Macbook Pro 15" 6750 vs Borderlands, Mafia 2, diablo 3, bioshock 2 etc.

Ohrstrom · May 3, 2012

Hi.

Im wondering how these mentioned games performs, fps wise on high or reasonably high settings with the low-end Macbook Pro 15".

Im also wondering, even if this might be the wrong forum if the 512Mb Ram increases to 1GB if you get additional Ram, if so, is 8GB enough or should one go directly for 16GB?

Edit: Would the question be better asked in the Macbook Pro forum?

cluthz · May 3, 2012

Ohrstrom said:
Hi.

Im wondering how these mentioned games performs, fps wise on high or reasonably high settings with the low-end Macbook Pro 15".

Im also wondering, even if this might be the wrong forum if the 512Mb Ram increases to 1GB if you get additional Ram, if so, is 8GB enough or should one go directly for 16GB?

Edit: Would the question be better asked in the Macbook Pro forum?

8 vs 16GB RAM:
For gaming this will make no difference at all.
Today the real difference is going from 2->4GB, some from 4->6GB and not so much over 6GB. Anything over 8GB is a waste for gaming, but can be nice for other stuff.

512MB vs 1024MB VRAM:
Games are usually limited by how fast the GPU is and not how much VRAM it has.
To make a game use more than 512MB VRAM on a 1440x900 screen you need to max out textures and also add some anti aliasing and other effects.
Usually the 6750M will struggle with settings that needs more than 512 MB VRAM anyways and most of the time the extra VRAM will be wasted.
However if you can live with lower FPS with better graphics more VRAM will help. There are of course some games that are very VRAM hungry, like some MMOs like SWTOR, other games like BF3 do also want tons of VRAM, but turning down settings will make it use less VRAM and you really wanna do that to make the game run nicely on a 6750M anyways.

TL;DR: If you like to play at 60 FPS and medium/high settings then the 512MB will be as good as the 1024MB one, if you like to play at everything maxed with 25 FPS then the 1024MB version might be worth it.

The games you mentioned:
I have only played Borderlands (but windows version), and Diablo 3.
I finished Borderlands before the mac version was out on my 2010 MBP with GT330M, the 6750 is about 50% faster and should run the game very nicely.
As far as I've heard the mac version is pretty well optimized and should play very well on the 6750M.
Diablo 3 is still in beta, it ran pretty much perfect in OSX on my machine, and I've heard reports that people with much less power than the 2011MBP has ran it very well.
Mafia 2 should run well on a 6750M, but the reviews on App Store tells a different story. http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mafia-ii-directors-cut/id481672738?mt=12
They might not be accurate tho, as the game should run very well on a 6750M if it's fairly well optimized. (Windows requirements are 8600GT/ATI HD2600, and the 6750M should be much faster than those.)
Bioshock 2, I have no idea, i think feral have made it compatible with intel hd, the 6750M is tons faster than intel hd.

Ohrstrom · May 3, 2012

cluthz said:
8 vs 16GB RAM:
For gaming this will make no difference at all.
Today the real difference is going from 2->4GB, some from 4->6GB and not so much over 6GB. Anything over 8GB is a waste for gaming, but can be nice for other stuff.

512MB vs 1024MB VRAM:
Games are usually limited by how fast the GPU is and not how much VRAM it has.
To make a game use more than 512MB VRAM on a 1440x900 screen you need to max out textures and also add some anti aliasing and other effects.
Usually the 6750M will struggle with settings that needs more than 512 MB VRAM anyways and most of the time the extra VRAM will be wasted.
However if you can live with lower FPS with better graphics more VRAM will help. There are of course some games that are very VRAM hungry, like some MMOs like SWTOR, other games like BF3 do also want tons of VRAM, but turning down settings will make it use less VRAM and you really wanna do that to make the game run nicely on a 6750M anyways.

TL;DR: If you like to play at 60 FPS and medium/high settings then the 512MB will be as good as the 1024MB one, if you like to play at everything maxed with 25 FPS then the 1024MB version might be worth it.

