Halo 1 & 2 for PC
This topic has moved here: Subject: gaming on a mac?
  • Subject: gaming on a mac?
Subject: gaming on a mac?
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I have no probelm against macs, theyre very nice computers but extremely overpriced for the performance you get out of them. Macs are just not meant for gaming. A $3000 mac can be crushed easily by a $1500-2000 pc, just check these benchmarks and try to argue against me. I just wanted to show you guys this because I've noticed a numerous amount of people raving how great macs are for gaming.

Several games including halo

Doom 3 on a dual processor, dual core mac

Another bench

We've often heard about the "Megahertz Myth" -- the idea that Macs can perform as well as or better than PCs despite their lower clock speeds, and that's true for some operations. Games don't work that way, though: there's no substitute for CPU cycles when it comes to games like this

  • 03.17.2006 12:57 PM PDT

Don't drink to excess– You might shoot at tax-collectors... and miss

Computer: Power Mac G5 CPU Type: PowerPC G5 (2.2) Number Of CPUs: 2 CPU Speed: 1.8 GHz L2 Cache (per CPU): 512 KB Memory: 1.25 GB Bus Speed: 900 MHz

ATi Radeon X800 XT Mac Edition
Display Type: LCD Resolution: 1680 x 1050 Depth: 32-bit Color

I didn't buy my Mac, (Dual 1.8 Ghz G5), for gaming. I bought it for graphics production, (print mostly, but some web), for which it's the industry standard.

I don't know much about other games, I only play Halo. I tried the Unreal Tournament demo. It looked nice. The single played demo worked fine and I pwned against the computer. In online multi player I got killed, but that was because there's some kind of teleporter disc shooting gun that everyone was using to zap themselves from point to point and I never got the hang of it.

I can play Halo on very high graphics settings with no problem, but I like the way it looks at lower settings– the red and blue armor in multiplayer is less muted, (more bright primary color), makes for better targets.

I'm always suspicious of "benchmarks", good or bad– they rarely reflect real-world usage/experience.

  • 03.17.2006 2:05 PM PDT
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Macintoshes weren't necessarily designed for gaming. Even then, there are other options for the PowerMacs. The PowerMacs you showed are outdated. You showed a Dual 2.5 Ghz PowerMac when the newest G5 is TWO dual core G5s clocked at 2.5 Ghz. I wouldn't necessarily say Macs are over priced. There's a lot of stuff that the ignorant don't mention. Macs come with tight integration between the OS and the Computer, since both of them were made by Apple Computer Inc. Also, not all of the Macs are $3000. You can get macs now for $700 (at costco) with 1.5 Ghz G4 processors, Radeon 9200 with 64 MB GPUs, 512Mb of RAM, Bluetooth, Airport (wifi), a bluetooth wireless keyboard and mouse, and a 3 year extended warranty. I'd say it's not a bad deal in my opinion. Even though they won't win many benchmarks, they still perform faster doing day to day tasks compared to Windows explorer. There are many of PC users who are absolutely obsessed with having the highest benchmarks, so they go and risk voiding their warranty by overclocking them just to get 5 fps more. If I wanted to be able to print out benchmarks, that pwned everyone else's, I'd build a PC, just like my parents' (which is at Best Buy for it's 4th repair in less than 3 months)

[Edited on 3/17/2006]

  • 03.17.2006 5:21 PM PDT
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yes mac's are EXTREME ripoffs, especially the G5's. I mean come on the cheapest one is $2000 and only comes with 512mb's of ram, and a geforce 6600LE(lower clockspeeds than even the regular 6600's). Even the $3300 powermac G5 only comes with 512mb's of ram. I mean come on your paying $3300 for a computer and getting 512mb's of ram, and a 6600 vid card. If you were to spend that on anything else, it would destroy it. For instance, if you were to buy a dell xps 600 with the following : pentium 4 670, dual 7800GTX's, 2 gigs ddr2 ram at 667MHz , and a 250 gig sata hd for $3219, INCLUDING a FREE 20" widescreen LCD. That dell would absolutely destroy the mac in any game benchmark and you guys know it, and it comes with a good monitor.

