What rMBP for photoshop/starcraft 2/Diablo3: iris, iris pro or Nvidia?

[dusk007]

How is your network connection? Is it stable or does the transmit rate change a lot and drop low. Are you on Wifi? or cable? Games much prefer the latency of cable.
Though 70C doesn't sound like there is too much load. Are you sure about that temp? I have a feeling that many people (on this forum) check temps via alt+tabbing out onto the desktop and checking what istat reports at the moment, rather than have a monitoring program that logs all readings for the last couple of minutes (or watch the open monitoring window on an external screen while gaming). If the load on those Intel chips drops significantly, there temp goes down in split seconds by 10-20C sometimes up to 30C.
If those 70C is what istat reports, in game it might be 80-90 easily.

But the your computer is slowing down everything might just be a network/router or slow internet issue. That is usually the source of lag spikes afaik. Sometimes it is also just bugs or other people and it just reports it wrong.

 

[phsphoenix]

How is your network connection? Is it stable or does the transmit rate change a lot and drop low. Are you on Wifi? or cable? Games much prefer the latency of cable.
Though 70C doesn't sound like there is too much load. Are you sure about that temp? I have a feeling that many people (on this forum) check temps via alt+tabbing out onto the desktop and checking what istat reports at the moment, rather than have a monitoring program that logs all readings for the last couple of minutes (or watch the open monitoring window on an external screen while gaming). If the load on those Intel chips drops significantly, there temp goes down in split seconds by 10-20C sometimes up to 30C.
If those 70C is what istat reports, in game it might be 80-90 easily.

But the your computer is slowing down everything might just be a network/router or slow internet issue. That is usually the source of lag spikes afaik. Sometimes it is also just bugs or other people and it just reports it wrong.

I'm on 100/100 here using the thunderbolt Ethernet connector, so I highly doubt it's a connection issue. Also, I use a notebook cooler when I game, so 70C might just be what the machine is actually at, considering there's a 150mm+ fan underneath. Interestingly though, in some games I first get a slowdown notice, then half way into the game during a huge battle the game tells me that someone else is slowing down the game...

 

[bill-p]

Seriously, sometimes I don't understand what the 750m does when I'm gaming. I run SC2 at 1680x1050, Medium Settings, using both the Iris Pro and the 750m. It's like the dedicated gpu isn't there. The only thing I've noticed is that a LOT of apps want the dgpu, and the stuff I do doesn't even remotely stress any gpu shaders...

Seems like the Late 2013 rMBP is having driver issues. It's surprisingly... slow in Bootcamp as well.

My Mid 2012 model is far faster than my colleague's Late 2013 in Windows... and I can run SC2 at 1920 x 1200, High settings very handily while his chugs along at your settings. At your settings, mine pretty much doesn't dip below 60fps.

So wait for an OS update? (10.9.1 is coming)

 

[phsphoenix]

Seems like the Late 2013 rMBP is having driver issues. It's surprisingly... slow in Bootcamp as well.

My Mid 2012 model is far faster than my colleague's Late 2013 in Windows... and I can run SC2 at 1920 x 1200, High settings very handily while his chugs along at your settings. At your settings, mine pretty much doesn't dip below 60fps.

So wait for an OS update? (10.9.1 is coming)

That's what I suspect as well. The Iris Pro is a good example. I can generate kernel panics on demand on Mavericks, all it takes it to try and play videos on the Iris Pro with VLC. Apparently during certain scenarios you get a fault in video ram or main memory when VLC attempts to play a video, and since I've used the Iris Pro with SC2 for hours on end, the hardware is most likely fine.

But I'm very surprised it's not working well on Bootcamp, and also a bit annoyed. I've hacked nvidia's desktop drivers to work with mobile gpus before. It's not a fun experience. But knowing Apple, that's probably what I have to do if I want any sort of performance out of the 750m in Bootcamp...

 

[dusk007]

That's what I suspect as well. The Iris Pro is a good example. I can generate kernel panics on demand on Mavericks, all it takes it to try and play videos on the Iris Pro with VLC. Apparently during certain scenarios you get a fault in video ram or main memory when VLC attempts to play a video, and since I've used the Iris Pro with SC2 for hours on end, the hardware is most likely fine.

I got those too. I was playing hours without issues and suddenly start a new one and panic. I cannot really do it on demand as playing the very same video again works fine.
I got those two twice and otherwise no issues. I still have some with Windows 8.1 but who knows what they are about. Sometimes when I try to alt tab out of a full screen game (win 8.1) it won't display the desktop or show some odd huge white recktangle that covers lots of things and stays on top of even a task manager window. Signing out and back in without a restart solves the issue. Then there is also the sound corruption that people reported before after some uptime. I only see it on Windows and again sign out and back in, everything is fine.