The games you mentioned:
I have only played Borderlands (but windows version), and Diablo 3.
I finished Borderlands before the mac version was out on my 2010 MBP with GT330M, the 6750 is about 50% faster and should run the game very nicely.
As far as I've heard the mac version is pretty well optimized and should play very well on the 6750M.
Diablo 3 is still in beta, it ran pretty much perfect in OSX on my machine, and I've heard reports that people with much less power than the 2011MBP has ran it very well.
Mafia 2 should run well on a 6750M, but the reviews on App Store tells a different story. http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mafia-ii-directors-cut/id481672738?mt=12
They might not be accurate tho, as the game should run very well on a 6750M if it's fairly well optimized. (Windows requirements are 8600GT/ATI HD2600, and the 6750M should be much faster than those.)
Bioshock 2, I have no idea, i think feral have made it compatible with intel hd, the 6750M is tons faster than intel hd.

Thanks for a great response. The reason Im asking about the Ram/VRam is that I just thought it would be best to have as much as possible for the unforeseen future.

Im not entirely sure if you answered or misunderstood me on the Vram thing though, Ive read about some gpus with 256 getting 512 to play with instead if you upgrade the Ram on your computer. I was just wondering i this applied to the 6750 aswell, that it gets 1GB if you increase the Ram enough on the computer.

The reason Im asking is that since Apple might never ever (exaggeration) release their next version of their Mbp's, can I stay content with the current version, so that I have a macbook that can actually play D3 when it arrives in 2 weeks. My current 13" Mbp Mid 09' does not, at an acceptable level.

I would upgrade ram to atleast 8GB and also get an SSD later on.

edddeduck · May 3, 2012

All the Feral ports in that list will be fine and I expect the others to be as well. The difference between 512MB and 1024MB is noticeable for settings like FSAA or texture quality where spare VRAM comes in handy, but as the other poster mentioned the card model is usually more important than the amount of VRAM.

That said I would get the 1GB model as it will last longer, their will be a time when 512MB VRAM is not enough

Edwin

Ohrstrom · May 3, 2012

edddeduck said:
All the Feral ports in that list will be fine and I expect the others to be as well. The difference between 512MB and 1024MB is noticeable for settings like FSAA or texture quality where spare VRAM comes in handy, but as the other poster mentioned the card model is usually more important than the amount of VRAM.

That said I would get the 1GB model as it will last longer, their will be a time when 512MB VRAM is not enough

Edwin

Thank you, but with the current situation I cannot afford the high end model, its just not on sale low enough in Sweden, there is unfortunately very poor pricecuts here, even with a new model around the corner.

edddeduck · May 3, 2012

FYI I checked and my work laptop has a AMD Radeon HD 6750M 1024 MB and it does a very nice job of all of the games

Feel free to PM me once the new Mac hardware is released, we are likely to get one for testing at work so I can let you know how well the games perform on it.

Edwin

Ohrstrom · May 3, 2012

edddeduck said:
FYI I checked and my work laptop has a AMD Radeon HD 6750M 1024 MB and it does a very nice job of all of the games

Feel free to PM me once the new Mac hardware is released, we are likely to get one for testing at work so I can let you know how well the games perform on it.

Edwin

I thought the 6750 all had 512MB and the 6770 had 1024MB?

However, the whole idea was if I would be content with the current Mbp so that I wouldnt have to wait for the next one and thus not have to endure weeks of Diablo 3 on my current Mbp, which only handles D3 in a 800x600 window on ultralow settings, and still with really poor fps.

cluthz · May 3, 2012

edddeduck said:
FYI I checked and my work laptop has a AMD Radeon HD 6750M 1024 MB and it does a very nice job of all of the games

Feel free to PM me once the new Mac hardware is released, we are likely to get one for testing at work so I can let you know how well the games perform on it.

Edwin

You could fire up OpenGL Driver monitor and check how much vram the games actually needs at playable frame rates

Also, I'm very happy to see devs from feral around the forum actively helping out mac users and listening to their ideas and needs. If it's a part of your job or because you are doing it on your own time, i dunno, but it's really showing that the community is taken seriously, and I'd like to see more from other devs too.

Killery96 · May 4, 2012

cluthz said:
8 vs 16GB RAM:
For gaming this will make no difference at all.
Today the real difference is going from 2->4GB, some from 4->6GB and not so much over 6GB. Anything over 8GB is a waste for gaming, but can be nice for other stuff.

