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Major Disappointment: Using 15" Late 2013 MBP with Logic Pro X (and Final Cut Pro X)

O

ooans

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jun 4, 2011
284
338
I came from a Late 2008 MBP to the newest and latest Late 2013 15" Macbook Pro with 750M(and Iris Pro.) It has been awesome in pretty much every way, except on the of the main reasons I bought it: Using Logic Pro X (and Final Cut Pro X.)

I've come to the conclusion that the GPUs in the rMBP are not powerful enough to drive the retina screen in these two applications. Scrolling and zooming in/out is slow, jerky and sluggish. I was hoping the latest updates to LPX and FCPX would alleviate this, but alas, no change.

Seeing that FCPX is optimized for Mac Pro and is a video editing software, I dont expect it to run perfectly or even super snappily on a laptop, but Logic Pro X... It's a freaking DAW! Currently I have to run it in low resolution mode to make it not annoy the hell out of me. Even zooming in on a single track is not fluid in retina mode.

Having to use low resolution mode kinda takes the sense of having a retina screen. Right now I wish Apple would have released a non-retina version of the 2013 MBP.

I guess I was naive to think that these softwares would be optimized to run fluidly on one of the most powerful machines Apple has released. (Of course, rMBP's GPU's are no match for the Mac Pro.) Or maybe the time for retina is just still a few years away...

/End of whiny rant


I know I'm way past the 2 week return period, but maybe If I bright up my case with Apple it could be possible? Though, getting hold of a non-retina 2012 15" MBP would be freaking hard seeing as I'm not from the states.
 
This should not behave like this. Your machine should be more than powerful for this.

Any chance you have LP9 also installed?

I'm running a 13inch late '13 and have no issues with scrolling and such in LP9. It is very smooth and I'm usually pretty picky about this. I'm using the resolution right after the best for retina one (1440X900 if I recall).

What resolution are you using (although yours will be higher because of 15inch)? Best for retina?
 
I am not noticing these problems on mine (2.3/16/512/dgpu). I don't use Final Cut, but I do use Logic, and zooming in on tracks hasn't given me any trouble. Maybe it depends on the type of track or the settings on them? Are you noticing this on specifically MIDI, or audio, or all of them?
 
Hello ooans. I have a 15in Early 2013 rMBP and can attest that I have 0 issues with logic or FCPX. I use both of them 4-5 a week and render 1080p no problem. You might have a hardware defect. Bring it into an Apple Retail Store and talk to a Genius.
 
Thanks guys for the encouraging replies! I'm gonna have it checked after xmas!


lg251 said:
Any chance you have LP9 also installed?

What resolution are you using (although yours will be higher because of 15inch)? Best for retina?
Click to expand...

LP9 with retina mode is also easy to get jerky/laggy by just scrolling around in a paused project with 10 audio clips. I'm using Best for Retina resolution.
 
The problem doesn't really lie on the GPU. It's all in the way Apple implemented their HiDPI in OS X. Mac Pro does not implement HiDPI since the display / monitor that the Mac Pro uses is running in native mode (no need for GPU to do extra work to implement the HiDPI even if the monitor is 4K in resolution). Windows laptops with almost 4K resolution (e.g. Yoga 2 Pro or Samsung Book 9 Plus) don't use HiDPI. They use text DPI scaling which works like zoom. All of that is completely hardware accelerated as well and that's why UI in Windows 8.1 laptops with 3200 x 1800 resolution is buttery smooth.

I do believe that the HiDPI implementation by Apple is not fully hardware accelerated. Therefore, some software rendering is used which makes the UI laggy on heavy applications.
 
cbautis2 said:
The problem doesn't really lie on the GPU. It's all in the way Apple implemented their HiDPI in OS X. Mac Pro does not implement HiDPI since the display / monitor that the Mac Pro uses is running in native mode (no need for GPU to do extra work to implement the HiDPI even if the monitor is 4K in resolution). Windows laptops with almost 4K resolution (e.g. Yoga 2 Pro or Samsung Book 9 Plus) don't use HiDPI. They use text DPI scaling which works like zoom. All of that is completely hardware accelerated as well and that's why UI in Windows 8.1 laptops with 3200 x 1800 resolution is buttery smooth.

