Low fps, Battlefield 3 On Macbook Pro early 2011 (specs better than recommended)

Jens Engels said:

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Hey

2 days ago i received my copy of battlefield 3 🙂, so i was more then exited to install it, but when i played it, i did auto configuration of video settings (all on high) and the game was playing on 20 to 25 fps, all stuttering 🙁..

I thought how is THIS possible, my specs of my MBP are way over the recommended specs. My specs are:

Bootcamp windows 7 64bit, 100gb partition, 20GB free on it
2.2 Ghz quadcore
8GB ram
Amd radeon 6600 and 6700, 1gb video memory
Integrated intel gpu (512mb)
500GB, 7200 rpm HDD

So i called ea customer service, they told me to install the new ati drivers 11.12 catalyst, so i did. This made a little bit of difference, but still had horrible fps 🙁.

Does anyone has this same problem, has some tips or did you solve this problem or if you could help me solve this problem? Please let me know. I would really appreiciate it!
As i realy love the battlefield graphics, and i'm (almost sure) my mbp could easely, play this game.

Thanks you
Jens

Click to expand...

For me, turning OFF VSync drastically improves performance in any game. With it on, low to medium settings on my Mac Pro 3,1 is tedious, and with it turned off I can play even newer games on the highest settings at 1680x1050 (my monitor's max resolution)

Low fps

Im having the same issue. Im running around 30-40 fps when i have a really good internet connection, I don't know if it is the radon driver version i have (11.11) but it is really frustrating. any one know if there is a better driver version for the graphics?

Dont do auto configure on video settings. I had that and my MBP ( 2010 w/ GT 330M 512MB) was connected to a full HD screen. auto configure set the resolution to 1920x1080 and put all settings to medium it resulted in like 5 fps 😀 so it clearly doesnt do it very well 😀
I then played on the MBP screen at 1280x852 and settings at low-medium. Worked great. Around 35-45 fps.

So my advice is to start low. Set resolution to the one desire, id recommend around 1280x800. Then put settings to medium. Play, see how it is, then fiddle with it, res up, settings up etc. Find the best settings for your machine.

(im pretty sure this will create a discussion as some people say the worst thing you can do is lower the resolution, blah blah blah.) OP, try it and if you dont like lower resolution then change it again, but you will have to set a lot lower settings. Id rather play at around 1280x800 and medium settings than 1440x900 and low settings.

GasCan360 said:

Im having the same issue. Im running around 30-40 fps when i have a really good internet connection, I don't know if it is the radon driver version i have (11.11) but it is really frustrating. any one know if there is a better driver version for the graphics?

Click to expand...

A good internet connection wont increase the graphics performance of your computer.
You see the biggest dip in performance is from the resolution you are playing at. (at 1280x800 its 1090560 pixels, at 1440x900 its 1296000 pixels (<20% more), at 1920x1080 its 2073600 pixels (62% more), at 2560x1600 its 4096000 pixels (97% more)). You see its a lot more pixels your GPU needs to push with increasing resolution. So if you want to play at your native res ( let it be 900p,1050p, 1080p or whatever) expect to have to lower your settings.

Try what I recommended to the OP

Don't forget you're on a laptop, not a desktop. You won't be able to run it well on high settings. BFBC2 runs great on this machine at medium, so BF3 isn't going to run better on high.

Take The-Pro's advice and lower the resolution. I have an early 2011 MBP with the same specs and I run it on Medium, 1440x900, and AA off or 1x. I think I have shadows on low, too. FPS isn't great, but is acceptable to me at around 40.

Jens Engels said:

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A405 Safari/7534.48.3)

Hey

2 days ago i received my copy of battlefield 3 🙂, so i was more then exited to install it, but when i played it, i did auto configuration of video settings (all on high) and the game was playing on 20 to 25 fps, all stuttering 🙁..

I thought how is THIS possible, my specs of my MBP are way over the recommended specs. My specs are:

Bootcamp windows 7 64bit, 100gb partition, 20GB free on it
2.2 Ghz quadcore
8GB ram
Amd radeon 6600 and 6700, 1gb video memory
Integrated intel gpu (512mb)
500GB, 7200 rpm HDD

So i called ea customer service, they told me to install the new ati drivers 11.12 catalyst, so i did. This made a little bit of difference, but still had horrible fps 🙁.

Does anyone has this same problem, has some tips or did you solve this problem or if you could help me solve this problem? Please let me know. I would really appreiciate it!
As i realy love the battlefield graphics, and i'm (almost sure) my mbp could easely, play this game.

Thanks you
Jens

Click to expand...

Well, bf3 lists as recommended a GTX 560 or 6950 so you are not even close to the recommended specs.

cirus said:

Well, bf3 lists as recommended a GTX 560 or 6950 so you are not even close to the recommended specs.

Click to expand...

I think he means above the minimum required specs to run the game. Not the recommended hardware.

Also keep in mind that mobile cards are alot slower than the desktop card with the same name.
Nvidias mobile 560m is roughly the same as desktop 450 and radeon 6600/6700 is slower than that.

The-Pro said:

I think he means above the minimum required specs to run the game. Not the recommended hardware.

Click to expand...

Yep, and I've never come across a game where meeting minimum specs means it will run well. That's the whole point of recomended specs. What you need to run the game VS what you need to run the game WELL

You're wasting your time with driver updates, you don't have anywhere near enough gpu grunt to run BF3 on high. Turn your settings down or get a machine intended for gaming if you want to run on high.

Start off by disabling HBAO

^^^ this.. I turned it on low and turned bloom and HBAO off and it still looks pretty awesome and runs great on my Macbook pro.

I had this issue after updating to new drivers. I went back to my mac side and made an updated bootcamp driver disk, reverted to whatever was on the disk and everything runs smooth as butter.

So worst case scenario, you can try that.

You all gotta be exaggerating your frame rates without recording them. I'm on a machine with catalyst 11.11 on a 2.2 i7 with a 6750m. BF3 at medium settings at 1280x800 stutters outside, in large areas dropping to 25ish FPS. Medium at a higher resolution on an older model with a lower clock speed getting better? How?

I mean, the best FPS I ever manage is in the 50s in alleyways on these settings. I just don't get it. Not all MBP's are created equal I guess.