23 replies to this topic

[Wolfchild]

Am I the only one disappointed with the frame rates of TF2?

I get nowhere near the same performance in OS X that I do in XP - this on my Mac Pro (Dual 2.66 GHz Xeon, Radeon X1900).  I was hoping to never have to boot into XP again, since the only reason I do that anymore is to play TF2.  Now I'll have go back at least once more to make sure all the vid settings are the same.  I have been slowly turning the settings down, down, down but nothing helps.  I haven't measured the actual average fps yet, because I really don't care what it is.  All I care is that the limitation in my play is my skill and not my framerate.  Playing Spy yesterday, I could only get backstabs on stationary targets because the framerate was too poor for me to track a moving target.

It made me feel like I suck - but that just can't be true, can it?  

[Hansi]

You're not alone, I tried it out today and the frame rate was crap

Seems like there are a lot of bugs: http://forums.steamp...d.php?t=1305224

and slow downs: http://forums.steamp...d.php?t=1302195

Turning off every graphic gimmic is the recommended route atm...

Glad I didn't buy it.

[DaveyJJ]

Wolfchild, on 13 June 2010 - 12:00 PM, said:

Am I the only one disappointed with the frame rates of TF2?

I get nowhere near the same performance in OS X that I do in XP - this on my Mac Pro (Dual 2.66 GHz Xeon, Radeon X1900).  I was hoping to never have to boot into XP again, since the only reason I do that anymore is to play TF2.  Now I'll have go back at least once more to make sure all the vid settings are the same.  I have been slowly turning the settings down, down, down but nothing helps.  I haven't measured the actual average fps yet, because I really don't care what it is.  All I care is that the limitation in my play is my skill and not my framerate.  Playing Spy yesterday, I could only get backstabs on stationary targets because the framerate was too poor for me to track a moving target.

It made me feel like I suck - but that just can't be true, can it?  

I haven't got an exact frame rate yet, but I play fine on my MacBook with a 9400M integrated card, as does my son on his new Mac mini. I know that doesn't help, but I don't know what else to say.

[Mister Mumbles]

DaveyJJ, on 13 June 2010 - 12:15 PM, said:

I haven't got an exact frame rate yet, but I play fine on my MacBook with a 9400M integrated card, as does my son on his new Mac mini. I know that doesn't help, but I don't know what else to say.

Same here. It is a bit puzzling, I must say, but I do have everything turned down so it runs more or less smoothly. Yeah, the port definitely needs some tweaking though. Only paid a few bucks for the game as I got it when the Orange Box set special was available when Half Life 2 was released.

Anyway, I do find it to be a fun game. Let's hope they improve performance a bit though.

[The Liberator]

Oh well, I guess we will just have to wait, will we not?

Liberator.

[bookman]

DaveyJJ, on 13 June 2010 - 12:15 PM, said:

I haven't got an exact frame rate yet, but I play fine on my MacBook with a 9400M integrated card, as does my son on his new Mac mini. I know that doesn't help, but I don't know what else to say.

Same here.

[EdgeJ]

So it's not just me?

I was horrified when I downloaded The Orange Box on my brand new MacBook Pro (the 2.66GHz, 4GB memory with GeForce 320M graphics) and found that the games will only run smoothly on medium settings for the most part!

So, is the solution for gaming on a Mac to Boot Camp? If I were to Boot Camp, would you guys recommend XP or Windows 7 if it's only for gaming?

[PeopleLikeFrank]

EdgeJ, on 15 June 2010 - 07:09 AM, said:

So it's not just me?

I was horrified when I downloaded The Orange Box on my brand new MacBook Pro (the 2.66GHz, 4GB memory with GeForce 320M graphics) and found that the games will only run smoothly on medium settings for the most part!

So, is the solution for gaming on a Mac to Boot Camp? If I were to Boot Camp, would you guys recommend XP or Windows 7 if it's only for gaming?

Well, we hope things will improve performance-wise on OS X. Bootcamp is going to give you more options in any case.

There's basically no point in sticking with XP at this stage. Windows 7 runs fine on any decent hardware, is much better, and games going forward are going to start requiring it more and more.

