Returned retina

[Trebuin]

I should have listed to myself about the retina. I thought why not upgrade to the retina for my deployment for the next year. The Display is nice, but the 512 GB upgrade compared to my crucial is expensive. The processor speed boost does help on CPU intensive tasks, which I really don't use nowadays.

The nVidia was the deal breaker for me. On the Mac side, it may be faster, but the retina resolution kills the fps on games. On the windows side, the ATI on my late 2011 can be overclocked beyond the nVidia (barely) and the resolution also kills the fps again. I just felt like I was spending 3k on a resolution bump in the end and paying on the fps side.

With the late 2011 mac, I don't think it is worth upgrading, especially with the major spec bump that model saw. If you had an older macbook, it would probably be worth the upgrade. I'll look again when there's another major spec bump on graphics.

 

[mattopotamus]

Just for the future....don't by Mac for a gaming upgrade.

 

[Marrakas]

You didn't really expect to be able to game at 2880x1800 did you? All but the best of desktop GPU's would struggle with that.

 

[MH01]

You didn't really expect to be able to game at 2880x1800 did you? All but the best of desktop GPU's would struggle with that.

He he spot on. I run a gtx 690 at around those rez, and it a great experience! I chuckle at people buying the retina expecting miracles from the mobile gpu.

Great laptop, not for gaming though.

 

[Zeov]

from what i've read, 1680x1050 and 1920x1200 still looks awesome in games like skyrim and diablo BF3 etc.

 

[Trebuin]

Actually, I was expecting to bump the res down, improve the fps, and enjoy the retina. The old law of use the resolution the display was designed for still holds solid.

 

[Marrakas]

Great laptop, not for gaming though.

Oh it's actually excellent for gaming, just not in that resolution. It can run newer games like skyrim maxed out at 1440x900, with some AA and be smooth as hell.

But yeah, don't buy the retina if you only gonna be gaming, there's better alternatives, but if you want a great allround, portable machine, which CAN run games pretty good, then it's a solid choice.

 

[leenak]

I know people do it but I'm still surprised that someone who has a 2011 MBP would get a 2012 MBP.

The Anandtech article brought up some good points about the new heat distribution design in the rMBP. Basically, because your CPU/GPU will be throttled down due to heat, the rMBP seems to have better sustained performance than previous designs of MBP. So it could actually be better for gaming than the previous versions just due to the better heat venting.

The difference probably isn't enough to upgrade though unless you really, really want to.

 

[mark28]

You didn't really expect to be able to game at 2880x1800 did you? All but the best of desktop GPU's would struggle with that.

The 27" iMac is doing fine at 2560-by-1440 resolution with games and it has a laptop GPU.

 

[maflynn]

The nVidia was the deal breaker for me. On the Mac side, it may be faster, but the retina resolution kills the fps on games. On the windows side, the ATI on my late 2011 can be overclocked beyond the nVidia (barely) and the resolution also kills the fps again. I just felt like I was spending 3k on a resolution bump in the end and paying on the fps side.

Well if you are a heavy gamer who over clocks their GPUs, then the MBP is a poor choice. Better to find out now then later.

 

[killmoms]

Actually, I was expecting to bump the res down, improve the fps, and enjoy the retina. The old law of use the resolution the display was designed for still holds solid.

I disagree. I have no complaints about running games at lower than native res. And I definitely appreciate full Retina resolution for general web/productivity tasks.

Different strokes, I suppose.

 

[itsmrjon]

The nVidia was the deal breaker for me.

I ONLY bought it because of the ability to test CUDA code.
To each his own though