Intel Iris improves graphics performance by up to 65% on new MacBooks Pro with Retina display

This week, in addition to new iPads, Apple also launched the long-awaited Retina display MacBooks Pro equipped with Intel’s “Haswell” processors.

MacBook Pro with Retina display (late 2013) open

A good news of these fourth generation chips is that they bring much more robust graphics, capable of improving the performance of the machines – after all, only the top-of-the-line model (15 inches) has a second graphics card (an NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M with 2GB of memory).

THE Macworld tested some of these units and the results are encouraging. First, however, a warning is worthwhile: the benchmark of them (Speedmark) is being upgraded to the ninth version in order to take advantage of OS X Mavericks. Therefore, the results of this study were based on individual tests with 12 applications and not something “global”.

Message given, let’s go to the results:

Benchmark of the new MacBooks Pro with Retina display


Benchmark of the new MacBooks Pro with Retina display

Compared to HD 4000 graphics, which equip MacBooks Pro Retina released in mid-2012 / early 2013, Iris graphics managed to achieve 45-50% better frame rates in tests Cinebench and Unigine Valley Benchmark. At the Unigen Heaven, gains were up to 65% in the frames!

Benchmark of the new MacBooks Pro with Retina display

Already in MathematicaMark 9, the new machines performed 8% better; in the CPU test (Cinebench) the result surpassed the old MacBooks Pro Retina with “Ive Bridge” processors by 5%. Using the HandBrake app (video converter) as a comparison, the new machines were 5% faster (MathematicaMark 9); interestingly, in the CPU test (Cinebench), they were worse (1%) – perhaps because of HandBrake’s own optimizations.

Benchmark of the new MacBooks Pro with Retina display

And the new PCIe SSDs, are they much faster even as Apple promises? According to Macworld, the gains are approximately 33% in the simple test of transferring folders and heavy files (6GB) from one side to the other. This is in the 256GB model, since interestingly the 128GB did not achieve a result above the machines of mid-2012 / early 2013. On the contrary, in tests of compression / decompression of files, the old generation fared even better – you will understand …

Regardless of some equal / worse numbers, in general, we can consider that Apple made a good upgrade.


MacBook Pro thumbnail with Retina display MacBook Pro with Retina display

Price: from R $ 5,999.00 (or 12x interest-free R $ 499.92)Sizes: 13 and 15 inchesCurrent generation: end of 2013

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