[EdgeJ]

PeopleLikeFrank, on 15 June 2010 - 07:39 AM, said:

Well, we hope things will improve performance-wise on OS X. Bootcamp is going to give you more options in any case.

There's basically no point in sticking with XP at this stage. Windows 7 runs fine on any decent hardware, is much better, and games going forward are going to start requiring it more and more.

Darn, I only have a Windows 7 upgrade disk, I'm guessing that won't suffice for a Windows 7 boot camp partition?

[Eric5h5]

PeopleLikeFrank, on 15 June 2010 - 07:39 AM, said:

Well, we hope things will improve performance-wise on OS X.

http://www.macrumors...ng-performance/

--Eric

[The Liberator]

EdgeJ, on 15 June 2010 - 08:21 AM, said:

Darn, I only have a Windows 7 upgrade disk, I'm guessing that won't suffice for a Windows 7 boot camp partition?

I think that would only work if you already had Vista installed, kind of like the Snow Leopard upgrade disk, yeah?

Eric5h5, on 15 June 2010 - 08:48 AM, said:

http://www.macrumors...ng-performance/

--Eric

Okay, cool. Thanks.

Liberator.

[PeopleLikeFrank]

EdgeJ, on 15 June 2010 - 08:21 AM, said:

Darn, I only have a Windows 7 upgrade disk, I'm guessing that won't suffice for a Windows 7 boot camp partition?

I wouldn't necessarily say that, as long as you own a previous version of Windows...

[The Liberator]

PeopleLikeFrank, on 15 June 2010 - 08:07 PM, said:

I wouldn't necessarily say that, as long as you own a previous version of Windows...

Ahhh, I stand corrected then.

Liberator.

[Smoke_Tetsu]

Well, after updating to 10.6.4 I can confirm that personally TF2 is running better on my 27 inch iMac than before. Much of the chop was reduced and I actually have been able to play through whole missions. Not sure if TF2 is really my kind of game but it seems fun regardless.

[ikir]

TF2 runs incredibily well on my MBP 13". Nvidia 320M, SSD and 10.6.4 make it runs very very well. Most of settings to high, just, vsync off and aa 2x but fast and graphically stunning (playing native res).

[Janichsan]

I played Half-Life 2 today for the first time since the weekend, after installing MacOS X 10.6.4 and after a handful of patches for HL2 have been released. Either it's just me, or the game really does run less fluent now. Movement – especially faster movement – is pretty jittery now, not only of the player but also of other characters and objects. Not that much that the game is unplayable, but noticeable.

*sigh* Valve's QA really leaves a lot to be desired...

[Frigidman]

Janichsan, on 16 June 2010 - 03:04 PM, said:

*sigh* Valve's QA really leaves a lot to be desired...

Their QA is the public, unfortunately. They are known for pushing broken patches, too often, and allow the flood to "wth?" posts on their forums to let them know they did something wrong. Then they scramble and release quick hot fixes hours after posting a bad patch.

Something you just have to kind of get used too with their games. One week it could be running perfectly fine... then steam forces an update down your throat, and then the game runs like crap till they fix it again.

[rob_ART]

I've been benchmarking Portal and Team Fortress (Steam for Mac). Most of my testing is at highest settings, 1920x1200, 4X MSAA, 4X Aniso.

The average for Portal using the GTX 285 dropped from 95 fps to 35 fps when I updated the Nehalem Mac Pro to 10.6.4. But after installing the driver update posted on the NVIDIA site (19.5.8f03), the average climbed up to 119 fps.

Ditto for Team Fortress. It went from 90 to 35 to 103 fps.

[Janichsan]

rob_ART, on 22 June 2010 - 11:23 AM, said:

...from 95 fps to 35 fps...

*cough*

Wow. I thought that stuttering I see on my 9400M equipped Macbook was bad, but that's worse than I expected.

[Sneaky Snake]

ikir, on 16 June 2010 - 12:14 PM, said:

TF2 runs incredibily well on my MBP 13". Nvidia 320M, SSD and 10.6.4 make it runs very very well. Most of settings to high, just, vsync off and aa 2x but fast and graphically stunning (playing native res).

What games have you tried with that 320M, because I'm strongly considering getting a mac with one of them in there.