Question for 256GB rMBP owners (bootcamp gaming)

[kimovski]

I'm trying to decide between 256GB or 512GB.

Are you guys(or girls) having trouble about so little space(256gb) to decide how much space bootcamp should partitioned?

Generally, what I want to do with bootcamp is doing little gaming (F1 2011, battlefield,batman ark.city etc..), nothing else.

Hope you guys can help me, need to order it soon as possible since here don't have apple store, only resellers and need to wait 2 months

cheers

edit: btw, i would go for 256GB/16GB/2.3 or 512GB/8GB/2.6

 

[2499723]

Strictly speaking, I don't have my rMBP yet, but my plan is just to install Windows on a very small partition (maybe 20-25GBs) and then use an external USB 3.0 HDD (or SDD) to install all my games on. I don't need them on the fly, though I suppose I could always cart around a portable USB 2.5" drive in my bag. The Steam folder can just be transferred over and I can run a very slimmed down version of Windows on the 256GB MBP. Perhaps you could do the same? I know the extra space would be good, but do you really want to have only 8GB RAM hardwired into your machine?

 

[kimovski]

Strictly speaking, I don't have my rMBP yet, but my plan is just to install Windows on a very small partition (maybe 20-25GBs) and then use an external USB 3.0 HDD (or SDD) to install all my games on. I don't need them on the fly, though I suppose I could always cart around a portable USB 2.5" drive in my bag. The Steam folder can just be transferred over and I can run a very slimmed down version of Windows on the 256GB MBP. Perhaps you could do the same? I know the extra space would be good, but do you really want to have only 8GB RAM hardwired into your machine?

Seriously, you just gave me a brilliant idea
My budget only allows me 256/16/2.3 or 512/8/2.6

Anyway, I will order the 256/16/2.3 configuration. I prefer to have more ram from video and audio editing. I also will have extra budget from the external HDD

Thx!

 

[Moriarty]

Edit: Never mind, OP responded to the previous guy above. But yeah that's what I'm doing too. Saves ~$500 over the 512GB config (cannot justify that cost!), and in 3 years' time, $500 might get you a 1.5TB SSD (if they end up upgradeable)

 

[dusk007]

If you want it internal you need quite a lot more than 25GB.
I used a streamlined custom Win7 x64 business from which I removed everything I don't need. That still is about 20GB installed.

You also need to deactivate hibernation because that would just create a 16GB file. Also Windows even if there is more than enough RAM swaps some stuff. If you only game on Windows you never need 16GB so you should deactivate swapping completely.

I got only CoD MW3 installed and Hitman Blood money. That is 15.3 and 4.4 GB.

There is also Office installed but not really anything else and it is at 57.5 GB used currently.

Anything below 50GB just won't be enough and with 60 GB you still have to switch out games. The modern ones are fairly huge unfortunately.
If you want the games installed and game this and that frequently you need some 80+ GB partition probably.

External works but I dislike loading times of HDDs or always having to attach external stuff. Since I got an optibay SSD I use the internal second HDD to temporarily store the installed game folders. Just copy them back and forth is a lot faster than installing or downloading the games again. Yet you have all the benefits of fast loading times. That way you can shrink the Windows partition fairly small with never more than 1-2 games installed, yet still get all the speed.

 

[Rmafive]

Definitely go with the 512. I left about 150gb for my bootcamp and the install took about 30gb! After installing games I have almost no space left! Can you run the games off of an external hard drive? I feel like that would be slow.

 

[psykick5]

I'm definitely doing the USB 3.0 external method. It's not like I'll be gaming without a real mouse or power plug anyway.

 

[kimovski]

Or..can I install windows on a 3.0 usb/thunderbolt drive and boot from it?

 

[leenak]

Or..can I install windows on a 3.0 usb/thunderbolt drive and boot from it?

No, windows will not allow that.

It'd be best to install windows and then figure out a way to swap out games and such. Pretty smart to use a USB for that. I installed 1 game and it took 30GB. It looks like I can install on my Mac partition though so I may do that since I do have a 512GB.

 

[Hrim]

I have the base 2.3 model en route, and my plan is to try to install windows on a SDXC Card (128Gb).

If I can't, I will install the games on it, as well as use it for storing the movies and songs.

In the worst case, I'll have a fast and light storage support for films...

Can someone provide a picture of a rMBP with SD slot used? I wonder how much it goes in...

 

[iMacDragon]

No, windows will not allow that.

It'd be best to install windows and then figure out a way to swap out games and such. Pretty smart to use a USB for that. I installed 1 game and it took 30GB. It looks like I can install on my Mac partition though so I may do that since I do have a 512GB.