Macs are good for many things, but gaming is not one of them. If i were going to get a pc for digital media editing and stuff, I'd go with a mac, but for gaming save yourself the money and buy something else thats nicer.

and those benchmarks arent just 5fps higher, theyre like 30-40.

[Edited on 3/17/2006]

  • 03.17.2006 5:50 PM PDT
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My iMac plays all the games that I like to play just fine. Well not necessarily Halo because of the universal binary issues but I e-mailed Macsoft about that and they said they were working on it. Doom 3 Runs with 25-50 fps on 1680x1050 with highest settings. Obviously the iMacs aren't gaming rigs but I still would never buy another PC even if it could blow my Macintosh out of the water. I don't really believe benchmarks (unless they're talking about frame-rates in a video game) because the 1.5 GHz mac mini performs much much better doing daily tasks than most of the high-end PCs I've used.

  • 03.17.2006 7:09 PM PDT
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I do not dispute the general logic of your post, however all of the benchs you have posted are almosta a year old.

That is before the release of OS 10.4 which includes several significant updates to Apple's OpenGL implementation. This is also long before a series of updates to the Doom3 engine that have increased it's performance. I would suggest you look up some recent benchmarks, espcially those of games running natively (universal binary) on the newly released Intel based Macintoshes.

There is also the issue of hardware. Apple charges ludicrous amounts of money for their own memory. It's stupid. You're better off buying and installing it yourself.

Macintosh video cards are also overpriced. Sadly the only thing preventing a Mac from using any standard PC video card is nVidia or ATI taking the time to write the f***ing drivers (which they won't do since they make so much money overcharging us Mac users) You can cicumvent this by buying a cheap PC video card, and flashing the ROM, but I it isn't for the feint of heart.

I'm not saying that your standard PC isn't going to a Mac by a fair margin when it comes to price/performance in regards to gaming. However all the extra money
you paid for a screaming video card does you little good outside of gaming.

  • 03.17.2006 7:28 PM PDT
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Compare the specs of the powermac G5, and the highest dell xps, Alienware area-51, and you'll notice a huge difference in the parts/price.(not to mention the dell and alienware come with 20" LCD monitors).


ok just so you guys understand, Im not trying to say macs are crap. Theyre very nice computers, but when it comes to gaming its definately not their strong point. Theyre great for audio, and video editing, and other digital media, but gaming capabilties is hte only thing they lack.

[Edited on 3/17/2006]

  • 03.17.2006 7:31 PM PDT
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the iMacs come with 20" monitors. And if you pimp-out an alienware or XPS it costs almost as much as a Power Mac G5.

  • 03.17.2006 8:24 PM PDT

Don't drink to excess– You might shoot at tax-collectors... and miss

Computer: Power Mac G5 CPU Type: PowerPC G5 (2.2) Number Of CPUs: 2 CPU Speed: 1.8 GHz L2 Cache (per CPU): 512 KB Memory: 1.25 GB Bus Speed: 900 MHz

ATi Radeon X800 XT Mac Edition
Display Type: LCD Resolution: 1680 x 1050 Depth: 32-bit Color

I love my Mac. I'll never own a Windows PC as long as Apple makes computers.

Walt Mossberg, the tech columnist at the Wall Street Journal reccommends them for everyone, with 2 exceptions, people who need to run a niche program that only runs on Windows and HARD-CORE GAMERS.

I only play one game, Halo, (and Solitaire one in a while). And Halo runs just fine.

  • 03.17.2006 9:28 PM PDT
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Posted by: GreenxPanda
the iMacs come with 20" monitors. And if you pimp-out an alienware or XPS it costs almost as much as a Power Mac G5.


no -blam!-, the iMac is a computer and monitor all in one. Its like saying my car came with tires.....The G5's do not come with monitors and thats what im talking about, not the iMacs.

Yea if you "pimp-out" an alineware or XPS it may cost as much(and they come with monitors unlike hte G5's), but it will certainly kick the mac's ass in any gaming benchmark.

