @ 60 Hz. Apple never documented this would work, so I took a chance assuming it would and perfect! I'm surprised Apple doesn't promote this capability. FAR better than the 2560 x 1440 @ 30 Hz they document can be achieved using the HDMI port. It also works perfectly when booted to my BootCamp partition running Windows 7 64 bit.

There you go - for anyone interested, tested and working. Run out and buy one! Or even two, why not? They look great!
Click to expand...

Your display is, at 2560x1440, not 4K, though.

The ASUS PQ321Q would be 4K - at 3840x2160. Just $3323 instead of $3499, yay!
 
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Beelzebubba666 said:
Just picked up a LG 4k display (27EA83R LG Display at Newegg) to go along with my new rMBP. I have the late 2013 15" with a 2.3 i7 and NVIDIA 750M. I connected it using a mini displayport to displayport cable and perfect - 2560 x 1440 @ 60 Hz. Apple never documented this would work, so I took a chance assuming it would and perfect! I'm surprised Apple doesn't promote this capability. FAR better than the 2560 x 1440 @ 30 Hz they document can be achieved using the HDMI port. It also works perfectly when booted to my BootCamp partition running Windows 7 64 bit.

There you go - for anyone interested, tested and working. Run out and buy one! Or even two, why not? They look great!
Click to expand...
QHD not Ultra HD. ;)

Interesting to know it runs full resolution on HDMI, thanks!
 
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Giuly said:
Your display is, at 2560x1440, not 4K, though.

The ASUS PQ321Q would be 4K - at 3840x2160. Just $3323 instead of $3499, yay!
Click to expand...

Yes, we need to know 3840x2160, no one is doubting 2560x1440 (that's the iMac display and lower resolution than I'm running now)

Peace said:
From Apple :

HDMI video output
Support for 1080p resolution at up to 60Hz
Support for 3840-by-2160 resolution at 30Hz
Support for 4096-by-2160 resolution at 24Hz
Click to expand...

Thunderbolt 2 theoretically support 3840x2160 at 60Hz but HDMI 1.4 doesn't which is why this test needs to be done through the thunderbolt port.
 
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jbg232 said:
Yes, we need to know 3840x2160, no one is doubting 2560x1440 (that's the iMac display and lower resolution than I'm running now)



Thunderbolt 2 theoretically support 3840x2160 at 60Hz but HDMI 1.4 doesn't which is why this test needs to be done through the thunderbolt port.
Click to expand...

Wasn't there a thread about someone running 4K at 30Hz with a Seki 4k TV?
 
Giuly said:
Both the ASUS and the MBP support DisplayPort 1.2, so all testing should just yield "Yep." for 3840x2160@60.
Click to expand...

They should, but no one has seen it happen yet which is the reason for the thread. Supposedly it works in windows but not in mavericks suggesting driver support problems.
 
I don't think so. If Apple says that it's Thunderbolt 2, then so it is. And Intel says DisplayPort 1.2 is part of Thunderbolt 2.

I doubt that you will see anyone confirming this until you can pick up a 4K display for $999, though. For whichever reason, only Windows people pick those up at $3.3K.
 
Beelzebubba666 said:
Just picked up a LG 4k display (27EA83R LG Display at Newegg) to go along with my new rMBP. I have the late 2013 15" with a 2.3 i7 and NVIDIA 750M. I connected it using a mini displayport to displayport cable and perfect - 2560 x 1440 @ 60 Hz. Apple never documented this would work, so I took a chance assuming it would and perfect! I'm surprised Apple doesn't promote this capability. FAR better than the 2560 x 1440 @ 30 Hz they document can be achieved using the HDMI port. It also works perfectly when booted to my BootCamp partition running Windows 7 64 bit.

There you go - for anyone interested, tested and working. Run out and buy one! Or even two, why not? They look great!
Click to expand...

LOL this site is great. FAR BETTER THEN 1440P.. but my screen is only 1440p
 
m98custom1212 said:
LOL this site is great. FAR BETTER THEN 1440P.. but my screen is only 1440p
Click to expand...

