Retina MBP UI performance - with video

[Marconelly]

ladeer, was the machine you tested a base 2.3Ghz model or a more expensive 2.6Ghz one?

I wonder if the clock of intel 4000 (which probably scales up with the base cpu clock) would help things, making the 2.6G model more desirable.

The 1680x1050 lookalike mode very likely looks better on this screen than it would on a native one. The reason being that they render at 3360x2100 then scale it down to 2880x1800 when you use that resolution. It's kind of backwards brute force process that they use, but it works, albeit with some performance loss (logic would dictate that the rendering would just happen in 2880x1800 but they'd use smaller fonts and UI elements, but OSX doesn't support that)

 

[macmyworld]

I own the $2199 model, have had it since 1 PM yesterday (Tuesday).

The link posted earlier in this thread does have some lag, but I agree with another poster that the issue is more Safari related. The same page has no lag in Chrome. Ditto for the Apple Store main page. It lags on the retina with Safari but does not with Chrome.

Granted, that Chrome is not retina ready yet.

I cannot duplicate some of the other lagging shown in the videos. Just banged around in iPhoto and had no issues at all. I am doing all of this running on battery, no plugged in.

My machine does have all updates applied and was migrated from a MacBook Air.

So, I do not disagree that there may be some minor lag issues, but I do know that in general my MBP retina is much more responsive than my 13" Macbook Air (2nd gen) is.

Happy to run any other specific tests for anyone. I'm very interested in this thread.

 

[Marconelly]

macmyworld, so you didn't see choppiness when going in and out of full screen mode with iPhoto (with other windows behind it)?

Also can you try forcing discrete GPU and seeing if the scroll lag persists in Safari, or if full screen mode transitions improve? You can do this by going to energy saver settings and disabling gpu switching. Then you can make sure what GPU is active by going to About/More Info. Just make sure you reboot after you force this, because of an apparent bug in OS:

Lag developed more severely after I exited the forced discreet mode. (I was in that mode the whole time.) lag did not go away even switching back to forced discreet mode until I restarted.

This is funny, and it could explain why some people saw no improvement whatsoever when switching to discrete graphics. Did you also try full screen mode in applications?

 

[macmyworld]

macmyworld, so you didn't see choppiness when going in and out of full screen mode with iPhoto (with other windows behind it)?

Also can you try forcing discrete GPU and seeing if the scroll lag persists in Safari, or if full screen mode transitions improve? You can do this by going to energy saver settings and disabling gpu switching. Then you can make sure what GPU is active by going to About/More Info. Just make sure you reboot after you force this, because of an apparent bug in OS:

I really don't see anything noticeable going from full screen iPhoto back to a bunch of windows. There is a very slight delay in all of the windows refreshing correctly, but minor enough that I wouldn't even see if without staring at it a few tries.

No difference with the discrete GPU enable for the iPhoto test or Safari test.

I did just download Google Chrome Canary (latest Chrome build) and it is retina compatible. The pages with lags in Safari have NO lag in Chrome Canary. This confirms the issue is Safari, not the retina display/integrated graphics.

 

[Marconelly]

No difference with the discrete GPU enable for the iPhoto test or Safari test.

I did just download Google Chrome Canary (latest Chrome build) and it is retina compatible. The pages with lags in Safari have NO lag in Chrome Canary. This confirms the issue is Safari, not the retina display/integrated graphics.

No difference even after a restart, correct?

Also, I have no doubt that the observation of no lag in Chrome is correct, however it may be emblematic of a filtrate problem that a browser with a worse/slower rendering engine is having an issue on this computer. I guess in the end it's not a big deal as long as browser can be made to display everything non-laggy on it.

 

[JoshRtek]

Tried One Out

I just got back from the Sherman Oaks Apple Store.

I played with the Base Retina MacBook Pro (2.3 GHz, 8 GBs RAM, 256 flash drive).

When I arrived, the screen was set to the 1920 x 1200 mode, so I switched it back to the "Best - Retina" mode.

I can confirm that the floor model I tested was glitchy as hell. Almost all the animations going into Full Screen Mode looked blocky and glitchy. Scrolling was a bit stuttered in every app as well.

I did not force-enable the discreet graphics card, however (I forgot to try this).

For whatever reason, though, none of this felt like a graphics card performance issue. I'm no expert, but I have a seriously underpowered Mac Pro in the graphics card department, so I know what that behavior looks like. The Retina MacBook Pro I tried out seemed to be suffering from buggy drivers, or some other software problem.

Also, for what it's worth, I tried out a 27" iMac (3.1 GHz i5, with 4 GBs of RAM). This computer also experienced the same kind of buggy and glitchy screen behavior. Weird.

