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Macbook Pro Retina Benchmarks

M

MacDevMike

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 13, 2012
122
39
Discovery Bay, Ca
I see that we have some Geekbench scores for the new Macbook Pro Retina, but I was wondering if anyone can produce some graphics benchmarks as well. Im thinking:

3dMark Vantage
3dMark 2011

I know that these are Windows benchmarks but they are typically a pretty good base line of how fast the gaming performance is. I am guessing that we may see around 10k in 3dMark Vantage on the 650M with Ivy Bridge...which would be around 40-50 percent faster then my 6750m.

Post the benchmarks guys!

:apple:
 
New Retina MBP is slower than non-retina

This might not come as a surprise or a shock, but given that the new retina MBP has the same graphics card as the equivalent non-retina variant, I went to the local Mac store and did a quick side-by-side comparison.

In native resolution, opening a bunch of windows in safari and all programs that apple has in their default apple store dock, the retina macbook pro struggled to open up mission control. The lag was very noticeable and made me reconsider my decision to get the retina MBP...

The non-retina new MBP (2012) performed admirably and mission control opened up smoothly as warm butter, but on the retina model, it was laggy.

Another quick test I did was to bring up launchpad, here too, the retina MBP displayed sub-60fps performance and there was a noticeable lag, compared to the non-retina MBP that was standing next to it.

When I brought the retina resolution up to 1680x1050 and then 1920x1200 (scaled), the lag was even more noticeable.

I wanted to get the new MBP to get away from the horrible mission control lag that plagued slower models, but, while not horrible, the lag is still very much there on the retina display. So if you ever got frustrated with mission control for being slow when you have lots of apps running, go to your local store and play around to see if you feel the difference.

I'm still on the fence, but it's not at all as clear to me now as it was before.
And for anyone bringing up stuff like "SSD" and "All Flash", I always run my MBPs with one SSD for the OS and a second internal drive for storage.
This was a Graphics Card-only review, nothing more.
 
zeraien said:
This might not come as a surprise or a shock, but given that the new retina MBP has the same graphics card as the equivalent non-retina variant, I went to the local Mac store and did a quick side-by-side comparison.

In native resolution, opening a bunch of windows in safari and all programs that apple has in their default apple store dock, the retina macbook pro struggled to open up mission control. The lag was very noticeable and made me reconsider my decision.

The non-retina new MBP (2012) performed admirably and mission control opened up smoothly as warm butter, but on the retina model, it was laggy.

Another quick test I did was to bring up launchpad, here too, the retina MBP displayed sub-60fps performance and there was a noticeable lag, compared to the non-retina MBP that was standing next to it.

When I brought the retina resolution up to 1680x1050 and then 1920x1200 (scaled), the lag was even more noticeable.

I wanted to get the new MBP to get away from the horrible mission control lag that plagued slower models, but, while not horrible, the lag is still very much there on the retina display. So if you ever got frustrated with mission control for being slow when you have lots of apps running, go to your local store and play around to see if you feel the difference.
Click to expand...

The lag is supposedly fixed in Mountain Lion.
 
zeraien said:
This might not come as a surprise or a shock, but given that the new retina MBP has the same graphics card as the equivalent non-retina variant, I went to the local Mac store and did a quick side-by-side comparison.

In native resolution, opening a bunch of windows in safari and all programs that apple has in their default apple store dock, the retina macbook pro struggled to open up mission control. The lag was very noticeable and made me reconsider my decision to get the retina MBP...

The non-retina new MBP (2012) performed admirably and mission control opened up smoothly as warm butter, but on the retina model, it was laggy.

Another quick test I did was to bring up launchpad, here too, the retina MBP displayed sub-60fps performance and there was a noticeable lag, compared to the non-retina MBP that was standing next to it.

When I brought the retina resolution up to 1680x1050 and then 1920x1200 (scaled), the lag was even more noticeable.

