Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Post
  • Reply
Binary Badger
Oct 11, 2005

Trolling Link for a decade


ironlung posted:

All the cables that came with my refurb were neatly coiled with various plastic things holding stuff in place, identical to the cables that came with all the brand new apple products I have ever bought. Everything was packed in nice and tight and the cables were in a white, very "Apple-like" box that had the Apple logo and said "Apple Certified". The noticeable difference was the lack of an outer box that said MacBook Pro on it, it was just regular cardboard.

Same thing when I bought a refurb 5th generation AEBS, it's like they just stopped printing those fancy Apple graphics on the box. The only thing on the box was a big laser printed label with my name and two barcodes on it.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

japtor
Oct 28, 2005

wdarkk posted:

Anyone know what the Xeon roadmap is like? I'm trying to read up on it but I'm confused as balls by Intel's naming and such. I'm trying to figure out if there will be a Mac Pro refresh this year.
Last I saw Haswell-E might be earlier than expected in Q3 but I think that's just the consumer one (i.e. the expensive rear end i7-X or whatever). The E5s are probably still late this year at the earliest so I wouldn't expect a major refresh this year. Wouldn't necessarily count it out entirely but it doesn't seem likely.

GPUs are another thing to consider but who knows when a Hawaii based GPU will be ready. And I'd guess it'd be another expensive high(er) end option whenever it comes around.

Binary Badger posted:

Same thing when I bought a refurb 5th generation AEBS, it's like they just stopped printing those fancy Apple graphics on the box. The only thing on the box was a big laser printed label with my name and two barcodes on it.
Same with the AppleTVs I've gotten. Seemed like new except with brown boxes instead of the white/printed boxes.

keevo
Jun 16, 2011

:burger:WAKE UP:burger:
I have a mid 2009 MBP and I think the screen hinge is a little loose because when the screen is wobbly when I'm adjusting it. Will the Apple store fix this? I would do it myself but after reading some guides, I'm not sure I want to risk loving it up because I'm stupid.

My PIN is 4826
Aug 30, 2003

keevo posted:

I have a mid 2009 MBP and I think the screen hinge is a little loose because when the screen is wobbly when I'm adjusting it. Will the Apple store fix this? I would do it myself but after reading some guides, I'm not sure I want to risk loving it up because I'm stupid.

Sounds like a repair involving no new parts, so if you're lucky they might sort you out for free. Besides, you have nothing to lose by going there and turning around if they do want to charge you for it.

BobHoward
Feb 13, 2012

The only thing white people deserve is a bullet to their empty skull
Fixing a wobbly screen usually requires replacing the friction clutch (aka hinge). Apple uses some kind of loctite goop for all screws during assembly so they're not too likely to work loose.

NOTinuyasha
Oct 17, 2006

 
The Great Twist
Will an early '13 MBPr be able to run two 27" TB Cinema displays and one older model 27" mini DP at the same time? Does the old 27" mini DP model look identical to the TB model? I need confirmation of this before I go make some bad decisions on Craigslist. And yeah I'm aware I'll need an HDMI to mini displayport adapter if it were to work at all.

Pilfered Pallbearers
Aug 2, 2007

NOTinuyasha posted:

Will an early '13 MBPr be able to run two 27" TB Cinema displays and one older model 27" mini DP at the same time? Does the old 27" mini DP model look identical to the TB model? I need confirmation of this before I go make some bad decisions on Craigslist. And yeah I'm aware I'll need an HDMI to mini displayport adapter if it were to work at all.

Will it work physically? Yes, but if it's a base level 13" early Rmbp running 4 displays total might be pretty slow, especially with integrated graphics.

japtor
Oct 28, 2005
You can daisy chain the two TB displays together off one TB port and the MDP one off the other TB port right? Plus I'm not sure the HDMI port will work for 1440p anyway.

FlapYoJacks
Feb 12, 2009

japtor posted:

You can daisy chain the two TB displays together off one TB port and the MDP one off the other TB port right? Plus I'm not sure the HDMI port will work for 1440p anyway.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HDMI#Version_1.4

Hdmi 1.4 can display up to UHD resolutions, so 1440p would be fine.

Wild EEPROM
Jul 29, 2011


oh, my, god. Becky, look at her bitrate.
iirc you can only do 3 displays with a 13" mbpr, whether it's 2 thunderbolt + the laptop's display, or 3 thunderbolt displays.

Should be doable, but it'll be slow.

NOTinuyasha
Oct 17, 2006

 
The Great Twist

Kingnothing posted:

Will it work physically? Yes, but if it's a base level 13" early Rmbp running 4 displays total might be pretty slow, especially with integrated graphics.

