MacBook Pro Retina running Bootcamp with 2 external 27" monitors

Question

I am wanting to buy a MacBook Pro Retina but am currently really nervous about doing so. I've read that everything seems to run well on the Retina and is usable as long as you have the latest graphics drivers and you bump the font to 150%.

All this is fine, but I'm worried about what happens when I plug in my 2 external 27" monitors. The main question I have is will Windows want to run those 2 monitors at 150% font as well or can you set it up so its only on the laptops monitor that the scaling will take place?

Also wondering if drivers improved with Mountain Lion?

Answer 1

If your MacBook Retina is running in 150 DPI then your external screens will run in 150 DPI as well. This is a no go.

You can run your MacBook in eg. 1920x1200 (or any other resolution). But because this is not native resolution it is grainy. Even running with perfect pixel doubling like 1440x900 is blurry (http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/59283/why-is-a-retina-macbook-running-1440x900-grainy-under-boot-camp). Like going from none-retina to retina (just the other way).

I have been running with the retina under Boot Camp for many weeks now, and I've given up. Yesterday I ordered a MacBook Air and I'm selling my retina on eBay (Denmark). I'm pretty tech savvy... And everybody who says retina and Windows are great lies!

You can try this on your own machine before buing a retina. Just change the DPI on your current laptop and attach an external screen and try changing the resolution to a none native resolution.

If Windows are your main OS, don't buy retina! Period.

Answer 2

I have a 2 x 24" setup at work and Windows 7 via Bootcamp. You can't have all three displays (2 external and 1 MBP) usable at the same time since Windows won't allow setting a different DPI on a per-display basis.

What you can do, however, is set resolution and DPI to work for external displays and use MBP display as an auxiliary space, maybe to move windows out of the way or what have you. Everything will look tiny on it, but you could find some use for it.

Answer 3

I'm pretty sure Windows cannot do per-monitor DPI settings, unless Apple have modified some drivers for it (pretty unlikely).

This answer from a sister stackexchange site backs that up: http://superuser.com/questions/29796/dual-monitors-on-windows-7-how-do-i-set-a-different-dpi-or-text-size-on-each-m

Answer 4

I'm able to have different monitors at different resolutions if I use Oracle Virtualbox. The great thing is that I can access my main MacOS hard drive (not read only like Bootcamp), and access all my files.

I just never see a need to personally use Bootcamp with Virtual box. I'll be able to test bootcamp on Monday when I get home