mbpsr 256vram vs 128vram performance gain all very confusing...

[prism]

Bearfeats says its an insignificant 9% gain (but they test on old and ported games), elsewhere (dont remember exactly where) the difference is dramatic (ranging between 3 and 800% on newer games) and I have also seen a score difference of 1000 on 3dmark06 between the two!!!
I was always led to think that it is the gpu core and memory speed that determines performance but now I am very confused!!!
Anybody care to enlighten?

[KingYaba]

Enjoy your 2.2 Macbook Pro as you saved yourself $500 dollars.

[squeeks]

the only real difference comes at high resolution where the graphics card need more room to store the larger textures

[prism]

the only real difference comes at high resolution where the graphics card need more room to store the larger textures

Ok but when I tried the demo of COD4, it was smooth only at a resolution of 800*600 which is simply horrible. HL2 on the other hand is perfect even in native resolution, what gives?

[Jiddick ExRex]

COD 4 is much newer and more demanding than the aging HL2 engine from Valve (still amazing graphics though) and this is why you cannot get the most from it. If you want any real benefit from the GPU, you should clock it to normal speed 475/700 regardless of what games you are running. Games like Bioschock and COD 4 will run moch better like this!

[Feverish Flux]

I'm only concerned about the difference in the two and Aperture.

Getting ready to buy, but don't need the extra .2 GHz and HDD just to get the 256 card...

[iCheddar]

It would be nice if Apple offered more of a PC company D= style configuration system.

Offer a 15" and 17" model, and offer all the customization we would want.

Then I'd get a 2.2 Ghz 15" with the 256meg card:D

[marclapierre13]

dude, dont even worry. I use aperture and Adobe photo shop CS3 with my 2.2ghz macbook pro, and it performs AWESOME. Save the coin, upgrade your RAM to 4gb (Im at 2gb for now, and its awesome, but thats my next upgrade)

[The Flashing Fi]

Ok but when I tried the demo of COD4, it was smooth only at a resolution of 800*600 which is simply horrible. HL2 on the other hand is perfect even in native resolution, what gives?

They are two different games, that is why. All games don't give the same performance on the same hardware...

[KingYaba]

It would be nice if Apple offered more of a PC company D= style configuration system.

Offer a 15" and 17" model, and offer all the customization we would want.

Then I'd get a 2.2 Ghz 15" with the 256meg card:D

Then no one would buy the 2.4ghz chip. ;)

[EvryDayImShufln]

It's kind of dumb though that nvidia even makes this card in 128 MB lol.

[prism]

Just tried the UT3 demo, oh man, now were talking!!! Amazingly fluid and breathtaking on medium settings. Much better than COD4 despite that they use the same UT engine!!!

[Am3822]

How about non-gaming performance?

marclapierre13 -- do you observe any problems with leopard (`choppy' animations/transitions/issues when using non-mirrored external displays) ?

[masse]

its not going to make a difference for non-gaming casual computer use.