I do believe that the HiDPI implementation by Apple is not fully hardware accelerated. Therefore, some software rendering is used which makes the UI laggy on heavy applications.
Click to expand...

No, this is all wrong.

HiDPI works exactly like it does in Windows. It's hardware accelerated, and it uses scaling. The GPU does no extra work. And the Mac Pro can do HiDPI.

None of the above is remotely correct.
 
MCAsan said:
I hope so.


Get a new Mac Pro if you want serious GPU action....not a laptop.
Click to expand...


People like you shouldn't even be allowed to give advice, seriously.

As for the laggy scrolling, this has been apparent since when they first introduced the retina macbook pros back in 2012. The GPU is not powerful enough to drive the screen, you are correct on that. You'd think they would have fixed this for the 2013 but they have not.
 
you need a 17" mbp in your studio

what a joy to work on all the above on the 17"mbp

cheers.
 
ooans said:
Thanks guys for the encouraging replies! I'm gonna have it checked after xmas!




LP9 with retina mode is also easy to get jerky/laggy by just scrolling around in a paused project with 10 audio clips. I'm using Best for Retina resolution.
Click to expand...

Ok then there must be an issue.

SMC reset could be a start. If not maybe reinstall OSX. Or simply bring it to Apple and show them the issues your experiencing.

My 13 with a humongous project is far from lagging whether I'm zooming, scrolling, moving plug ins around, etc.
 
Logic X on my rMBP (2.3 i7, 16GB, 2GB 750m) is butter smooth, even with a few Soundtoys Decapitator instances, Waves plugins, multiple space designer buses, Amp designer...I've yet to freak it out. Maybe the leap from a 2007 Santa Rosa MBP has blown my mind, but I don't think you should be struggling even on Iris Pro.
 
ooans said:
I've come to the conclusion that the GPUs in the rMBP are not powerful enough to drive the retina screen in these two applications.
Click to expand...



Oops. Wrong conclusion. Very wrong.

Get a replacement. Thinking that the 2012 mbp is the solution is quite mistaken.
 
I was experiencing some serious GUI lag on my 13" rMPB under 10.9. I finally figured out that it occurred when I had iTerm 2 terminals open with translucent blur enabled. Because I kept the terms open almost all of the time, the animations were always very sluggish.

Disabled blur in the terms -- bam, smooth GUI again. I suspect that any Terminal terms with blur would cause the same slowdowns.

Matt
 
I took the laptop to an Apple Certified maintenance store, where they ran quick tests on the laptop which gave no errors and told me that it is normal for retina macbooks with retina apps to have more lag compared to non-retina macs.

And if I have a problem with this that I should talk to Apple.

Edit: At least I got a refund on Logic Pro X. If I have to use a really ugly program (any retina apps in non-retina mode) I might as well use the older version of it (Logic Pro 9.)
 
Last edited:
Apple gives you until January 7th to return holiday purchases made after November 1st. Just return it if you are not happy.
 
Pro tip: go to mac app store and download display menu, and run it at the native resolution. Problem solved.
 
goMac said:
No, this is all wrong.

HiDPI works exactly like it does in Windows. It's hardware accelerated, and it uses scaling. The GPU does no extra work. And the Mac Pro can do HiDPI.

None of the above is remotely correct.
Click to expand...

actually he is correct on the display running at native res, the display is always running at its native resolution. when someone chooses 'best for retina" it's enlarging the OSX GUI to make it "feel" like 1440x900 and NOT changing the resolution at all.

A for not being hardware accelerated, it is fulling accelearated whether it's mac or pc
 
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