  • 03.17.2006 9:33 PM PDT
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Posted by: SimonJester753
I love my Mac. I'll never own a Windows PC as long as Apple makes computers.



You will also never get above 45 fps either!


edit - one more thing, run a benchmark and see what you get with your mac

[Edited on 3/17/2006]

  • 03.17.2006 9:37 PM PDT
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Maybe I don't need to get 45+ fps. The brain sees 30 as smooth, thtat's about the frame rate of a movie. Also, why would you even start the thread? What was it's particular purpose? To irritate? To get flamed?

[Edited on 3/18/2006]

  • 03.18.2006 1:08 AM PDT
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Maybe we don't want to get 45+ fps

Hey speak for yourself buddy. I would love it if my Mac games got better performance.

There are two primary reasons Mac suck for gaming. This isn't to say that gaming on a Mac isn't enjoyable or that there aren't any games for Macs, these are just statements of fact.

(1) Almost all games these days are made for the PC or consoles first and then maybe later ported to the Mac. This means that right off the bat, the game has been optimized and tweaked for the best possible performance on a PC from the ground up. Porting a game that's been so heavily optimized to Windows software and Intel hardware often results in a significant performance hit. Few games that make it to the Mac are optimized for Apple's OpenGL libararies, or support Symmetric Multi-Processing, two things which give a MASSIVE performance boost on most Macs.

(2) Macs are currently suffering from a lack of gaming titles. This is primarily because of middleware. On example especially relevant to Halo 2 is Havok. Havok studios, the people that made the physics engine powering Halo 2, want so much money to license a Mac version of their code, that none of the companies that port games to the Mac can afford their prices. This has killed many would be ports of Mac games in their tracks, especially such unheard of titles as Half-Life 2. You can bet that M$ isn't about to pay the money they want for a puny Mac port.

There are success stories. Apple is starting to realizing that lack of gaming hurts potential Mac sales (at least in their consumer oriented offerings). They have been optimizing their OpenGL libraries to make the more gaming friendly.

Sadly for the time being if all you care about is gaming don't get a Mac. If you want to do most anything else, get one you will save time, money, and headache in the long run.

  • 03.18.2006 7:45 AM PDT
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Yes I understand there's a lack of gaming titles and that most of the ports suck but not all of them. Doom 3 is great example. The patch for the intel macs is supposed to take full advantage of the dual core processing power of the new iMacs and Macbook Pros, which I've heard are actually playable at 1680x1050 with everything on medium. I just want to play Halo, and to do that, my Mac works just fine.

  • 03.18.2006 8:01 AM PDT
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Honestly, I believe Macs can make decent gaming rigs, but your average Windows-based gaming computer is still superior I believe.

  • 03.18.2006 8:53 AM PDT
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Posted by: Master Kim
Honestly, I believe Macs can make decent gaming rigs, but your average Windows-based gaming computer is still superior I believe.


my point exactly

Posted by: GreenxPanda
Maybe I don't need to get 45+ fps. The brain sees 30 as smooth, thtat's about the frame rate of a movie.


No, its different for film/tv. If youve ever seen individual cells of a film strip you'd see that they are somewhat blurred so that it appears smoother when its playing at 24fps. The actual true standard is 29.7 fps when importing from a dv cam, but then its edited down to either 24 or 25 depending on the format.

Also if you've ever played a game at 60+ fps, and then put vsync on, you can really tell a difference. Im guessing you've never done that because your on a mac, but most people here can say that its true.

[Edited on 3/18/2006]

  • 03.18.2006 10:08 AM PDT
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I play Halo at 1280x800 with everything on highest but specular and shadows off. I get about 30-55 fps. I'd have to agree with you that there is a significant difference between 30 and 45. I can play it at 1680x1050 with everything on but I only get about 20-33 fps on my X600 XT which is soon to be an X1600.

  • 03.18.2006 6:16 PM PDT
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Well of course AMD is fastest. It runs at 64 bits me thinks, instead of 32 bits.

And was it talking about BenchMark frame rates?

[Edited on 3/19/2006]

  • 03.19.2006 3:30 AM PDT
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Posted by: Bapa
Well of course AMD is fastest. It runs at 64 bits me thinks, instead of 32 bits.