I meant early 2013. It's got the 1GB 650M. I also don't run it with the retina display open when I'm at my desk. I was actually meaning to get an iMac but my older MBP went through so many motherboards the Apple store gave me this top-of-the-line replacement for free like a few months ago. The retina display is very nice but I it spends most of it's time closed at my desk.

japtor posted:

You can daisy chain the two TB displays together off one TB port and the MDP one off the other TB port right? Plus I'm not sure the HDMI port will work for 1440p anyway.

You can't chain a mini displayport through the thunderbolt ports on the TB display according to google.

Pilfered Pallbearers
Aug 2, 2007

NOTinuyasha posted:

I meant early 2013. It's got the 1GB 650M. I also don't run it with the retina display open when I'm at my desk. I was actually meaning to get an iMac but my older MBP went through so many motherboards the Apple store gave me this top-of-the-line replacement for free like a few months ago. The retina display is very nice but I it spends most of it's time closed at my desk.


You can't chain a mini displayport through the thunderbolt ports on the TB display according to google.

No you can not. One mdp in each thunderbolt and 1 hdmi. It will definitely work.

Sonic Dude
May 6, 2009

BobHoward posted:

Fixing a wobbly screen usually requires replacing the friction clutch (aka hinge). Apple uses some kind of loctite goop for all screws during assembly so they're not too likely to work loose.

On the unibody models you can sometimes remove the clutch cover and tighten the screws holding the hinges on. I just learned that a few weeks ago.

japtor
Oct 28, 2005

ratbert90 posted:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HDMI#Version_1.4

Hdmi 1.4 can display up to UHD resolutions, so 1440p would be fine.
But can the MBP's HDMI port do it and/or whatever HDMI-MDP adapter?

NOTinuyasha posted:

You can't chain a mini displayport through the thunderbolt ports on the TB display according to google.
Correct, but that's not what I said. You're looking at two TB displays and one MDP one, so I suggested chaining the TB displays together on one port and the MDP one (by itself) on the other port on the machine.

Whether the laptop supports it (Wild EEPROM's post) I have no clue though. Apple's specs page says this:

quote:

Dual display and video mirroring: Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the built-in display and up to 2560 by 1600 pixels on up to two external displays, both at millions of colors
And 1920x1200 on top of that. There might be some limitation with TB/DP streams or outputs on the IGP or some other random crap but I can't seem to find someone trying the specific config I mention.

Shaocaholica
Oct 29, 2002

Fig. 5E
If anyone is curious about the health of a 3 year old 3rd party battery thats been kept in storage. Graph below is showing the 3rd charge cycle after 2 full cycles since I got it. The first time running it, OS X was saying it was not functioning properly which isn't surprising given that it was storage away in god knows what conditions for 3 years according to the previous owner. The charge cycles indicate the previous owner was telling the truth about using it for ~1 month before putting it away.



Bought it off ebay for $40.

Shaocaholica fucked around with this message at 07:53 on Apr 20, 2014

NOTinuyasha
Oct 17, 2006

 
The Great Twist

Kingnothing posted:

No you can not. One mdp in each thunderbolt and 1 hdmi. It will definitely work.

Are you sure? There's some people saying, and Everymac too for this specific laptop, that OS X can only manage 1920x1200 over the HDMI port. It's a 1.4 so it should be capable but it's a software limitation. Someone claimed you could get 1440p/40hz with SwitchResX over HDMI though. Which is fine for me because it's just a work monitor off to the side.

Whatever, I have more time to figure this out, so please, if anyone has any other information, feel free to chime in. MDP Cinema displays aren't the easiest things to find used. There's like all of like ten on eBay and everything on Craigslist gets bought up before I get a chance so it might be a while.

Edit: And I don't think you can do two chained TB displays and one MDP over the two thunderbolt ports either - read that multiple places. There's literally no official documentation regarding this though.

NOTinuyasha fucked around with this message at 08:19 on Apr 20, 2014

BobHoward
Feb 13, 2012

The only thing white people deserve is a bullet to their empty skull

NOTinuyasha posted:

Edit: And I don't think you can do two chained TB displays and one MDP over the two thunderbolt ports either - read that multiple places. There's literally no official documentation regarding this though.

Did some searching, and it doesn't explicitly cover what you want to know, but it's good enough to figure everything out once you know how Thunderbolt handles all displays. Look at FAQ #18.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5219

Thunderbolt doesn't have its own native display protocol, it's really all encapsulated DisplayPort. Every TB display device (whether it's Apple's TB Display, one of those TB docking stations, or the single mDP at the end of the chain) pulls one DisplayPort off the TB bus.

