Does the new Macbook Pro 15" (late 2013) supports 4K via Thunderbolt/Displayport?

Resurrecting this thread....

Does anyone know if the 15" Macbook Pro (late 2013 or mid 2014 models) with Iris Pro ONLY (not with discrete Nvidia 750M chip) supports 60Hz output with SINGLE stream transport mode (not using multi-stream transport)? There are a couple monitors that have been introduced since the last post in this thread that have new hardware scalers that support 60Hz refresh rate without relying on the multi-tile trick used by MST. The monitors are 28" Samsung U28D590D and the 28" Asus PB287Q. I'm curious if anyone has hooked up the 15" Macbook Pro with Iris Pro to these monitors and seen if it can output 60Hz with SST. Anyone tried out this combo?

Hi Larry,

Thank you for your reply and feedback about your setup. However, I'm not sure it quite settles my question because the resolution of the LG 34UM95-P monitor doesn't need the MST workaround. As I'm sure you know, the LG has an atypical aspect ratio but its resolution of 3440x1440 (4,953,600 pixels) isn't that much more than the resolution of my old 30" Apple Cinema Display (2560x1600 = 4,096,000 pixels). Monitor scalers have had the capacity to handle around 5 million pixels without any tricks - it's only with Ultra HD/4k monitors with 3840x2160 resolution and 8,294,400 pixels that the monitors needed to resort to MST until new scalers could be rolled out that could handle all those pixels without multiple tiles.

So, still wondering if any has an 15" rMBP Iris Pro only plus Ultra HD monitor w/ SST that can answer my question...anyone? 🙂

Yes, my comment was based on late/October 13-inch rMBP with Iris 5100, which most likely also applies mid-2014 13' rMBPs as they also have Iris 5100'.

Nonetheless, the problem of outputting only 30Hz on 4K might be applicable to all late 2013 and mid-2014 rMBPs running Yosemite Betas and/or Developer Previews, hence comments from people on 4k 60Hz outputting capability who own any rMBP of the said iterations and a 4K 60Hz monitor and run Yosemite Betas and/or Developer Previews would be greatly appreciated.

Hmm, decide to buy macbook pro 13 retina today only because I read in this forum and it has been confirmed that the 13 model support 4K@60hz. I connect it to my Dell UP2414Q and only 1080P hiDPI @30Hz is available. The OS is 10.9.5 Maverick. So I'm not sure if the support has been pulled?

I'm assuming all that we've learned in this discussion would also apply to the just announced (2014) new Mac Mini -> it seems to support 30 Hz 4K, but since it only has Iris graphics, I assume there's no chance of 60 Hz 4K output through a Thunderbolt 2 adapter? (Despite the TB2 having sufficient BW, I'm assuming the graphics card can't handle it.)

What happens if you run a 4K display (such as the Dell UP2414Q) at 3840×2160 with 60Hz and you start a game that uses a different resolution, e.g. 2560×1400?

- Blank screen?

- GPU scaling? Does the performance suffer?

- System switches to SST and uses the monitor's scaler?

So what's the final verdict? Does the low-end Macbook Pro retina 2013 15' (with only integrated iris Pro) really support one 4K-display @60 Hz, as per http://support.apple.com/kb/ht6008 ? I really want to make sure there is no mistake in that article and that there is no need to go for the high-end discrete Nvidia just to drive one 4k-display @60Hz. Thanks!

so i understand the following:

- Apple will skip 4k and go right to their own 5k.

- iMac drives display internally via Dual Displayport 1.2 or something else odd?

- 5k external display via single cable will come only with Displayport 2.0

- 2014/2014 MBPs stuck forever with 2k Thunderbolt Display

guess its time to buy some new MBP next year..

As rayGcon pointed out the support of 4k / 60Hz on external display is not down to Intel graphics (within a certain generation) but rather the processor and hence TDP or maximum power consumption. Here's a link that sums it up nicely, it also includes info on Broadwell models. Just scroll down to Maximum display resolution section.

https://software.intel.com/en-us/articles/quick-reference-guide-to-intel-process or-graphics

larrysing,do you use scaled resolution on your Dell P2715Q 4K and does it affect the graphical performance in any way?

The way I understand OSX does scaling is that display is handled off-screen at twice the resolution. Say if you're using 2560 x 1440 scaled resolution on a 27" inch 4k display (e.g. Dell P2715Q) then the off-screen resolution is 5120 x 2880 (a lot of pixels). That might affect performance as Mac OSX and anandtech article point out http://www.anandtech.com/show/8023/apple-releases-osx-10-9-3-improved-4k-display

The reason I ask is that I'm undecided whether to pick MBP 15 with discrete or just the integrated graphics (due to the lack of support of switchable graphics in bootcamp versus iris pro performance and handling 4k scaled resolutions). Btw, how is iris pro driver support in bootcamp, if you've used it?

The upcoming variant of OSX El Capitan introduces performance improvements, especially on graphics performance by virtue of Metal engine. Indeed Apple claims 10x performance improvement in graphics. This may make possible for Apple to develop a software/driver update that would enable 4k 60Hz output on OSX El Capitan via DP1.2 as it may no more be very taxing on the system.

Please kindly provide your opinions. Actual results from people owning Haswell (late 2013 or mid-2014) 13'' rMBP and a 4k 60Hz monitor would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you, jdiamond. The thing is, the computers subject to my questions can theoretically do 4k 60Hz, but Apple does not allow it on OS X, hence my question is they would enable it in El Capitan. Let me elaborate:

The 13'' Haswell (late 2013 and mid-2014) rMBPs which have Iris 5100 GPU can do 4k 60Hz on Windows. However they cannot do it on OS X. The fact that 4k 60 Hz is possible on Windows means that OS X can theoretically do it as well. Perhaps Apple thought that 4k 60Hz would not perform well on these computers and hence opted out this feature on OS X. Now with this 10x performance improvement in graphics I thought that Apple may enable this feature in El Capitan.

What do you think?

Guys,

Has there been a change with the final release of El Capitan? Can the Iris 5100 of 13'' Haswell rMBPs can now do 4k 60Hz?

The Metal engine of this El Capitan may have enabled 60Hz refresh rate with 4K resolution due to its performance bump. For example, Arstechnica tested some GPUs including Iris Pro 5200 which saw a 53% performance boost. While he did not test non-Pro Iris 5100, its boost may be sufficient for Apple to now tweak its software to enable 4k 60Hz.

http://arstechnica.com/apple/2015/10/metal-performance-in-os-x-el-capitan-someti mes-great-often-mixed/

I will really appreciate if a late 2013 or mid-2014 13'' Haswell rMBP owner who happen to own a 4k 60Hz gives a try.

I think I just figured out my problem!

I bought the P2715Q from Amazon warehouse deals, but the monitor in the box was a P2815Q!

The differences between the 2 displays:

P2715Q: 60Hz refresh rate; IPS panel

P2815Q: 30Hz refresh rate; TN panel

I'm stuck in 30Hz laggy land...

How do you enable 4K @ 60Hz on a Late 2013 Retina Macbook Pro, running El Capitan?

I'm getting the full 2160p resolution and everything is nice and sharp, but I'm stuck at 30Hz, so things don't have that nice smooth motion we all love on our Macs.

I saw a MiniDisplayPort 1.2 to HDMI 2.0 active adapter from Club 3D... do those work, or is there some software workaround?

Mac:
MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Late 2013)
2.3 GHz Intel Core i7
16 GB 1600 MHz DDR3
NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M 2048 MB

Screen:
4K Vizio M43-C1
(using input 5, which does 4K @ 60Hz)