And was it talking about BenchMark frame rates?



No, it is fastest because it has the best architecture. Instead of using high clockspeeds, they chose to use low latencies, and slightly lower clockspeeds. And no, almost 95% of all AMD 64 users are only running 32 bit. You need to have a 64 bit operating system, and there are only 2 currently out : windows x64(which really lacks support), and a version of linux which is terrible for gaming. Linux is the only thing worse than mac for gaming.

  • 03.19.2006 3:49 AM PDT

Intel Macs change all that.

Here are some interesting benchmarks that compare performance on the 2.0 GHz Intel Core Duo iMac to the older PowerPC models which are represented in the article linked in the original post.

Keep in mind that the iMac represent Apple's consumer-level line, while the G5 PowerMacs represent the pro line. Once Apple brings out the Intel PowerMac some time this year, the improvements will be even more pronounced. Also remember that this is just the first iteration of the Intel line of Macs, and further optimisation should take place with each future revision, beyond simple CPU speed bumps.

  • 03.19.2006 5:18 AM PDT

Don't drink to excess– You might shoot at tax-collectors... and miss

Computer: Power Mac G5 CPU Type: PowerPC G5 (2.2) Number Of CPUs: 2 CPU Speed: 1.8 GHz L2 Cache (per CPU): 512 KB Memory: 1.25 GB Bus Speed: 900 MHz

ATi Radeon X800 XT Mac Edition
Display Type: LCD Resolution: 1680 x 1050 Depth: 32-bit Color

TMH1988 wrote:
You need to have a 64 bit operating system, and there are only 2 currently out : windows x64(which really lacks support), and a version of linux which is terrible for gaming. Linux is the only thing worse than mac for gaming.

From Apple's website:
Mac OS X Tiger delivers native 64-bit support, enabling you to run applications that address massive amounts of memory.

I've been playing with these setting:
Vertex Shaders Only
FSAA: off
Lens Flare: Low
Model Detail: High

Tonight I tried:
Vertex Shaders Only
FSAA: 2x
Lens Flare: Low
Model Detail: Medium

Things looked a little smoother. Game played fine, (caped 3 flag in a row, even with web browser running in background).

I've played with Vertex + Pixel Shaders on and the game played as well, but I like the way things look with Vertex only, (especially through the scopes).

I have no idea of how to measure FPS while in game, or I'd tell you.

Edit- I got the FPS data:

Macintosh HD\Applications\Halo\Halo Frames=4700
Total Time=89.32s
Average frame rate=52.62fps
Below 5fps= 15% (time) 0% (frames) (13.403s spent in 11 frames)
Below 10fps= 15% (time) 0% (frames)
Below 15fps= 15% (time) 0% (frames)
Below 20fps= 16% (time) 0% (frames)
Below 25fps= 18% (time) 1% (frames)
Below 30fps= 21% (time) 3% (frames)
Below 40fps= 36% (time) 12% (frames)
Below 50fps= 46% (time) 21% (frames)
Below 60fps= 65% (time) 39% (frames)
###Sound Options###
Hardware Acceleration= No
Sound Quality= Low
Environmental Sound= No
Sound Variety= Low
###Video Options###
Resolution= 640 x 480
Refresh rate= 0 Hz
Framerate throttle= No Vsync
Specular= No
Shadows= No
Decals= Yes
Particles= Off
Texture Quality= Medium


[Edited on 3/20/2006]

  • 03.19.2006 9:30 PM PDT
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you check the time demo box when Halo starts up. There are more options to change when you get into the game, press escape, change settings, and then video settings. I now have 2 apple computers, yesterday I brought home a mac mini, with a 1.5Ghz G4, 512MB of RAM, and a Radeon 9200 with 64MB of RAM. I was surprised how well Halo ran at 800x600, which isn't bad for the video card it comes with. I don't plan on using this computer for anything but office work (which is why I left it in my office) so it'll be fine, but it's nice to know that I can still play Halo on it if I wanted to, you know, on those slow days at work... ;-)

  • 03.19.2006 9:55 PM PDT