The limitation is therefore how many DisplayPorts are routed from the video chip to the Thunderbolt bus controller inside a given Mac. According to #18 it would appear that, for all rMBP models to date, that would be two of them. So you are correct, it's either two chained TB Displays, or one TB Display plus one mDP.

To complete the picture, footnote 4 says that if you use the HDMI port on a rMBP you lose one TB display. So the HDMI output is really a DP-to-HDMI converter, and it has to borrow a DP link which is normally connected to the Thunderbolt controller. Or something close to that anyways.

e: if you don't need full performance on a third display, look into USB3 display adapters.

BobHoward fucked around with this message at 10:05 on Apr 20, 2014

NOTinuyasha
Oct 17, 2006

 
The Great Twist
That'd make more sense if I wasn't staring at a three display setup already - one TB display, one 1080p connected with a displayport to HDMI adapter, another connected directly through HDMI, and it'working fine. So using both TB ports doesn't deactivate the HDMI port.

NOTinuyasha fucked around with this message at 22:22 on Apr 20, 2014

spoon daddy
Aug 11, 2004
Who's your daddy?
College Slice

NOTinuyasha posted:

That'd make more sense if I wasn't staring at a three display setup already - one TB display, one 1080p connected with a displayport to HDMI adapter, another connected directly through HDMI, and it'working fine. So using both TB ports doesn't deactivate the HDMI port.

does it disable the laptop display?

Pilfered Pallbearers
Aug 2, 2007

quote:

How many external monitors can I run late 2012 RMBP Apple Support Communities : https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5462022?tstart=0

Mercurius
May 4, 2004

Amp it up.

spoon daddy posted:

does it disable the laptop display?
No, the screen stays on. OWC had a 15" rMBP driving 2 thunderbolt displays, a HDMI display and the retina screen a couple of days after the first gen rMBPs were released: http://blog.macsales.com/14241-macbook-pro-15-with-retina-display-can-run-3-external-displays

NOTinuyasha
Oct 17, 2006

 
The Great Twist
The internal display does stay on even with three external monitors. I was looking to upgrade the two 1080p monitors on the left and right to 1440p Cinema displays. We already know the MBPr can support two 1440p TB displays, but the big mystery is if it can support a third 1440p MDP Cinema display through the HDMI port.

My best shot at this point is getting an HDMI 1.4 to MDP cable/adapter and praying the MDP Cinema display works at native resolution, even if requires fiddling around with SwitchResX. Otherwise I'll probably just break down and get a refurbished iMac.

RyceCube
Dec 22, 2003

I Might Be Adam posted:

I'm sure that even the stock rMBPs are going to blow away my current machine but it's the longevity I'm thinking about. I usually get a minimum of 5 years out of my apple counters before certain tasks become too slow and irritating. Last year, it was a print catalog with back and forth Photoshop and InDesign work on large files that finally made me decide I need to start looking for new machine. Watching programs hang and chug along for minutes at a time can really affect your productivity.

Good news is that I'll be able to dump some more ram into it and my wife can use it for internet/word processing for quite a bit longer after I upgrade to a new machine.

Honestly, youre probably better off spending less, putting aside the money, and selling your laptop in 2-3 years and buying a new one then trying to make one last 5 years. You'll probably have a drastically more usable machine towards the end, while spending similar amounts. The diminishing returns for spending more is pretty high.

Mercurius
May 4, 2004

Amp it up.

NOTinuyasha posted:

The internal display does stay on even with three external monitors. I was looking to upgrade the two 1080p monitors on the left and right to 1440p Cinema displays. We already know the MBPr can support two 1440p TB displays, but the big mystery is if it can support a third 1440p MDP Cinema display through the HDMI port.

My best shot at this point is getting an HDMI 1.4 to MDP cable/adapter and praying the MDP Cinema display works at native resolution, even if requires fiddling around with SwitchResX. Otherwise I'll probably just break down and get a refurbished iMac.
I think the real problem is that HDMI is kind of terrible as a display protocol compared to DisplayPort. I've never personally used any of the HDMI to Mini-DP adapters but I don't know of any proper HDMI to Dual Link DVI adapters which is the sort of bandwidth that you need to run a 1440p display so I wouldn't be terribly surprised if it doesn't work right. That said, I guess if your adapter is HDMI 1.4 compliant you might be able to use SwitchResX to force the res to go across it.

kuskus
Oct 20, 2007

japtor posted:

You can daisy chain the two TB displays together off one TB port and the MDP one off the other TB port right? Plus I'm not sure the HDMI port will work for 1440p anyway.
I found out this weekend that the following combination doesn't work:

13" Macbook Pro -> Thunderbolt Display -> Mini DisplayPort to VGA adapter.