512MB vs 1024MB VRAM:
Games are usually limited by how fast the GPU is and not how much VRAM it has.
To make a game use more than 512MB VRAM on a 1440x900 screen you need to max out textures and also add some anti aliasing and other effects.
Usually the 6750M will struggle with settings that needs more than 512 MB VRAM anyways and most of the time the extra VRAM will be wasted.
However if you can live with lower FPS with better graphics more VRAM will help. There are of course some games that are very VRAM hungry, like some MMOs like SWTOR, other games like BF3 do also want tons of VRAM, but turning down settings will make it use less VRAM and you really wanna do that to make the game run nicely on a 6750M anyways.

TL;DR: If you like to play at 60 FPS and medium/high settings then the 512MB will be as good as the 1024MB one, if you like to play at everything maxed with 25 FPS then the 1024MB version might be worth it.

The games you mentioned:
I have only played Borderlands (but windows version), and Diablo 3.
I finished Borderlands before the mac version was out on my 2010 MBP with GT330M, the 6750 is about 50% faster and should run the game very nicely.
As far as I've heard the mac version is pretty well optimized and should play very well on the 6750M.
Diablo 3 is still in beta, it ran pretty much perfect in OSX on my machine, and I've heard reports that people with much less power than the 2011MBP has ran it very well.
Mafia 2 should run well on a 6750M, but the reviews on App Store tells a different story. http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mafia-ii-directors-cut/id481672738?mt=12
They might not be accurate tho, as the game should run very well on a 6750M if it's fairly well optimized. (Windows requirements are 8600GT/ATI HD2600, and the 6750M should be much faster than those.)
Bioshock 2, I have no idea, i think feral have made it compatible with intel hd, the 6750M is tons faster than intel hd.

Actually, at least the mac app store version of Borderlands runs horribly on my 15" Macbook Pro, with the same graphics card. I have to play at 1280x800 and keep shadows off. It's pretty crappy. Same with CoD4. I've concluded that Mac OSX is a pretty shoddy OS for playing most modern games. Diablo 3 runs significantly smoother in Windows, and can get much more consistent framer eats and it lags less. Hope this helped. No idea on Mafia.

Ohrstrom · May 4, 2012

Thanks alot, I guess Ill just stick it out and wait for next release, the performance on the upcoming should be boosted to levels that will keep me satisfied for a while, and I guess while it would be nice to be able to play fps games with high and AA etc on, its a notebook afterall and some compromise should be expected.

But, waiting for next release should mean less compromise, so Ill refill the fueltank for my patience and try some eco-driving for a while.

shardey · May 5, 2012

Ohrstrom said:
I thought the 6750 all had 512MB and the 6770 had 1024MB?

However, the whole idea was if I would be content with the current Mbp so that I wouldnt have to wait for the next one and thus not have to endure weeks of Diablo 3 on my current Mbp, which only handles D3 in a 800x600 window on ultralow settings, and still with really poor fps.

The early 11 15" high end and the early 11 17" have the 6750m 1gb, whereas the late 11 low end has the 6750 512mb and the high end 15" and 17" both have the 6770m 1gb.

Ohrstrom · May 6, 2012

shardey said:
The early 11 15" high end and the early 11 17" have the 6750m 1gb, whereas the late 11 low end has the 6750 512mb and the high end 15" and 17" both have the 6770m 1gb.

Thank you.

Meever · May 8, 2012

Is there some reason you can't bootcamp? Running those titles on win7 will improve your performance substantially. It'll also be much cheaper than getting them on the app store.

edddeduck · May 9, 2012

Meever said:
Is there some reason you can't bootcamp? Running those titles on win7 will improve your performance substantially. It'll also be much cheaper than getting them on the app store.

It's not always that clear cut

1. The speed boost is not always that great, in fact on certain cards some games can be slightly faster on some settings on a Mac. Although on lower settings windows is usually a little faster.

2. You have pay for a copy of windows which is more expensive than a couple of games.

3. You have to give up space on your HD for a Bootcamp volume. On a laptop with smaller HDs this is more of an issue.

4. You have to quit OS X to run windows, jokes aside that means all your email, iChat etc is not accessible. On the Mac you can be playing, hear a ping, tab out and check your email. If you are using bootcamp you can't. You can't play for 10 mins while waiting on a download etc

I am not saying Windows is not a solution for some peopele and some games but it is not a perfect solution for everyone.

Edwin

throAU · May 9, 2012

I ran the diablo 3 beta on the MBP in my sig (under lion) just fine. it looked great and ran at an extremely playable frame-rate. No idea what the frame rate was, and i don't care. it was easily fast enough.