I also ran another unrelated test. I launched just about every heavy-duty app in the Applications folder (Aperture, Logic, Final Cut Pro X, Garage Band, iTunes, Mail, Safari, iMovie, iPhoto, etc.) Each app loaded almost instantaneously. Also, I tried to let each app function in the background (movies playing continuously in iMovie and Final Cut X, audio playing in Logic, GarageBand, and iTunes, and two movies playing Safari, etc.)

Performance seemed pretty darn good for all that activity. The activity monitor even showed 2.00 GBs of RAM inactive. No too shabby. Throughout all this, the computer's display was still glitchy as hell, but to me this seems like evidence that it's a software problem.

Also, I'd like to point out that ONLY iPhoto was updated to be optimized for the Retina Display. Aperture and Final Cut X were not...I find this bizarre (I think these machines were taken out of the boxes and set up immediately with no time to check complete functionality).

Anyhow, that's what I've observed...

 

[sahot]

I have a new RMBP and I can't say i've seen it be choppy, at all.

 

[macNewbie02]

I just got back from the Sherman Oaks Apple Store.

I played with the Base Retina MacBook Pro (2.3 GHz, 8 GBs RAM, 256 flash drive).

When I arrived, the screen was set to the 1920 x 1200 mode, so I switched it back to the "Best - Retina" mode.

I can confirm that the floor model I tested was glitchy as hell. Almost all the animations going into Full Screen Mode looked blocky and glitchy. Scrolling was a bit stuttered in every app as well.

I did not force-enable the discreet graphics card, however (I forgot to try this).

For whatever reason, though, none of this felt like a graphics card performance issue. I'm no expert, but I have a seriously underpowered Mac Pro in the graphics card department, so I know what that behavior looks like. The Retina MacBook Pro I tried out seemed to be suffering from buggy drivers, or some other software problem.

Also, for what it's worth, I tried out a 27" iMac (3.1 GHz i5, with 4 GBs of RAM). This computer also experienced the same kind of buggy and glitchy screen behavior. Weird.

I also ran another unrelated test. I launched just about every heavy-duty app in the Applications folder (Aperture, Logic, Final Cut Pro X, Garage Band, iTunes, Mail, Safari, iMovie, iPhoto, etc.) Each app loaded almost instantaneously. Also, I tried to let each app function in the background (movies playing continuously in iMovie and Final Cut X, audio playing in Logic, GarageBand, and iTunes, and two movies playing Safari, etc.)

Performance seemed pretty darn good for all that activity. The activity monitor even showed 2.00 GBs of RAM inactive. No too shabby. Throughout all this, the computer's display was still glitchy as hell, but to me this seems like evidence that it's a software problem.

Also, I'd like to point out that ONLY iPhoto was updated to be optimized for the Retina Display. Aperture and Final Cut X were not...I find this bizarre (I think these machines were taken out of the boxes and set up immediately with no time to check complete functionality).

Anyhow, that's what I've observed...

BTW, did they have the RMBP in stock for sale in Sherman Oaks?

 

[jcljk]

I own the $2199 model, have had it since 1 PM yesterday (Tuesday).

The link posted earlier in this thread does have some lag, but I agree with another poster that the issue is more Safari related. The same page has no lag in Chrome. Ditto for the Apple Store main page. It lags on the retina with Safari but does not with Chrome.

Granted, that Chrome is not retina ready yet.

I cannot duplicate some of the other lagging shown in the videos. Just banged around in iPhoto and had no issues at all. I am doing all of this running on battery, no plugged in.

My machine does have all updates applied and was migrated from a MacBook Air.

So, I do not disagree that there may be some minor lag issues, but I do know that in general my MBP retina is much more responsive than my 13" Macbook Air (2nd gen) is.

Happy to run any other specific tests for anyone. I'm very interested in this thread.

The lag appears worst when scrolling a page with many pictures. I tried iTunes and it was as lag as safari as long as there are many pictures to render. It feels like the machine is struggling to render retina images.
Please let us know if you find the same lag issue with scrolling a page with many images.

 

[ladeer]

ladeer, was the machine you tested a base 2.3Ghz model or a more expensive 2.6Ghz one?

I wonder if the clock of intel 4000 (which probably scales up with the base cpu clock) would help things, making the 2.6G model more desirable.

The 1680x1050 lookalike mode very likely looks better on this screen than it would on a native one. The reason being that they render at 3360x2100 then scale it down to 2880x1800 when you use that resolution. It's kind of backwards brute force process that they use, but it works, albeit with some performance loss (logic would dictate that the rendering would just happen in 2880x1800 but they'd use smaller fonts and UI elements, but OSX doesn't support that)

the base model. i was using discreet graphic

 

[OSMac]

The lag appears worst when scrolling a page with many pictures. I tried iTunes and it was as lag as safari as long as there are many pictures to render. It feels like the machine is struggling to render retina images.
Please let us know if you find the same lag issue with scrolling a page with many images.

