I am about to get the new slim retina macbook pro with 512 ssd ram.
It has an NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M as a graphics card.
Will this be a good configuration to use touch designer. (using bootcamp )
Actually while writing this I wonder if bootcamp will still be available in mountain Lion…
Bootcamp works fine under Lion, and the Nvidia Geforce 650M should work fine for TouchDesigner assuming there are no issues with drivers.
It remains to be seen how Windows will run on the retina display, it might not look good, or it might be too tiny to read if there is no scaling. I haven’t heard any first reports of Windows running on it yet. If needed, you can probably use an external monitor to get around any issues.
Don’t forget to you’ll need an external optical drive or USB flash drive to install Windows…
thnx for the input Ben.
How did this end up working out macha-one? I’m considering a similar purchase.
Jep,
Would like to know to…
+1 for the results here too!
I recently got a new retina MacBook Pro (2.7 with 16GB) and installed bootcamp with Touchdesigner last night.
I am new to Touchdesigner, but I can say so far that it runs great. Windows on the retina display is great once you get the Bootcamp drivers installed. I also would recommend turning down the resolution as the default makes everything really small.
All and all really happy with it, that is until a Mac version comes out. 
before going for a sub-optimal resolution for TouchDesigner, try these unsupported incantations from the textport…
" … uioptions -o font.relative.size 0 will set the fonts to its default size. uioptions -o font.relative.size 3 will set the fonts to 3 points larger. fonts are clamped to 5 points larger and 3 points smaller than normal. "
(from release notes derivative.ca/wiki077/index. … /077/12600 )
Thanks for the update, this is good to know.
Hey there,
these are interesting news. But is the new graphics card able to handle the 088 version of TD (or at least in the future)? Or is this graphics card to weak?
I recently purchased a 15" Retina Macbook Pro and am using it as my daily TouchDesigner system. Everything works great so far, including 088!
Here are some suggestions if your using a 15" retina display;
- After installing the bootcamp drivers, go to Nvidia.com and get the latest graphics drivers for the OS you are using (Windows 8 in my case).
- As Proxemics suggested previously, turn down the resolution by right-clicking on the desktop and selecting Screen Resolution. The default resolution of 2880x1800 renders TouchDesigner beautifully but everything in the interface becomes extremely small, like squeezing a 30"+ monitor down to a 15" one. You can not use the uioptions tip Rodberry suggested as more than just the text is smaller, all the buttons and menus are uniformly scaled down as well. I have found that 1920x1200 is an ideal size for the 15" screen (for my eyes, YMMV).
- In the same Screen Resolution dialog, there is an advanced option link called “Adjust the size of text on screen” which I find helpful to change to 125% scale. This helps for Windows generally, not just TouchDesigner.
- Multiple monitors work great, no issues so far with either the HDMI out or the mini-displayport out.
- The Nvidia 650M seems up to the task, although not the most powerful mGPU on the market it seems fast and snappy, I’ve had no surprises. All the solid-state drives likely help too.
Things to consider when ordering;
- Apple’s solid-state prices are high and there is already 3rd party SSD boards available for these machines. For about the same price as the 500GB upgrade on the Apple store, you can purchase this 3rd party kit and keep the 256GB drive that comes with the machine as an external SSD. If you need to bootcamp partition the drive, consider how much space you will have for each partition. OWC Solid State Drives - I want one
- If you need a more monitor output than the HDMI port, you’ll need mini-displayport out to DVI/VGA/HDMI adaptors - I got one
- If you need ethernet network access, you’ll need an adaptor - I’m okay wireless so far
- If you need to install software from a disk, you’ll need an external optical drive. - I used this for my Windows install, but you can install via USB flash drive as well
I’ll post more tips as I come across them.
Did I mention how damn great this display looks? 
Good to hear, Ben! I’m slightly jealous…having to lug my 20 lb laptop and charger around!
This looks like a great (although expensive) option for running TD.
But if you need the Macbook for other work and can ONLY have 1 machine I suppose it makes sense.
At about $1000 cheaper I am looking to get the Asus N56VZ which uses the same 650M graphics card as the new 15" Mac Books. The price difference will pay for a new retina iPad and iPad mini for my girlfriend
And according to this article, there is still a penalty to be paid when running Windows on a Mac
zdnet.com/blog/bott/the-hidd … ac_p2/3673
either a hard drive access penalty when running Bootcamp or a CPU-graphics penalty with virtualization.
Confirmed in this article (see gaming)
blog.laptopmag.com/windows-7-tes … good-is-it
And finally, everyone knows Apple gouges when it comes to any hardware(RAM,SSD) upgrades.
Can somebody confirm the state of play with tearing output out of a rmbp 650m?
Anybody else encounter extreme framerate drop when touch runs on extended desktop? This only happens on my bootcamped Retina MacBook “Pro” 15. Even the default new project only runs 1-2 FPS when any window from touch is on second screen. This has been consistent across many non-commercial 088 builds. This isn’t a demo limitation is it?
Could this be caused by the Macbook’s energy saving dual-GPU setup? Do I need GPU affinity to force touch onto the NVIDIA card and off the integrated GPU? I’m not the best at navigating system prefs/info in Windows 8.1 yet, but hopefully someone knows some settings I should check on…
Its definitely a not non-commercial thing as we don’t throttle speeds for any version. It’ likely related to the dual-GPUs, not sure how to fix it though. GPU affinity won’t help since all the cards need to be Quadros for that to work.
Can anyone think of somewhere to begin to try to sort out this framerate nosedive on extended desktop? This is still a consistent issue. A debugging idea? A system preference control panel to check? This is vexing! 
Hi GutMod, what version Nvidia drivers are you running? I would try new ones from Nvidia.com version 350 or higher, the ones that come with bootcamp are very old.
Updated driver. Running NVIDIA Driver 353.06 on a GeForce GT 650M. Problem persists. If any window with moving images is on the second display, TouchDesigner GUI drops to 1fps.
In testing the problem, I right clicked a moviefilein TOP and opened a viewer window (displaying default Trillium.jpg) and dragged that to the second screen. There was a short framerate hit then smooth at 30fps. Also when using a Window COMP on second display everything will run 1fps, when I disable redraw, the TouchDesigner GUI framerate returns to normal.
I’m using experimental build 50180 now, but this has been a long running problem.
And then, just before posting the above, I tried changing my second display’s resolution to 720p from the defaulted 1080i in the NVIDIA preference panel… 
… 
Framerate was back to normal with moving content on both screens. I began to wonder if this had been because my MacBook just couldn’t manage 1920x1080 on second display, or that maybe it had to do with non-commercial res-limits, so I switched to 1080p: everything was fine I then wondered if it had been the interlacing vs progressive, so I switched to 1080i: everything was fine It seems that messing around with settings then returning to default somehow forced things to work right for the first time 
We’ll see how long this accidental fix holds.
Great that you solved it! I recommend always running progressive. I often run 3 1920x1080 on my old retina w/650M, no problems.