But I'm very surprised it's not working well on Bootcamp, and also a bit annoyed. I've hacked nvidia's desktop drivers to work with mobile gpus before. It's not a fun experience. But knowing Apple, that's probably what I have to do if I want any sort of performance out of the 750m in Bootcamp...

The newest nvidia drivers install now fine for me. It is 331.82. No idea why it suddenly works. I wish somebody like Anand would finally release the review and publicly complain about the deactivated Turbo Boost 2.0. You can overclock with any software like MSI Afterburner by 135Mhz but it feels like there is plenty of room and turbo boost would be more convenient and save as it only uses available headroom based on general load.
It alsmost feels like Apple is preparing to drop dGPUs and doesn't want the 750M to look too good.
Those tools all only allow a 135Mhz offset but I have no clue if there is any way to change just the turbo boost clock. The new Dell XPS 15 has clocks of 941 as base and boost to 1058Mhz. Apple sits a 925Mhz no Turbo.
I installed the 331.82 today so maybe that will solve some of the Windows issues.

 

[edfoo]

Simple answer. Since you are a person who want to make sure your new rMBP will work well in the future as in your must-have 16GB RAM comment, then just get the discreet nVidia graphics card to be sure.

 

[phsphoenix]

I got those too. I was playing hours without issues and suddenly start a new one and panic. I cannot really do it on demand as playing the very same video again works fine.
I got those two twice and otherwise no issues. I still have some with Windows 8.1 but who knows what they are about. Sometimes when I try to alt tab out of a full screen game (win 8.1) it won't display the desktop or show some odd huge white recktangle that covers lots of things and stays on top of even a task manager window. Signing out and back in without a restart solves the issue. Then there is also the sound corruption that people reported before after some uptime. I only see it on Windows and again sign out and back in, everything is fine.
The newest nvidia drivers install now fine for me. It is 331.82. No idea why it suddenly works. I wish somebody like Anand would finally release the review and publicly complain about the deactivated Turbo Boost 2.0. You can overclock with any software like MSI Afterburner by 135Mhz but it feels like there is plenty of room and turbo boost would be more convenient and save as it only uses available headroom based on general load.
It alsmost feels like Apple is preparing to drop dGPUs and doesn't want the 750M to look too good.
Those tools all only allow a 135Mhz offset but I have no clue if there is any way to change just the turbo boost clock. The new Dell XPS 15 has clocks of 941 as base and boost to 1058Mhz. Apple sits a 925Mhz no Turbo.
I installed the 331.82 today so maybe that will solve some of the Windows issues.

If Intel continues improving their GPUs dropping the dGPU might not be such a bad idea. I'm actually not a huge fan of gaming on a laptop to begin with. My opinion is that laptops just don't have the cooling or the space to be a decent gaming machine without also breaking the bank. But including a really weak dGPU and then crippling it by not updating the drivers. Let's just hope that 10.9.1 fixes some stuff.

 

[Maccotto]

Finally i think to try with base macbook 15"+16gb ram.
If it isn't possible, what GPU is better between hd5000 of air and Iris of Pro 13"?

 

[sonyisawesome]

If Intel continues improving their GPUs dropping the dGPU might not be such a bad idea.

It'll take years for Intel to accomplish what both Radeon and Nvidia has been doing for decades.

Those who are in favor of integrated over dedicated, have fun waiting for a decent integrated gpu.

 

[iKrivetko]

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1662978/

 

[dusk007]

It'll take years for Intel to accomplish what both Radeon and Nvidia has been doing for decades.

Those who are in favor of integrated over dedicated, have fun waiting for a decent integrated gpu.

Intel has a lot more money than Nvidia and AMD combined (and had for a long time) and they have started heavily recruiting in the GPU section about 7 years ago.
AMD even at its peak was never more than a fifth of market share and Intel in Q3 of 2013 earned 6 times of what Nvidia usually makes in a year. They have so much more R&D money it is almost ridiculous.
Ivy Bridge vs. Sandy Bridge was predominantly a GPU upgrade. In the dual core Iris chips the GPU is now the biggest chunk of the whole SoC. Iris Pro beats every mobile dGPU other than high end and upper mainstream can hold its ground just so. Low end and low midrange is beaten. There once was a time when 64bit low end dGPUs had a reason to exist because integrate were actually really bad.
It does take years but they didn't start yesterday.