It should be quite workable through thunderbolt. thunderbolt will just look like another sata controller to windows, unlike usb 3.

 

[2499723]

Seriously, you just gave me a brilliant idea
My budget only allows me 256/16/2.3 or 512/8/2.6

Anyway, I will order the 256/16/2.3 configuration. I prefer to have more ram from video and audio editing. I also will have extra budget from the external HDD

Thx!

Absolutely. I've been asking around if there's any slow-down by playing games off an external HDD over USB 3.0. Obviously 5400rpm drives will give you longer loading times than 7200rpm, but the setup certainly seems doable. As you say, when money is an object, you have to think of workarounds. I figure it's easier to come up with more hard drive space (even if that means external) than it is to upgrade RAM that is soldered onto the motherboard! Very pleased for you and the fun you'll no doubt have on the rMBP. =)

----------

I have the base 2.3 model en route, and my plan is to try to install windows on a SDXC Card (128Gb).

If I can't, I will install the games on it, as well as use it for storing the movies and songs.

In the worst case, I'll have a fast and light storage support for films...

Can someone provide a picture of a rMBP with SD slot used? I wonder how much it goes in...

Are SDXC cards fast enough to run games off of? If so, that's a pretty cool method. I just have no experience running anything intensive off an SD card. That said, I've run games off my Wii SD card, and that's not much different (though the games are not ridiculously taxing either). We'll see. I'll stick with the HDD plan, but I'd like a shot at trying your method as well.

 

[Callumbear845]

Sorry to hijack the thread, but if I was only installing windows 7 and battlefield 3, how much space should I allocate?

 

[Kaemon]

Out of curiosity, Would getting a 64GB SD card and just carring that around work for games? Couldn't one just insert that in for games? Get a good class 10 of course, but that should provide decent enough speed wouldn't it?

I haven't used an SD card or a Laptop in years, so I'm out of touch in these kind of things...

If that fails a USB3.0 flash drive.

 

[Andrmgic]

It should be quite workable through thunderbolt. thunderbolt will just look like another sata controller to windows, unlike usb 3.

It does work with thunderbolt.. but you still need an internal partition on the primary hdd.. I was able to get away with a 5GB partition and boot windows 7 pro from an external ssd connected via thunderbolt.

If I remove the internal partition, it refuses to boot. The windows installer picks up the thunderbolt drive as disk 0 and treats it like an AHCI device (you can see the device under system profiler in OS X as "Unknown AHCI standard controller" in the serial-ATA section.)

 

[01mggt]

It seems Windows 8 supports what's being called "Windows to Go" where you can install on USB drives. I have followed a couple guides to make install it to a USB 2.0 hdd and they seem to work fine. However I can't boot them to verify as I don't have my rMBP yet (3-4 weeker). I tried booting them on my 2008 unibody MacBook with no success. I am thinking it's because it requires EFI 2.0 which thermbp supports but my old unibody did not. There are a couple videos on youtube of it booting off a MBP as well as a MBA that are cool They say it's basically native speeds at USB 3.0.

You have to currently have the release preview of windows 8 installed in bootcamp to do the install to USB but then you can just delete it. Also it says if you accidently unplug the drive while windows is running it will automatically freeze windows and give you 60 seconds to plug the drive back in! I am planning to do this with a partition on my Seagate 750GB Hybrid 7200rpm drive in a USB 3.0 enclosure. The Hybrid drive caches up to 8GB of frequently used files in flash memory plus has I think 512mb of main cache. Should make it really fast over USB 3.0 . The hdd only costs aroun $140 or less It's also a 2.5" so it is easy to carry around!

 

[Zeov]

Definitely go with the 512. I left about 150gb for my bootcamp and the install took about 30gb! After installing games I have almost no space left! Can you run the games off of an external hard drive? I feel like that would be slow.

i have a pretty "old" external hard drive (2009, cheap one) and i play all games with no problems at all when its connected to my mac and gaming through that.

 

[01mggt]

External works but I dislike loading times of HDDs or always having to attach external stuff. Since I got an optibay SSD I use the internal second HDD to temporarily store the installed game folders. Just copy them back and forth is a lot faster than installing or downloading the games again. Yet you have all the benefits of fast loading times. That way you can shrink the Windows partition fairly small with never more than 1-2 games installed, yet still get all the speed.[/QUOTE]

I may look into this idea The folder for each game shouldn't take too long to move. I would kind of rather do that than have a mechanical hdd hanging from my usb port all the time. Don't like the thought of moving it around alot while it's spinning.

