BF2142 and Mac Pro with 8800 Nvidia card (stock) - VERY POOR performance

[pprior]

I bought the 8800 upgrade for my old mac pro when it first came out. It was WAY slower than the stock ATIx1900 card (!) in 2142 so I returned it. I subsequently bought the ATI3970 upgrade and it worked fine.

Fast forward to today and i just received my new octocore 3ghz mac pro which came with (you guessed it) the 8800 card from Apple (replacment machine, long story).

I'm flabbergasted to see that performance is still SO bad it's unplayable.

Is there anyone on this forum playing BF2142 with this card that gets acceptable frame rates? I'm only running 1024x768 and a machine of this caliber with that video card should EASILY be able to run 1600x1200!

[diamond.g]

I bought the 8800 upgrade for my old mac pro when it first came out. It was WAY slower than the stock ATIx1900 card (!) in 2142 so I returned it. I subsequently bought the ATI3970 upgrade and it worked fine.

Fast forward to today and i just received my new octocore 3ghz mac pro which came with (you guessed it) the 8800 card from Apple (replacment machine, long story).

I'm flabbergasted to see that performance is still SO bad it's unplayable.

Is there anyone on this forum playing BF2142 with this card that gets acceptable frame rates? I'm only running 1024x768 and a machine of this caliber with that video card should EASILY be able to run 1600x1200!

What detail settings are you using? Resolution isn't the only thing that could cause it to be choppy. Plus I seem to remember the 8800 being a GT and not a GTX...

[ryanvsrobots]

did you update your drivers? bf2142 should run fine maxed on that mac.

[Kaos Theory]

I am playing COD2 (Probably a little harder on machine than BF2142, but still) on my NVIDIA 8800GS iMac, and I only get around 12 frames per second regardless of settings!!! I am sick of the poor effort that is put into Mac ports... I mean, with your hardware (not to mention mine) on a Windows machine, we would be getting around 100 FPS. (Not that I would buy a PC; I would just install Windows for gaming.) If anyone has any tips to get better frame rates, then please post them! I have already addressed this issue in multiple post, my latest being "Does Anybody Get High Frame Rates With Call of Duty 2 On An NVIDIA iMac?" If you have any suggestions, then please post here or there. Thanks!

[bokdol]

i dont think it's the card as much as the poor programing by EA. i have COD4 and it runs great with my 8800. but battlefield 2142 sucks. especially when someone nukes a spot. feels like a slideshow sometimes.

[pprior]

I don't know of any way to "update drivers" on the mac.

I've run system update and there are no updates available.

System settings are all at medium with no antialiasing. With the ATI card I can max out settings at 1024x768 with no problems.

It's probably EA games fault, they really suck. However I play this game a lot, and really want to get it working again, but do not want to pay for another video card given the 8800 should be WAY more than enough horsepower.

[Kaos Theory]

Guess we should all just buy COD4, huh?

[Winni]

Guess we should all just buy COD4, huh?

Yes, but buy the Xbox 360 version. Forget computers, especially Macs, for gaming. PCs are simply too expensive and Macs are too expensive and too under-powered in their graphics performance for games. Consoles have become the only option that makes real sense.

[pprior]

Bah, the console game controllers bite.

Give me a keyboard and mouse any day.

There has to be a fix to this - it's obviously a driver problem.

[marclapierre13]

Guess we should all just buy COD4, huh?

Yup. Buy mine off of me, i am selling my COD 4 for mac...

/end shameless plug...:D

[Less Exciting]

Is this a 128 or a 256 card?

128 and you'll have to have most settings on lowest, depending on ram.

256 there should be little problem.

[pprior]

Is this a 128 or a 256 card?

128 and you'll have to have most settings on lowest, depending on ram.

256 there should be little problem.


It's -512- but trust me, there is a BIG problem.






NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT:

Chipset Model: NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT
Type: Display
Bus: PCIe
Slot: Slot-1
PCIe Lane Width: x16
VRAM (Total): 512 MB
Vendor: NVIDIA (0x10de)
Device ID: 0x0602
Revision ID: 0x00a2
ROM Revision: 3233
Displays:

[aluminumapple]

i should remind you bf 2142 was a very glitchy and buggy game with unreliable internet source that kept crashing..

everyone who had the pc version vowed never to buy EA games because of that.

[pprior]

Maybe, but the point is that it runs splendidly with the ATI card, but horrifically with the Nvidia card which is reportedly faster for games.

[Mackilroy]

You're not really getting good frame rates either way if you're playing the Mac version. Under Windows my 8800 GT performs beautifully, but that has the disadvantage of me having to reboot. I think it's more an issue of how they used Cider to port it over, instead of making a native Mac port of the game.

[pprior]

With the 3870 (and even the x1900) ATI cards my frame rates were butter smooth, again it's only the nvidia that pukes on itself.

[Kaos Theory]

I was so mad today... I was playing COD2 online, and getting only 12 frames per second again. :mad: What's the point of having this awesome graphics card if older games don't support it? I had some guy on the server telling me how iMacs can't have discreet graphics, and then how the 8800GS wasn't an under-clocked 8800GT... Thanks goodness for forums that are Mac-exclusive ;). Anyway, if there is anybody who plays COD2 on a 2.8 GHz iMac with NVIDIA graphics, then please give me some tips :D.
Oh, and you're absolutely right, pprior, I would never play an FPS on a console; there's little skill involved. (Well, FPSs are good on Wii, but that's a different story.)

[alkar]

Aspyr is working on a CoD 2 patch for 8xxx support... It could be in a long time, it seems the problem is related to OSX too, and they are waiting for Apple to fix the bug....