Is Sarfari resizing jpg images like the retina iPad does?

 

[macmyworld]

I just got back from the Sherman Oaks Apple Store.

I played with the Base Retina MacBook Pro (2.3 GHz, 8 GBs RAM, 256 flash drive).

When I arrived, the screen was set to the 1920 x 1200 mode, so I switched it back to the "Best - Retina" mode.

I can confirm that the floor model I tested was glitchy as hell. Almost all the animations going into Full Screen Mode looked blocky and glitchy. Scrolling was a bit stuttered in every app as well.

I did not force-enable the discreet graphics card, however (I forgot to try this).

For whatever reason, though, none of this felt like a graphics card performance issue. I'm no expert, but I have a seriously underpowered Mac Pro in the graphics card department, so I know what that behavior looks like. The Retina MacBook Pro I tried out seemed to be suffering from buggy drivers, or some other software problem.

Also, for what it's worth, I tried out a 27" iMac (3.1 GHz i5, with 4 GBs of RAM). This computer also experienced the same kind of buggy and glitchy screen behavior. Weird.

I also ran another unrelated test. I launched just about every heavy-duty app in the Applications folder (Aperture, Logic, Final Cut Pro X, Garage Band, iTunes, Mail, Safari, iMovie, iPhoto, etc.) Each app loaded almost instantaneously. Also, I tried to let each app function in the background (movies playing continuously in iMovie and Final Cut X, audio playing in Logic, GarageBand, and iTunes, and two movies playing Safari, etc.)

Performance seemed pretty darn good for all that activity. The activity monitor even showed 2.00 GBs of RAM inactive. No too shabby. Throughout all this, the computer's display was still glitchy as hell, but to me this seems like evidence that it's a software problem.

Also, I'd like to point out that ONLY iPhoto was updated to be optimized for the Retina Display. Aperture and Final Cut X were not...I find this bizarre (I think these machines were taken out of the boxes and set up immediately with no time to check complete functionality).

Anyhow, that's what I've observed...

Nice report. Again for those new to the thread. I own one of these machines and the lag in Safari is Safari, not the machine. If you download Google Chrome Canary you will not see any of the issues.

I just went into iTunes. I agree with the poster that it is a bit choppy. So nice catch there.

One other new comment from me is on battery life. For some bizarre reason, Apple took away the time remaining as a display option (you have to click the battery icon to see it). It will only should the percentage or the picture of the battery. Anyhow, battery life appears to be substantially shorter than the claimed near 7 hours. My current usage looks the be around 2.5 hours where my MacBook Air 13 would have been around 5.5 hours.

 

[CausticPuppy]

Sir, you did edit the video probably to trim length or get rid of unwanted clip.

Nope- there were no edits. I uploaded directly from my camera app to Youtube. The only post-processing was the Youtube image stabilization (which I have since removed).

 

[wmage]

The lag in OP's video might be caused by the application they use in stores.

Last year I was playing with Air, and Expose was really laggy, I mean 2fps laggy.

The thing is they run this application that displays info about the store on the desktop, you can schedule apt and whatnot. It's buggy and it causes expose to lag.

So if you see something like this, be sure to ask about it.

Edit: CSI'd

 

[Artagra]

Something to remember: This kind of performance is very, very subjective.

I would liken it to the opinions you get about running a 27" or 30" display on an HD3000 powered Macbook (2011 13" pro, 2011 11" or 13" air). Some people say the performance is terrible, horrible, you can't live with it, and they returned their macbook / display and went with another option. Other people say they can't notice it at all, and that the performance is as good as on the internal screen. And some people fall in the middle - they see the performance difference, but they are happy to accept it for the increased resolution.

Beyond being subjective, it's also impacted by the applications you run and the way you use them.

So I would say definitely look at a 2012 MBP Retina before writing it off due to this.

 

[macmyworld]

Something to remember: This kind of performance is very, very subjective.

I would liken it to the opinions you get about running a 27" or 30" display on an HD3000 powered Macbook (2011 13" pro, 2011 11" or 13" air). Some people say the performance is terrible, horrible, you can't live with it, and they returned their macbook / display and went with another option. Other people say they can't notice it at all, and that the performance is as good as on the internal screen. And some people fall in the middle - they see the performance difference, but they are happy to accept it for the increased resolution.

Beyond being subjective, it's also impacted by the applications you run and the way you use them.

So I would say definitely look at a 2012 MBP Retina before writing it off due to this.

100% agree. I have seen nothing performance wise to return my machine. I'm looking forward to what Mountain Lion enhances and apps that are updated.

Yes this is new hardware for Apple, and yes it borders on bleeding edge. But isn't that half the fun of buying the latest and greatest?

 

[minnus]

Are people experience less graphical issues with the upgraded laptops (2.6/2.7)?

 

[pandamonia]

My iPad 3 has no problems at 1500p in webpages or video.