 

[photosaurus]

It seems Windows 8 supports what's being called "Windows to Go" where you can install on USB drives. I have followed a couple guides to make install it to a USB 2.0 hdd and they seem to work fine. However I can't boot them to verify as I don't have my rMBP yet (3-4 weeker). I tried booting them on my 2008 unibody MacBook with no success. I am thinking it's because it requires EFI 2.0 which thermbp supports but my old unibody did not. There are a couple videos on youtube of it booting off a MBP as well as a MBA that are cool They say it's basically native speeds at USB 3.0.

You have to currently have the release preview of windows 8 installed in bootcamp to do the install to USB but then you can just delete it. Also it says if you accidently unplug the drive while windows is running it will automatically freeze windows and give you 60 seconds to plug the drive back in! I am planning to do this with a partition on my Seagate 750GB Hybrid 7200rpm drive in a USB 3.0 enclosure. The Hybrid drive caches up to 8GB of frequently used files in flash memory plus has I think 512mb of main cache. Should make it really fast over USB 3.0 . The hdd only costs aroun $140 or less It's also a 2.5" so it is easy to carry around!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfhXgjp2Dt8

 

[striker33]

I have the base 2.3 model en route, and my plan is to try to install windows on a SDXC Card (128Gb).

If I can't, I will install the games on it, as well as use it for storing the movies and songs.

In the worst case, I'll have a fast and light storage support for films...

Can someone provide a picture of a rMBP with SD slot used? I wonder how much it goes in...

You just made my day. That is just awesome, especially considering I'll only be playing things like WoW and GW2. Much more convenient than being tethered to a USB3 drive, although its a fair bit more expensive for the convenience as well.

The cheapest Sandisk 128GB SDHC cards get around 42MB/s read, which is perfectly fine for gaming, although not quite as fast as the 90MB/s or so you'd get from USB3.

 

[dog299]

I am in the exact position; just got the base level rMBP and want to bootcamp to Windows 7 for a spot of gaming now and again.

I was thinking of allocating 100gig for the Windows leaving the rest for Mac.

It doesn't leave me much room i know, but i have the Mac side covered with a Thunderbolt external raid set up and countless Mac formated external hard drives; more concerned with the windows.

How does using external drive storage on Windows work with Steam?

And is it painful playing the games on an external drive? guessing it have to be NFTS formatted?

 

[01mggt]

The steam part is a good question. I have Civ5 and it uses steam. I wonder how this would work out if the game is installed externally.

 

[striker33]

I am in the exact position; just got the base level rMBP and want to bootcamp to Windows 7 for a spot of gaming now and again.

I was thinking of allocating 100gig for the Windows leaving the rest for Mac.

It doesn't leave me much room i know, but i have the Mac side covered with a Thunderbolt external raid set up and countless Mac formated external hard drives; more concerned with the windows.

How does using external drive storage on Windows work with Steam?

And is it painful playing the games on an external drive? guessing it have to be NFTS formatted?

The steam part is a good question. I have Civ5 and it uses steam. I wonder how this would work out if the game is installed externally.

Its easy, when you install steam, make sure you install it to the external drive first, then any game you actually download on Steam will be installed externally automatically.

I did it fine with a old USB 2 drive for around 10 or so steam games.

 

[jtap]

I have the base 2.3 model en route, and my plan is to try to install windows on a SDXC Card (128Gb).

If I can't, I will install the games on it, as well as use it for storing the movies and songs.

In the worst case, I'll have a fast and light storage support for films...

Can someone provide a picture of a rMBP with SD slot used? I wonder how much it goes in...

I am planning on doing this as well. Hopefully Windows 8 will support loading from a SDXC card, but otherwise I will just use it to install the games. Looking into this one: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820220666 .

 

[708692]

No, windows will not allow that.

It'd be best to install windows and then figure out a way to swap out games and such. Pretty smart to use a USB for that. I installed 1 game and it took 30GB. It looks like I can install on my Mac partition though so I may do that since I do have a 512GB.

Definitely go with the 512. I left about 150gb for my bootcamp and the install took about 30gb! After installing games I have almost no space left! Can you run the games off of an external hard drive? I feel like that would be slow.

Guys, just remember this: By default, Windows assigns a huge load of HDD space as a page file. For example, on my 16GB RAM retina, there was a 16gb pagefile (pagefile.sys). I went through the system control panel and forced this down to a manually allocated size of 1GB. As there's so much RAM in the Retina, it's doubtful you need any more than 1GB of a page file.

The second thing to turn off is hibernation. By default it is turned on and will assign a file that is 75% of your RAM.
Turn the hibernation off by opening a command prompt with admin privs (right click the icon), then type:
powercfg /hibernate off