I haven't tried MDP->DVI, or straight up MDP -> MDP. I doubt they'll work.
(e: Just read BobHoward's response, and maybe only one is allocated per TB port?)

kuskus fucked around with this message at 15:10 on Apr 21, 2014

I Might Be Adam
Jun 12, 2007

Skip the Waves, Syncopate
Forwards Backwards

Phiberoptik posted:

Honestly, youre probably better off spending less, putting aside the money, and selling your laptop in 2-3 years and buying a new one then trying to make one last 5 years. You'll probably have a drastically more usable machine towards the end, while spending similar amounts. The diminishing returns for spending more is pretty high.

Yeah, that's a really good point. I don't usually sell off my electronics except for iPhones. If I could get a fair return on selling it after 3 years, it would make a lot of sense. I know someone that basically sells off whatever he has the moment a new version comes out. To me, that seems like you're just renting it at that point. A new iPad every 8-12 months? Forget it. I could probably get some money for my 2009 mbp but I think I'll just throw some more ram in it, wipe it and give to my wife.

How is the integrated video card in the new rMBP? I'm not going to lie, I enjoy playing some games on steam but I'm never going to build a gaming PC.

Thanks Ants
May 21, 2004

#essereFerrari


For what it's worth I owned a 2009 13" MBP pretty much base-spec 2.26GHz from new, paid £760 for it with 3-years AppleCare, upgraded it to 8GB RAM, a 240GB SSD and put a new battery in and sold it last week for £500. Made the purchase of a rMBP a lot easier.

Stick100
Mar 18, 2003

I Might Be Adam posted:

Yeah, that's a really good point. I don't usually sell off my electronics except for iPhones. If I could get a fair return on selling it after 3 years, it would make a lot of sense. I know someone that basically sells off whatever he has the moment a new version comes out. To me, that seems like you're just renting it at that point. A new iPad every 8-12 months? Forget it. I could probably get some money for my 2009 mbp but I think I'll just throw some more ram in it, wipe it and give to my wife.

How is the integrated video card in the new rMBP? I'm not going to lie, I enjoy playing some games on steam but I'm never going to build a gaming PC.

From what I can tell the base model of a given model will hold it's value the best. The discrete 650m in the rMBP 2012 plays games quite well. In total it seems like I can play games at about the level of PS3/Xbox 360. I've heard teh integrated video card in the 15' rMBP has comparable graphics performance.

So in general you should be able to play recent games (Bioshock Infinite as an example) at 720p on medium settings. The loads will be lighting fast as you have the SSD.

In general you can get 60fps if your willing to run in pretty low res (720p) on moderate settings (none of the cool new graphics options).

Of course I use Bootcamp exclusively and from what I've read Bootcamp Windows 7/8 supposedly runs OpenGL better than OSX.

Long way of saying the rMBP is a good if not great gaming machine as long as you keep your expectations in check. Personally as a gamer/game developer I'm hoping for an update soon with a better discrete option.

BobHoward
Feb 13, 2012

The only thing white people deserve is a bullet to their empty skull

kuskus posted:

I found out this weekend that the following combination doesn't work:

13" Macbook Pro -> Thunderbolt Display -> Mini DisplayPort to VGA adapter.

I haven't tried MDP->DVI, or straight up MDP -> MDP. I doubt they'll work.
(e: Just read BobHoward's response, and maybe only one is allocated per TB port?)

You can chain two displays from one port. This is a different issue, a limitation of Intel's generic Thunderbolt chip for peripherals. It can only decode one DisplayPort stream from the Thunderbolt bus. In one mode it can send that stream out over dedicated pins, in another it can reconfigure one of its Thunderbolt interfaces as a mDP if you plug a mDP device in. The two modes are mutually exclusive, and in Apple's TB Display it's permanently configured in the dedicated mode, for obvious reasons.

So, you can't plug a mDP device directly into a Thunderbolt Display. If you had a daisy-chainable non-display Thunderbolt peripheral, such as a HDD enclosure, you could put it between the TB Display and the mDP display and it would all work fine.

