Macbook Pro Retina 13" late 2013 (Haswell) UI Lag

Question

Level 1

1 points

Macbook Pro Retina 13" late 2013 (Haswell) UI Lag

My config: 2.6/16/256, 10.9 (Mavericks)

NOTE: Outside of the issues mentioned, this computer has been great. Awesome build quality, perfect size and weight, Retina screen is outstanding, CPU is snappy, boot and wake from sleep is blazing, it makes ZERO noise, even under heavy usage it only gets mildy warm and it gets great battery life.

Here's my problem: While the machine is wonderful in many aspects, it is far from the smooth experience we have come to expect from Apple products. As mentioned in the title, the UI is a step behind and the smooth transitions of non-retina models are stuttery a jerky on the retina.

Some examples of UI issues that I've replicated on floor models at the Apple store are:

1. Putting certain stock apps in fullscreen show choppy animation (Finder, Safari, Chrome, Maps) while others are buttery smooth (iPhoto).

2. Mission control stutters occasionally (usually when one of the above offenders are open).

3. Preview of any large .jpg or RAW image will cause significant lag when putting it into fullscreen. It literally trips the entire way.

4. Swiping between full screen apps will cause light animation stutter.

To troubleshoot it, I've done a few things.

1. Brought it to the genius bar. They checked all of the harware and ran a number of other diagnostics (including resetting the PRAM). While they confirmed the issues I have mentioned, they told me to wait for a software update that will resolve them.

2. Tried things that others have reportedly worked for them: Deleting windowservers in Library, etc.

3. Downloaded "Display Menu" from the App Store so that I can manipulate resolution settings. Interestingly enough, Display Menu hasn't optimized all of their settings for Retina and choosing any stock settings (including best for retina 1280x800) lowers the overall image quality. When in Display Menu's version of 1280x800, all of the problems (outide of the preview issue) dissapeared. Animations were back to being buttery smooth. This leads me to belive that Iris isn't quite up the the task of Retina.

I'm hoping that Apple didn't purposely release these Pro's without considering the GPU's ability to offer a "smooth ride". Has anyone else experienced this? If it is indeed a driver issue, I hope that Apple addresses this sooner than later. Based off of forums from early 2013 rMBP owners, it doesn't look like that will be the case.

Are you experiencing this also and have you found any true solutions?

MacBook Pro with Retina display, OS X Mavericks (10.9), 13-inch 2.6/16/256

Posted on Nov 10, 2013 9:30 PM

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Answer 1

Oct 17, 2014 10:16 AM in response to Community User

Trust me, Darkkz, that's only going to waste time. I've done more than 25 reinstalls on my 15" rMBP and it didn't resolve anything.

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Answer 2

Oct 17, 2014 10:17 AM in response to Community User

If you want to spend the time, I'd do it. I have family with an old 23 inch iMac from 2009 (used every day for 5 years) and it was unusably slow. I did a clean install of Mavericks on it and it ran beautifully. Unfortunately, they keep four or five users logged on, so the 4GB of ram don't quite cut it.

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Answer 3

Oct 17, 2014 10:18 AM in response to ntomallen

i've written before that it must be a software problem, however now i have to admit that it is, in fact, hardware related issue.. i've had i from the very beginning, and after 2 logicboard swaps, a creen replacement, and a swap of the whole laptop (!!!) i still had it. The fact that makes me sure that the issue is related to hardware is that the same games on both Mac OS and Win 8.1 (in boot camp) are running with the same glitches (flickering, lego blocks etc.). And, the animations are quite choppy on both systems.. so i don't think it is software.

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Answer 4

Oct 17, 2014 10:19 AM in response to Wayne Chin

It's a bit odd because the Mavericks copy was..probably max 1 month old or something.

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Answer 5

Oct 17, 2014 10:22 AM in response to JovZun

What bothers me is that there are several firmware fixes for this laptop. On PCs you can reinstall "bios" until kingdom come, but on a Mac, you can only apply a firmware update ONCE, then that's it. Super frustrating, especially when you want to just troubleshoot and weigh out any variables.

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Answer 6

Oct 17, 2014 10:22 AM in response to Community User

clean install does not solve anything, i've done it at least 3 times

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Answer 7

Oct 17, 2014 10:25 AM in response to JovZun

I remember applying an SMC reset on the 15" retina, went into Single User Mode and performed all the maintenance scripts and it worked for about 10 minutes. Then it went all laggy again 😟

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Answer 8

Oct 17, 2014 10:26 AM in response to JovZun

Try this: https://david.gyttja.com/2013/01/21/fix-lagging-display-performance-on-retina-ma cbook-pro/

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Answer 9

akaris

Level 1

0 points

Oct 17, 2014 10:42 AM in response to Community User

Guys, stop it.

Get RDM and set your Mac to a non-HiDPI resolution. I set my 13" rMBP to 1920x1200, non-HiDPI, and couldn't be happier. No lag whatsoever, and more real estate.

Yeah yeah, we pay for retina and can't use it, well get over it, or suffer the lag. Clearly Apple doesn't give a **** about it anyway - I had my rMBP for 8 months now, always had the problem, exchanged it 3 times, and abandoned retina altogether. Even the techs at the Apple Store never admitted the issue - or they were just not aware of it. Most people don't see / don't bother the lag; so why would the huge machine care about the few of us?

If you're not happy with this situation, get a Dell. If you really want a Mac, well just accept that you're paying too much money than you should to get an Apple logo and swallow the pill.

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Answer 10

Oct 17, 2014 10:47 AM in response to akaris

How can you work on a 13" at 1920x1200?

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Answer 11

Oct 17, 2014 11:07 AM in response to akaris

Again, not everyone is suffering screen lag. Again, if someone out there is smart enough to write code to jailbreak and unlock iPhones, then surely, if willing, someone can fix this problem as well.

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Answer 12

Oct 17, 2014 11:11 AM in response to JovZun

I would first try to reset the PRAM to see if that helps. If that doesn’t help then try the steps as in the post.

Reset PRAM:
* Shutdown and the start your Mac, and before the grey boot screen appears hold down the P, R, option and command keys simultaneously. See here for more info: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1379?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US

If that doesn’t help, try deleting the preference files as in the post. There are multiple ways to do it, I would recommend via the terminal. So open the commandline terminal program (search for “terminal” using spotlight).
* Open terminal
* Type the following command (it will ask you to enter your password, as this file requires administrator privileges to delete, which is the ‘sudo’ command):

sudo rm /Library/Preferences/com.apple.windowserver.plist

* Type the following command (those files are in your account, so you don’t need admin access to delete):

rm ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.windowserver*.plist

* Then perform a PRAM reset again

Hopefully that helps! Good luck!

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Answer 13

Oct 17, 2014 11:14 AM in response to Wayne Chin

Been there done that. Some of the files are missing (apparently they were deleted in Yosemite). The problem for is bigger. I run a small to soon be medium web agency and i got some funds, tl;dr, i'm kinda stressed because the plan was made to purchase a lot of Apple stuffs and right now i am kinda desperate because, i don't want this to happen mid project. I understand that this can be easily avoided by not updating, but still..

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Answer 14

Oct 17, 2014 11:15 AM in response to Community User

How many times have you taken your laptop to Apple? I'd grind them, show them the lag, get them to at least replace your current laptop!

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Answer 15

Oct 17, 2014 11:17 AM in response to Wayne Chin

I can confirm that PRAM reset doesn't work. Just tried it.

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