I wanted to get the new MBP to get away from the horrible mission control lag that plagued slower models, but, while not horrible, the lag is still very much there on the retina display. So if you ever got frustrated with mission control for being slow when you have lots of apps running, go to your local store and play around to see if you feel the difference.

I'm still on the fence, but it's not at all as clear to me now as it was before.
And for anyone bringing up stuff like "SSD" and "All Flash", I always run my MBPs with one SSD for the OS and a second internal drive for storage.
This was a Graphics Card-only review, nothing more.
Click to expand...

there's a big thread on this that discovered that UI lag on the retina MacBook is down to some sort of kiosk app they use in Apple stores. People who actually own the laptop report no UI lag.
 
Squashy said:
there's a big thread on this that discovered that UI lag on the retina MacBook is down to some sort of kiosk app they use in Apple stores. People who actually own the laptop report no UI lag.
Click to expand...

Interesting notes, thanks, it bears more digging!

And while it may very well be true, I did discover some interesting (and disappointing) benchmarks for OpenGL rendering, with Cinebench.

One additional note is that I didn't go to an actual apple store, but a mac store in Stockholm, they do not run the same Apple Kiosk software that you will find i a real Apple Store.

In summary, the new Retina MBP gets on average around 36fps on the cinebench tests. My old 2011 MBP (the highest end model at the time, graphics card wise), has been rated around around 35fps. And the late 2011 model got even better marks. I'm still looking for 2012 NON-retina benchmarks, but here are some links to compare 2012 and 2011...

Here are some more links:
retina gets 39fps (older mbp still wins): http://www.barefeats.com/mba12a.html

retina gets 34fps: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVniAF9I99o&feature=player_detailpage#t=383s

early 2011 MBP gets 35fps: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEkFNVNkgWM&feature=player_detailpage#t=224s

retina gets 33fps: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zg8C7hIvdCc&feature=player_detailpage#t=96s

Please note that the CPU performance and memory performance is totally irrelevant for me, because I am trying to compare the performance of graphics rendering and UI performance - the choice is between a 2012 (or late 2011 MBP) and a Retina MBP.

I'm sure there are many more examples, and it just means more digging. I like to think that Mission Control performance is indicative of general UI performance, and I'm not interested in the Retina premium if it turns to seriously impact UI performance. I also noticed some lag when scrolling around in Safari, that I never experienced on my 2011 MBP, but again, I'll need to do more digging.

PS: also if this was a Kiosk software problem, why wasn't the non-retina MBP next to it not affected?
 
Last edited:
An interesting note...my Macbook Pro w/6750 and 2.3 ghz i7 clocks in a GPU score of 4456 in Vantage (this is the gpu only side of the score, not the final score.)

The new Retina w/650m put down over 8000 on the GPU score...nearly double. Obviously you need the oomph with that many pixels, but this is a more significant upgrade in video card then people are giving it credit for.

Final Vantage Scores
2011 Macbook Pro: p5786
2012 Retina MBP: p10712
Yikes.

Just my .02 cents.
 
MacDevMike said:
An interesting note...my Macbook Pro w/6750 and 2.3 ghz i7 clocks in a GPU score of 4456 in Vantage (this is the gpu only side of the score, not the final score.)

The new Retina w/650m put down over 8000 on the GPU score...nearly double. Obviously you need the oomph with that many pixels, but this is a more significant upgrade in video card then people are giving it credit for.

Final Vantage Scores
2011 Macbook Pro: p5786
2012 Retina MBP: p10712
Yikes.

Just my .02 cents.
Click to expand...

Now what about the non-retina 2012 MBP? It's got the same GPU but doesn't have to run such a high resolution display.
 
jshbckr said:
Now what about the non-retina 2012 MBP? It's got the same GPU but doesn't have to run such a high resolution display.
Click to expand...

You do know that those benchmarks don't run on native res for easy comparison right? So it would be a very similar score on the non-retina.
 
Last edited:
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