The next-gen MacBook Pro with Retina Display Review
by Anand Lal Shimpi on June 23, 2012 4:14 AM EST- Posted in
- Mac
- Apple
- MacBook Pro
- Laptops
- Notebooks
Boot Camp Behavior
When the MacBook Pro with Retina Display first started shipping Apple hadn’t even released Boot Camp drivers for the system. Since then Apple has uploaded a Windows Support package to its servers, and the Boot Camp Assistant will give you drivers for everything in the machine should you ask for it.
The driver bundle and Boot Camp Assistant work with both Windows 7 and the Windows 8 Release Preview, although Apple only explicitly offers support for the former. You don’t have to do anything to make the Windows 8 RP work with the Boot Camp Assistant, just supply the Win 8 RP ISO instead of the Windows 7 image during the Boot Camp setup and you’re all set.
Like all previous MacBook Pro Boot Camp installs, only the discrete GPU is “connected” under Windows. Apple relies on a lot of its own software to switch between processor and discrete graphics which obviously isn’t made available under Windows, thus you only get the dGPU. Apple uses NVIDIA’s 296.49 drivers for the GeForce GT 650M under Windows. Since the standard Windows desktop doesn’t support integer DPI scaling (see update below as you can force 2.0x scaling) Apple picked the next best option and configures Windows for 1.5x DPI scaling and 2880 x 1800 as the defaults. The result is a desktop that looks like this:
At the largest text scaling setting Windows is remarkably usable on the 15.4-inch display at 2880 x 1800. Unfortunately as I mentioned in the Zenbook Prime review, Windows 7 and third party handling of DPI scaling is hardly elegant. While applications that aren’t Retina-aware under OS X tend to simply have blurry text, those that don’t behave properly with DPI scaling under Windows just look odd. Some text elements will be huge and overflow outside of their normal borders, while others will ignore the scaling setting entirely and just be too small. It’s passable in a pinch but suboptimal for certain.
Windows 8 RP on the rMBP. Note the Skyfall trailer is in a full 1080p window
Windows 8 does a somewhat better job, but only under Metro. Metro supports integer DPI scaling at 1 and 2x factors, similar to OS X. With DPI scaling enabled under Windows 8, Metro looks like it would at 1440 x 900 - similar to the default setting for the Retina MacBook Pro under OS X.
200% DPI scaling under Windows 7
Update: As many of you have correctly pointed out, Windows allows you to specify custom DPI scaling modes including an integer 2.0 setting. The result is the same "1440 x 900"-like desktop you get under OS X. Application compatibility still appears to be an issue, check out the gallery below for some examples. Overall Windows is very usable on the rMBP, but just as under OS X the overall experience really depends on application support.
Software Funniness
With the Retina MacBook Pro I get the distinct impression it was launched before the software was ready to support it. Apple did an amazing job enabling Retina support in all of the iLife applications, but iWork isn’t ready for it yet. The system technically launched without Boot Camp support although that was soon added. Then there are the UI performance issues in applications like Safari under the currently available version of Lion. There are also occasional graphical glitches under Lion. the occasional flashing of UI elements, nothing major but just not the polish we’re used to from Apple. Once again, Mountain Lion addresses a lot of this and is only a month out but you still have to deal with reality in the interim.
I also had a strange experience where the CPU clocks on the system magically decided to get clamped down to around 1.2GHz on battery power. A simple reset of the PRAM and SMC fixed the problem but it was odd behavior for sure. I can’t completely fault Apple for this one, as I know I subjected the rMBP to a bunch of strange tests over the course of the past week and a half.
If you’re buying today, just be aware that the best experience will come with Mountain Lion and even then you’ll have to wait an unspecified amount of time for Retina-aware app updates.
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vision33r - Sunday, June 24, 2012 - link
When a PC laptop goes on sale, the listed price is never the actual purchase price.A $1000 Dell usually end up getting sold for $800 or less after coupons and Dell runs sales all the time. Same goes for HP.
Apple almost never do a sale until the model is outdated, the only discount is the education one.
It's a certain that all PC laptop makers have to cut corners to make a profit, competition is fierce. Most buyers are more price sensitive these days then specs.
duploxxx - Monday, June 25, 2012 - link
Many manufacturers allow options in there designs towards more cutting edge technology...I have a full HD display in a 15"since 2008, same for my SSD.... just a matter of cutting cost for low profile. This differentiate with apple who already put these in the baseline... call bleding edge wathever you want but I am sure my Laptop cost probably a few 100$ less with eluminated keyb, optimus etc.... but it hasbn't got the shiny apple logo :)
Johnmcl7 - Saturday, June 23, 2012 - link
Sony have been offering 13.1 1920x1080 screens for a few years which admittedly isn't nearly as high as the new Macbook screen but given Sony have been frequently criticised for offering such a pointlessly high resolution it's little surprise they haven't developed it further.When Apple do it however they get praised for their innovation and bringing the market forward when in reality they're a while behind other companies who are genuinely innovative and getting the technology out there.
John
Super56K - Saturday, June 23, 2012 - link
I'm not sure you understand. It's rendered at double the resolution, but presented at the same size as 1440x900 or 1900x1200 on a 15" screen. You gain clarity rather than real estate.What other notebooks out there can do that?
ananduser - Saturday, June 23, 2012 - link
Lol...you just described DPI scaling. The retina mb just offers ready made presets. To achieve the same effect on the Z simply change the DPI scaling within the native resolution.KoolAidMan1 - Saturday, June 23, 2012 - link
Scaling in Windows doesn't work the same, nor is it targeted towards such specific resolutions. Anand talks about this himself in the review.Hopefully Windows 8 outside of the Metro UI addresses this.
OCedHrt - Sunday, June 24, 2012 - link
That's because Windows only goes up to 1.5 instead of 2. But at 1920x1080, 1.5 gives you 1280 x 720. Do you really want to go that small?ananduser - Sunday, June 24, 2012 - link
OMG...it's been said 10 times already in the comments. Windows goes all the way up to 200%. Anand does not know Windows setting well enough.ananduser - Sunday, June 24, 2012 - link
That't the idea, scaling should *NOT* be dependent on specific resolutions. It should be agnostic. That's what Windows does because it's supposed to power the world's computers, macs included.dagamer34 - Sunday, June 24, 2012 - link
Windows 8 addresses this by providing an easy way to serve up high resolution assets for the OS to use depending on the DPI of the machine. It takes all of the guesswork out of the developers hands with no extra code needed.