MacBook Pro Retina - NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M with 1GB GDDR5 memory only shows 512MB

[DanSandbergUCONN]

Hi All -

Just purchased a new MacBook Pro with Retina display (15 inch, 2.7 GHz). The stock graphics card is the NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M with 1GB of GDDR5 memory. When I go to About This Mac--> More Info --> Overview Tab is says on the third line

Quote: Graphics Intel HD Graphics 4000 512 MB

I called Apple and, after being transferred twice, came to the conclusion that they did not know why the mac was recognizing 512MB versus 1GB. The last person I spoke with assured me that I had 1GB, that the 512MB was the amount of flash storage, and that there was no way to scan or verify the graphics card had 1GB via the OS. Of course, opening the machine to check the graphics card would void my applecare so I'm not going to do that.

I'm not having any problems with it but I should have what I paid for. Does anyone have any information on this? Is the 512MB read-out really the flash storage? If so, why is the flash storage listed under Graphics and not under Storage? Is there a way to determine how much graphics memory I have? I search NVIDIA's site for information but did not find an answer.

Thank you in advance . - Dan

[trevor]

Quote: When I go to About This Mac--> More Info --> Overview Tab is says on the third line

Go to About This Mac --> More Info (which launches System Profiler--you can also just load System Profiler directly from /Applications/Utilities) --> Hardware --> Graphics/Displays. I believe (based on my 15" MacBook Pro 2009, which has the nvidia GeForce 9400M and the GeForce 9600M GT) that you will see two video cards listed. One will be the slow Intel HD Graphics 4000 with shared memory that you mention, the other will be the quick nvidia GT 650M with 1 GB. Is that what you see?

The Intel HD Graphics 4000 is listed as having 512 MB of memory, but it actually has zero bytes of memory, because it uses slow shared memory. In other words, it steals memory from your computer to store it's graphic data, and has no dedicated memory of it's own. This is a formula for slow graphics. It's only advantage is that you'll get more battery time, because the fast video card uses more power.

You'll want to use the nvidia GT 650M, with it's own fast dedicated memory. Once you switch to using the nvidia card, I suspect that your overview will show the 1 GB of dedicated memory that you are expecting.

Trevor

[DanSandbergUCONN]

Quote: Originally Posted by trevor Go to About This Mac --> More Info (which launches System Profiler--you can also just load System Profiler directly from /Applications/Utilities) --> Hardware --> Graphics/Displays. I believe (based on my 15" MacBook Pro 2009, which has the nvidia GeForce 9400M and the GeForce 9600M GT) that you will see two video cards listed. One will be the slow Intel HD Graphics 4000 with shared memory that you mention, the other will be the quick nvidia GT 650M with 1 GB. Is that what you see? The Intel HD Graphics 4000 is listed as having 512 MB of memory, but it actually has zero bytes of memory, because it uses slow shared memory. In other words, it steals memory from your computer to store it's graphic data, and has no dedicated memory of it's own. This is a formula for slow graphics. It's only advantage is that you'll get more battery time, because the fast video card uses more power. You'll want to use the nvidia GT 650M, with it's own fast dedicated memory. Once you switch to using the nvidia card, I suspect that your overview will show the 1 GB of dedicated memory that you are expecting. Trevor

Yes, thank you very much. Sorry for the delayed reply, I was away last week.