[Kaos Theory]

Finally, a patch for it... Where'd you hear about this?

[alkar]

on InsideMacGames forum.

[oldjetsetter]

FWIW Try running COD 2 under Rosetta. On 3.06gHz iMac w/8800GS video card, it runs quite adequately and the game is playable. Not how it's meant to be, though. Natively, it is slightly better looking graphically but has an annoying glitch that means any movement v. briefly freezes every second or two, making combat/running/aiming difficult. Hope this helps. Perhaps BF2142 (don't own) can be used similarly (?).

[diamond.g]

With the 3870 (and even the x1900) ATI cards my frame rates were butter smooth, again it's only the nvidia that pukes on itself.

That is more likely due to ATI writing it's own drivers and Nvidia letting Apple write it's drivers than the actual card performance. The big hint that it isn't the card is the results being opposite when gaming under Windows.

[pprior]

I've noted besides the slow frame rate that this nvidia card also demonstrates tearing, which the ATI never did.

I hate to dump this card and buy another 3870, which is pretty out of date as it stands. I thought ATI had announced another mac card coming out.

It's absurd that such an expensive computer can be bested by a PC that costs 1/5 as much.

[apfhex]

I thought ATI had announced another mac card coming out.
They announced plans for the 4850/4870, but nothing since. Maybe when the next Mac Pro model comes out.

Look at Barefeats and other places and you'll see that the 8800GT does perform marginally worse compared to the 3870 because of the drivers in OS X, though usually not that much worse. But since the game is a Cider port as well, it's going to run worse just because of that, so that's probably amplifying the issue.

It's absurd that such an expensive computer can be bested by a PC that costs 1/5 as much.
Well, unfortunately Apple doesn't really care about gaming. That doesn't make the Mac Pro worse for other tasks. Fortunately, you can install Windows for a much better gaming experience, turing "such an expensive computer" into a competent gaming machine (albeit with limited video card choices ;)).

[Kaos Theory]

I'll check it out. I sure hope they release this soon...

[Ol3s]

I have an aluminium macbook with 2ghz and the game game works fairly well on maximum settings and very well with low settings and high resolution.

[BertyBoy]

Ear;y 2008 Mac Pro with the nVidia 8800 card.

Runs absolutely fine for me, but I do get artifacts after a few hours when it overheats, so I remove the side panel and all is good.

I run max resolution and max settings for most, but chat id off.

Is your BF2142 up to v1.50 ? This made a BIG difference. How much RAM ? I use 24GB, but it ran fine with 10GB too.

[pprior]

Ear;y 2008 Mac Pro with the nVidia 8800 card.

Runs absolutely fine for me, but I do get artifacts after a few hours when it overheats, so I remove the side panel and all is good.

I run max resolution and max settings for most, but chat id off.

Is your BF2142 up to v1.50 ? This made a BIG difference. How much RAM ? I use 24GB, but it ran fine with 10GB too.

Really? You're running the Mac version, not PC in bootcamp, right?

I have 16GB, plenty of free ram. I notice particularly poor performance during artillery strikes.

[BertyBoy]

Really? You're running the Mac version, not PC in bootcamp, right?

I have 16GB, plenty of free ram. I notice particularly poor performance during artillery strikes.

Mac version yes.

But artillery strikes is a real killer I agree. I usually dash for cover and sit it out.

[otis123]

this has to be a driver issue, a machine like that should be able to run 4 copies of that game at once.

[pprior]

Maybe a glimmer of hope for the pathetic nvidia performance (quoted from barefeats quick updates page):

"March 28th -- Caution on GeForce 8800 GT in Nehalem: We've been trying all the different graphics cards in the Nehalem Mac Pro 8-core 2.93. I was puzzled when I installed the GeForce 8800 GT. The Core Image apps ran really great -- better than ever.

However, when shifted over to 3D games, I received a shock. It ran painfully slow. One third the speed of the GeForce 120 GT. I've learned today a patch is forthcoming from nVIDIA via Apple to fix the problem."

It would be nice because quite frankly I'm pissed at having to spend $400 to upgrade a video card to ATI when it should be more than enough speed for this old game.

[Consultant]

I've noted besides the slow frame rate that this nvidia card also demonstrates tearing, which the ATI never did.

I hate to dump this card and buy another 3870, which is pretty out of date as it stands. I thought ATI had announced another mac card coming out.

It's absurd that such an expensive computer can be bested by a PC that costs 1/5 as much.

Screen tearing usually means the frame rate is too high.

Did you look at your frame rate?

Tearing and low frame per second are different behavior.

[pprior]

It's definitely slow frame rate, very choppy down into the teens or lower

[Consultant]

It's definitely slow frame rate, very choppy down into the teens or lower

Looks like problem with specific game and card combination

More info:
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=471059&page=6
http://osx411.com/full-rundown-of-bf2142-for-the-mac/

[pprior]

It may be, but as of today the 8800 is the premium video card available (4870 not released yet except new mac pros) and EA games or Nvidia (or Apple for that matter!) can't bother to get the freaking driver fixed?

Explain to me again why these people make millions of dollars?

[apfhex]

Looks like problem with specific game and card combination
Call of Duty 2 is also completely unplayable, and I bet those aren't the only games. But good news!

We received a pre-release of a "repaired" driver that restores the GeForce 8800 GT to its former glory.
http://www.barefeats.com/nehal07.html

Too bad there, erm, aren't enough games for OS X to really use it. :o *goes back to playing Far Cry in Windows*