Im sure a full power intel 4000 can do 1800p without problems. it could be immature drivers or some other problem with software that will be ironed out.

 

[ppone]

What sun spider score do you get for your rMBP using Safari and also using Chrome.

http://www.webkit.org/perf/sunspider/sunspider.html

I own the $2199 model, have had it since 1 PM yesterday (Tuesday).

The link posted earlier in this thread does have some lag, but I agree with another poster that the issue is more Safari related. The same page has no lag in Chrome. Ditto for the Apple Store main page. It lags on the retina with Safari but does not with Chrome.

Granted, that Chrome is not retina ready yet.

I cannot duplicate some of the other lagging shown in the videos. Just banged around in iPhoto and had no issues at all. I am doing all of this running on battery, no plugged in.

My machine does have all updates applied and was migrated from a MacBook Air.

So, I do not disagree that there may be some minor lag issues, but I do know that in general my MBP retina is much more responsive than my 13" Macbook Air (2nd gen) is.

Happy to run any other specific tests for anyone. I'm very interested in this thread.

 

[Haarith :)]

I own the $2199 model, have had it since 1 PM yesterday (Tuesday).

The link posted earlier in this thread does have some lag, but I agree with another poster that the issue is more Safari related. The same page has no lag in Chrome. Ditto for the Apple Store main page. It lags on the retina with Safari but does not with Chrome.

Granted, that Chrome is not retina ready yet.

I cannot duplicate some of the other lagging shown in the videos. Just banged around in iPhoto and had no issues at all. I am doing all of this running on battery, no plugged in.

My machine does have all updates applied and was migrated from a MacBook Air.

So, I do not disagree that there may be some minor lag issues, but I do know that in general my MBP retina is much more responsive than my 13" Macbook Air (2nd gen) is.

Happy to run any other specific tests for anyone. I'm very interested in this thread.

How is it like running youtube videos? Or watching movies? I still have time to cancel my order

 

[macmyworld]

What sun spider score do you get for your rMBP using Safari and also using Chrome.

http://www.webkit.org/perf/sunspider/sunspider.html

206.8 ms Safari
175.4 ms Google Chrome Canary

But oddly enough, the display of the various test completing was a ton faster with the Chrome beta build (literally 40 seconds or so).

 

[Pentad]

I just spent 15 mins playing with retina MBP at Valley Fair and spoke with a genius for the whole time. We tested laggyness using Gamespot.com...

The lag at higher resolutions only showed when I scrolled the page very quickly. (fast enough to allow momentum to scroll)
If you scroll slowly, page renders smoothly.

Ladeer:

I appreciate your tests and they worry me. I wish you could have done something more taxing than a simple browser/web page. Though, showing lag on gamespot.com makes me worry about much more intensive applications.

For example, if it was slowing down displaying a simple web page during scrolling, how will it handle much more intensive applications? How about a huge layout design in InDesign where there are hundreds of objects? Photoshop with a number of large images being scrolled and manipulated? I wonder about AutoCad and LightWave in higher resolutions??

I would like to run a graphics demo in all the scaled modes to get a better scientific idea of how bad the lag really is.


-P

 

[millerrh]

Ladeer:

I appreciate your tests and they worry me. I wish you could have done something more taxing than a simple browser/web page. Though, showing lag on gamespot.com makes me worry about much more intensive applications.

For example, if it was slowing down displaying a simple web page during scrolling, how will it handle much more intensive applications? How about a huge layout design in InDesign where there are hundreds of objects? Photoshop with a number of large images being scrolled and manipulated? I wonder about AutoCad and LightWave in higher resolutions??

I would like to run a graphics demo in all the scaled modes to get a better scientific idea of how bad the lag really is.


-P

Yeah, that's what scares me too...if it can't handle simple things like scrolling on a web page, what about when I'm doing real work? Lag like this or worse than this would be super annoying as you are trying to work in Photoshop or Indesign. A main reason for me to upgrade from my 2010 2 core MBP would be for a performance gain! If it ends up being worse cause the display takes too much out of it, not acceptable. Hopefully this is just a driver issue that will be resolved.

 

[adnbek]

I think the lag is also due to the custom Apple store software running on them. I've noticed this lag on all the macs (not just the retina mbp but even the regular mbps and imacs) at my local store too and it's definitely due to that store software running. (the one that allows you to schedule appointments and such)

EDIT: Damn, wmage beat me to it.

 

[Eriksrocks]

Back at the Apple Store and all of the display Retina MacBook Pros are doing it. Forcing to discrete graphics mode doesn't help any. So I'm with everybody else who is saying that this is either due to the store software they are running on them or is some other software issue that can quite easily be fixed.

I tried running Software Update to figure out which updates are installed but when I ran it there was no "Installed Updates" tab.

And yeah, still no stock. WTF.