Just checked this thread since posting... I stated incorrectly about the "4k", obviously. I had been following a few threads on this similiar topic and someone elsewhere was asking about any HQHD monitor and the new MBP machines and what port supported what. My mistake...but... 1440 @ 60 Hz is far better than 1440 @ 30 Hz. Quite a difference, actually.
 
Beelzebubba666 said:
Just checked this thread since posting... I stated incorrectly about the "4k", obviously. I had been following a few threads on this similiar topic and someone elsewhere was asking about any HQHD monitor and the new MBP machines and what port supported what. My mistake...but... 1440 @ 60 Hz is far better than 1440 @ 30 Hz. Quite a difference, actually.
Click to expand...

Are you gaming? What is the difference
 
Any updates on this? I'm planning on purchasing a 2013 15" retina for the sole purpose of connecting a Dell Ultrasharp 4K display to it while at home via the Display Port 1.2 connection.

So it looks like this is still not resolved on mavericks but it works on Windows?
That's pretty funny honestly.

Maybe when the Mac Pro comes out they will update mavericks for proper 4k support?
 
So who wants to be the guinea pig? I highly doubt a rMBP could drive the ASUS monitor at 4K resolutions, but I am curious what's the highest performance we could get with no lag and looking good.
 
PDFierro said:
So who wants to be the guinea pig? I highly doubt a rMBP could drive the ASUS monitor at 4K resolutions, but I am curious what's the highest performance we could get with no lag and looking good.
Click to expand...

why do you doubt it?

apple says it can do 4096x2150 24fps over hdmi
apple says it can do all 4k resolutions at 60fps over displayport 1.2 through tb2
apple says it can cope with internal 2880x1800 and two 2560x1600 simultaneously

even if you compare the number of pixels to drive two 2560x1600 displays to 4096x2150, it's only a 7% difference

(2560*1600)*2 = 8192000
4096*2160 = 8847360

so if you close the laptop and only run the 4k monitor its about 34% less pixels than the triple screen setup people say runs fine..

(2560*1600)*2 + 2880*1800 = 13376000
4096*2160 = 8847360

though an actual test to see how well it performs / how loud the fans get would be nice

----

additionally if you use apple's scaling options and pick 1920x1200 it runs the screen at 3840x2400 (keeping the 200% dpi) and scales that image down (looks better than plain 1920x1200) and that is 9216000 pixels so...
 
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jbg232 said:
Apple doesn't expressly say that... That's the problem.
Click to expand...

sure apple doesn't state 4k anywhere

however the only reason the hdmi is limited to 24fps is due to the hdmi version being 1.4 not 2.0

the tb2 ports are 20G/ss and support display port 1.2 (requires 17.28GB/s) which can do 4k 60fps

and the graphics cards irispro & 750m can both do 4k

iris pro "Each digital port [of which there are three] is capable of capable of driving resolutions up to 3840x2160 at 60 Hz through DisplayPort and 4096x2304 at 24 Hz/2560x1600 at 60 Hz using HDMI" source (page 32)

page 36 shows a table of all valid combinations actually showing a possible 4k 60fps over eDP (internal display) and dual 4k fps external displays over DP

750m "Up to 3840x2160" source
 
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jbg232 said:
Apple doesn't expressly say that... That's the problem.
Click to expand...

I just wanted to say that this is a great thread and one I'm keeping an eye on.
I have purchased a maxed out current MacBook Pro with Retina 15" (not cheap) and was hoping to connect a Ultra HD 3840 x 2160 display.

So am I correct in thinking that this is a software issue with Mavericks at the moment?
With some new displays being released soon with Thunderbolt 2, will this perhaps fix the issue? or not?

Thanks again.
 
The truth is... no one knows. It is strange that Apple specifically mentions that only mac pros will work with 4K monitors at 60Hz but it seems to be software only at this point thus likely due to the drivers. Whether apple will put the resources into developing drivers for the graphics card of the new rMBP is still an unknown.
 
I'm baffled that Microsoft have better support for Apple's hardware than Apple does.

What are they playing at?!
 
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