Q: Mountain Lion UI Lag on rMBP !!! (Let's Make this thread serious and hope for a fix)

Any update on this situation? My computer still lags until I turn on Quartz Debug and initiate tracking rectangles to smooth it out. It's a necessity now to have Quartz Debug open all the time because I have kind of gotten used to the smooth UI. When it starts lagging now I notice it even more than before.

This has no effect on mine. Haven't heard from Apple in a while either.

For me the ultimate test is flipping through months in the Calendar app. Compare the smoothness of the animation with your iPad doing the same thing. This is so annoying paired with the overall unsmoothness when launching Mission control or swiping through your different desktops... I still can't believe that people are claiming to have no lag whatsoever given that I can replicate the same lag on the 10 rMBPs at my local Apple store.

I appreciate people trying to fix this themselves, but I refuse to find a solution for this problem myself. The reason for buying an Apple product was to not having to fiddle around with my system as I used to do back in my PC days.

This is likely my final post on this thread as Apple engineers have concluded to me that they cannot find a solution for me. I am dismayed that after spending a month with a senior advisor their only solution was to take it back to the Genius Bar and letting them continue to run diagnostics on it. I'm completely choked. With that I'm putting this rMBP on Craigslist and collect myself a grand and a half going back to a MacBook Air.

So Apple engineers said they couldn't fix it, but they won't let you return the machine or trade in the machine for a different one?

I received an email from a senior advisor with specific instruction on my case to have the laptop brought back in one more time into a Genius Bar. They're going to do a thorough invasive scan of my entire laptop and software makeup and get to the bottom of this. I'll let you all know the results in a couple of days.

Thanks for the updates Wayne. As ppl have stated on here, their retinas don't have lag, and I saw one at the Apple Store not showing lag. I just want a machine without lag. I'm thinking about scheduling another appointment at the Apple Store and see what options they give. Two phone calls to AppleCare, a genius bar appt, a hardware fix, and the problem still persists should be enough to show them there is definitely a problem with my machine.

I have a rMBP 2.4 GHz, 16GB RAM .. and I'm not so very satisfied with the transition between desktops. I don't know if it has something to do with the amount of apps and windows you have on your desktop ? Because when I change between the dock page and desktop#1 with lots of windows and apps, the transition is very smooth but when I do it between desktop#1 and desktop#2, the transition then becomes a bit laggy which is quite annoying. Maybe this is normal I don't know, does anybody here experience this ?

Considering the price and the technical specs of this rMBP, I would have wanted everything to be very smooth. I mean it's not like

my processor is heavily loaded.

I'm trying to just use an external display (closing the lid of the MB). On the external display everything works perfect. Opening the lid again, all the open apps comes back on the MB display, and then graphics are lagging again.

Have anyone the same expirence?

Your problem is exactly what is being discussed in this thread. Including lag when entering Mission Control.

No external monitor.

I'm not having any GUI lag at all at the moment and everything is as smooth as it acutally can be.

So in my case it is quite certian that it's a software issue. I might turned off something that could have caused the problem when I restarted my macbook. It's been over 10h since I restarted it and it is still smooth.

This is maybe a crazy and nonsense idea, but i at least in my 15 RMBP i don't see any diference between the integrated and the discrete, when it comes to UI Lag, they perform exactly the same, the same amount of lag with either one. I even Installed Quartz debug to see the fps and they are identical. How can this be?

The ideia that crossed my mind is that, what if the integrated chipset is always in charge of the UI, even with the discrete chipset activated? Like the 650m don´t even process those kind of graphics. Is this possible? That the integrated only takes care of the more demanding applications processes?

I mean, if didin´t use after effects, and see actual graphic card power, i wouln´t say it have a 1gb ddr5 card.

Any thoughts on this?

So after spending three nights at Apple, after deep invasive scans and numerous submissions of video and log files to Apple Engineers, the conclusion is that there is nothing wrong with my laptop. All scores, all results are with "flying colours" and that doesn't qualify me for any replacement units to be issued until "further tests have been conducted." I'm sick of this BS, I'm frustrated by the fact that my laptop doesn't run as fast as any of the floor models at any given Apple Store.

To summarize everything that I have tried with no solution:

SMC resets: works for a few minutes, but as soon as I run a 64-bit graphics or video intensive app, all lagging starts again.

Switching between integrated and discreet video cards: no effect on 64-bit apps, but frame rates have improved by 10 on 3D games.

10.8.3 update and 1.1 SMC update: further improvements on discreet video (gaming only, no improvements on 64-bit apps)

Apps compiled with universal binaries scream, butter smooth window resizing and scrolling)

Sorry to hear Wayne. I don't get how they can just deny a replacement. I don't care what Apple's tests say, when you can visibly see that a machine isn't performing properly and doesn't run as well as other models of the same machine. I'm thinking about scheduling another genius bar appt early next week to see what they do on a second visit for the same issue after my previous hardware replacement. It's weird that this issue has slight variation among users for example, my machine almost runs smooth when using the discrete graphics, with only minor lag, but when using the integrated graphics it lags with every desktop switch and when entering mission control. Vitor_mfc doesn't see any difference between discrete and integrated and I believe others reported no difference between the two as well.

Can't confirm.