The irony is that the Thunderbolt HDD (or whatever you used between) probably would have the exact same Thunderbolt chip in it as the Thunderbolt Display. It's a somewhat silly limitation IMO, since Intel's Thunderbolt controller chips can encode two DisplayPort streams onto the Thunderbolt bus. They penny-pinched the chip designs for devices and the result is this very nonintuitive limitation.

bsaber
Jul 27, 2007
Just had my rMBP sent in for repairs today, the fans wouldn't spin up no matter how hot it got. Every test passed but the fans just wouldn't spin up. SMC reset didn't do anything, reformat fresh install didn't do anything. As its my main computer, I hope it comes back soon. They're recommending a replacement of the fans. Anyone else run into similar problems? If so what was the cause?

Thanks Ants
May 21, 2004

#essereFerrari


I'd find it hard to believe it was the fans (plural so I'm assuming 15") if they both stopped spinning up - it's not exactly a common part to fail. I think it's going to be whatever tells the fans to spin up that sits between the SMC software and the power connectors on the fans. So it could be a new logic board.

I heard the fan on my 11" MBA spin up today for the first time ever after Mail.app crashed. It looks to small to have one hidden inside.

the talent deficit
Dec 20, 2003

self-deprecation is a very british trait, and problems can arise when the british attempt to do so with a foreign culture





My 2013 13" rmpb has a series of scratches and chips on the screen. Can the glass surface be replaced seperately from the LCD or am I looking at a top case replacement to fix the issue?

Binary Badger
Oct 11, 2005

Trolling Link for a decade


the talent deficit posted:

My 2013 13" rmpb has a series of scratches and chips on the screen. Can the glass surface be replaced seperately from the LCD or am I looking at a top case replacement to fix the issue?

LCD display is all one manufactured part, you'd have to pay for a new one.

bsaber
Jul 27, 2007

Caged posted:

I'd find it hard to believe it was the fans (plural so I'm assuming 15") if they both stopped spinning up - it's not exactly a common part to fail. I think it's going to be whatever tells the fans to spin up that sits between the SMC software and the power connectors on the fans. So it could be a new logic board.

I heard the fan on my 11" MBA spin up today for the first time ever after Mail.app crashed. It looks to small to have one hidden inside.

Hm, I'm assuming a logic board replacement would take much longer than a just replacing the fans and sensors. Was hoping to get it back in 3 days rather than 5. Oh well...

And yes it's a 15".

Pilfered Pallbearers
Aug 2, 2007

the talent deficit posted:

My 2013 13" rmpb has a series of scratches and chips on the screen. Can the glass surface be replaced seperately from the LCD or am I looking at a top case replacement to fix the issue?

Top case is what holds your keyboard. You'll need an entire new display clamshell (whole LCD panel/glass/aluminum backing). This will not be covered by AppleCare or limited warranty, you will be paying out of pocket.

Djimi
Jan 23, 2004

I like digital data

Caged posted:

For what it's worth I owned a 2009 13" MBP pretty much base-spec 2.26GHz from new, paid £760 for it with 3-years AppleCare, upgraded it to 8GB RAM, a 240GB SSD and put a new battery in and sold it last week for £500. Made the purchase of a rMBP a lot easier.
Savor that memory.

spoon daddy
Aug 11, 2004
Who's your daddy?
College Slice
Just picked up a 15" retina with discrete graphics and am super happy with it except for one thing, while playing intense games that require discrete graphics such as D3 or GW2 the charge slowly drains even while plugged in with the 85W charger that came with it. Is this expected behavior?

e: This is what I have http://store.apple.com/us/product/FE294LL/A/refurbished-154-inch-macbook-pro-23ghz-quad-core-intel-i7-with-retina-display

Star War Sex Parrot
Oct 2, 2003

Yes that is expected behavior.

Pivo
Aug 20, 2004


Star War Sex Parrot posted:

Yes that is expected behavior.

Is it really? I've never been able to run anything so hard as to drain the battery on my 2011 17" MBP while plugged in. Maybe the rMBPs are different, but that seems unusual to me. In theory the charger should provide enough power for the maximum of what the machine can use, right? It defeats the purpose otherwise. Imagine you're using it for some heavy rendering work, CPU+GPU and lots of IO, you leave it on overnight to finish a job while plugged in and find it dead? No way. Apple wouldn't stand for that, no self-respecting manufacturer would. I refuse to believe that you can place any kind of load on a laptop that would overpower the charger, and I've certainly never seen it happen, either with MBPs or other non-Apple products.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Wild EEPROM
Jul 29, 2011


oh, my, god. Becky, look at her bitrate.
Keep in mind your old 17" mbp only had to push 1920x1200 (2,304,000 pixels), while the new one has to push 2880x1800 (5,184,000 pixels) - more than double the number of pixels.

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • Post
  • Reply