10.3.5 updated graphics drivers?

[stoid]

Are we going to see a boost in graphics performance again?

[vraxtus]

Are we going to see a boost in graphics performance again?

God I hope we do.

[stoid]

I haven't updated yet, what's the best way to benchmark my PowerBook before I update? Then I can tell all of you if it makes a difference! :D

[oingoboingo]

I haven't updated yet, what's the best way to benchmark my PowerBook before I update? Then I can tell all of you if it makes a difference! :D

An easy option is to run Xbench before and after the update. Xbench contains graphics benchmarks, so changes in the performance of the video drivers shoud show up there.

[benpatient]

XBench score after 10.3.5
overall:200.35
OpenGL Graphics test:182.74
Quartz Graphics test: 225.9

before 10.3.5
overall: 205.55
OpenGL: 186.5
Quartz: 197.84

So yeah, there was a marginal increase in graphics speed, at least on xbench...the overall system score dropped some, though...most of the difference seems to be in the disk read-write tests, which you may or may not know fluctuate quite a lot from one run of XBench to another...

btw, i'm on a dual 1.8 w5200U, dual 160gb drives in a RAID 0 and 2.5gb of RAM.

[stoid]

My Radeon Mobility 9700 in my PBook didn't get much either according to XBench.

[vraxtus]

Maybe do a real game timedemo...?

XBench means nothing in terms of real world gaming performance -_-

[crazzyeddie]

You probably won't see any overall improvement. These updates usually fix graphics driver bugs that may cause your games to crash, or have extreme slowdowns at certain points (like maybe a smoke effect).

[ZildjianKX]

Are we going to see a boost in graphics performance again?

Again? Games ran worse for me going from 10.3.3 to 10.3.4... I just hope it goes back to normal...

[applekid]

My timedemos of Halo shows:

Just six days ago in 10.3.4:
Frames=4700
Total Time=250.71s
Average frame rate=18.75fps
Below 5fps= 6% (time) 0% (frames) (15.066s spent in 16 frames)
Below 10fps= 12% (time) 3% (frames)
Below 15fps= 33% (time) 17% (frames)
Below 20fps= 68% (time) 49% (frames)
Below 25fps= 80% (time) 63% (frames)
Below 30fps= 88% (time) 75% (frames)
Below 40fps= 95% (time) 87% (frames)
Below 50fps= 99% (time) 96% (frames)
Below 60fps= 99% (time) 97% (frames)

After restarting into 10.3.5:
Frames=4700
Total Time=257.89s
Average frame rate=18.22fps
Below 5fps= 7% (time) 0% (frames) (19.967s spent in 19 frames)
Below 10fps= 14% (time) 3% (frames)
Below 15fps= 35% (time) 18% (frames)
Below 20fps= 68% (time) 49% (frames)
Below 25fps= 81% (time) 65% (frames)
Below 30fps= 89% (time) 76% (frames)
Below 40fps= 95% (time) 88% (frames)
Below 50fps= 99% (time) 96% (frames)
Below 60fps= 99% (time) 97% (frames)

Of course my 800 MHz G4 iMac, 768 MB RAM, and a GeForce4MX won't get anywhere, but it looks like yet another speed drop. I've ran a couple of games with no feelings of no change at all, at least. I'll give it another try later.

[vraxtus]

I had the same as Applekid:

10.3.4
Average frame rate=23.74fps

10.3.5
Average frame rate=22.66fps

Terrible.

[Converted2Truth]

Damn this really pisses me off. Updates are supposed to FIX things, not complicate them. Apple needs to invest alot more of their resources into OpenGL/OpenAL. The reason 95% of my friends won't have anything to do with Apple is because of crappy games/lack of games/etc...

This would be a worthwhile and rewarding investment. If jobs wasn't such a 2-d a-hole, Mac OSX would be running games FASTER than a boggy winblows box. ..but no.

I wonder if he (Apple) knows how far behind Apple REALLY is graphically?

I wish the product were geared toward meeting the needs of current consumers. GIVE US AN iMAC WITH UPGRADEABLE VIDEO CARD! Give us decent vc drivers! Give us reasons not to buy a PC! ...i got impatient and did....gameing is important to me... i'm an addict.

[bousozoku]

I'm betting that they've fixed several problems with OpenGL and that's led to a slight slowdown. Some games I've played have had visible gaps since Panther and hopefully, are fixed with this release.

Going fast is fine, if everything works right for everyone, but if it doesn't, sometimes things need to be re-worked. Apparently, the best quality is somewhat slower. Unfortunately, overall throughput is not up to x86 machines (except perhaps the G5 series), so there is nothing to take up the slack.

[PlatinumBlade]

I'm pretty bummed about the seeming lack of performance as well. One thing I did notice though and I'm wondering if others have seen this, is that after running the 10.3.5 update my mouse started acting weird in games. It is really jumpy now and sometimes catches. By that I mean my entire screen freezes for a split second and then continues on.

I actually did see performance increases in Halo and Black Hawk Down that made them playable. Not enjoyable playable but at least better than before.

I do need a better card in this machine because Halo still sucks. I'm averaging ~ 20 FPS much of the time which is not good. The only way I can fix that is drop the game down to 640X480 resolution but who wants to do that? It would be nice to have ATI and nVidia do the drivers themselves instead of relying on Apple because Apple never seems to get it right. Maybe they should have the guys who worked on UT2K4 do it as that games is glassy smooth on my machine.