Haven't played borderlands or Mafia 2...

And yeah, if i wanted to play games under Windows, i'd fire up my windows box. Boot camp = a lot of space for a windows install, windows updates, games, etc that i could make better use of under OS X.

shardey · May 9, 2012

I ran D3 on my 17" 2.3ghz with the 6750m oc'ed to 775/975 @ .955v and it ran everything maxed at 1200p (except shadows) at 40+ fps, on Win 7 64bit enterprise. (Keep in mind I do run Lubbos fan control to increment the fans at lower temps, as well as reapplied new thermal paste to MX 4.)

You should more than likely be able to run this in either Lion or Windows at native resolution, but with some settings lowered. Also realize it was a beta, therefore it may have been limited to 1 or 2 cores or possibly something not mentioned. These are very powerful machines, and can run many current games a good detail with a slight overclock and under volt.

ak47-whaaa · May 11, 2012

I'm using a stock 13 inch (late 2011 early 2012) MBP. Plays Borderlands GOTY on max settings almost perfectly.

That is all except for one problem: The mouse input lags. I would use right mouse button for aim down sight and try to shoot with left mouse button immediately after the scope is up.

The problem is the left mouse button only registers after 1 second after the right mouse button is clicked. I change the ADS button and this problem disappears. Any idea on how to fix this anyone? It's really annoying to ADS using a keyboard key.

edddeduck · May 14, 2012

ak47-whaaa said:
I'm using a stock 13 inch (late 2011 early 2012) MBP. Plays Borderlands GOTY on max settings almost perfectly.

That is all except for one problem: The mouse input lags. I would use right mouse button for aim down sight and try to shoot with left mouse button immediately after the scope is up.

The problem is the left mouse button only registers after 1 second after the right mouse button is clicked. I change the ADS button and this problem disappears. Any idea on how to fix this anyone? It's really annoying to ADS using a keyboard key.

The lag is caused by the mouse drivers taking time to pass on the mouse clicks to the game as the mouse information goes from the mouse to the mouse drivers to the OS to the game. If you are using a bluetooth mouse or a third party mouse with drivers try a USB mouse with no drivers it usually improves the issue.

We have a patch coming which we have tried to make the response quicker but the main reason for the delay is the layers of software between the mouse click and the game getting the mouse data.

Edwin

ak47-whaaa · May 14, 2012

edddeduck said:
The lag is caused by the mouse drivers taking time to pass on the mouse clicks to the game as the mouse information goes from the mouse to the mouse drivers to the OS to the game. If you are using a bluetooth mouse or a third party mouse with drivers try a USB mouse with no drivers it usually improves the issue.

We have a patch coming which we have tried to make the response quicker but the main reason for the delay is the layers of software between the mouse click and the game getting the mouse data.

Edwin

Sounds great I can't wait. I hope the patch helps with the multiplayer a bit more as well, I can rarely connect with others

The-Pro · May 14, 2012

Ohrstrom said:
Im not entirely sure if you answered or misunderstood me on the Vram thing though, Ive read about some gpus with 256 getting 512 to play with instead if you upgrade the Ram on your computer. I was just wondering i this applied to the 6750 aswell, that it gets 1GB if you increase the Ram enough on the computer.

This was never answered.
No it doesn't increase with a RAM upgrade. This is because the MBP has a dedicated GPU with its own independent graphics memory.
On a mac with an Intel HD 3000 the graphics memory increases to 512MB from 256 or 384MB with a RAM upgrade to 8GB. This is because integrated GPU's like the HD 3000 use system RAM, when more is available, more will be assigned to the GPU. 512MB is the maximum. if you upgrade the RAM to 8GB on a 15" with dedicated 6750 or 6770, the intel HD 3000 will also receive 512MB, but since you don't game on the HD 3000 if you have the 6750 or 6770 it doesn't really matter.

Ohrstrom · May 14, 2012

The-Pro said:
This was never answered.
No it doesn't increase with a RAM upgrade. This is because the MBP has a dedicated GPU with its own independent graphics memory.
On a mac with an Intel HD 3000 the graphics memory increases to 512MB from 256 or 384MB with a RAM upgrade to 8GB. This is because integrated GPU's like the HD 3000 use system RAM, when more is available, more will be assigned to the GPU. 512MB is the maximum. if you upgrade the RAM to 8GB on a 15" with dedicated 6750 or 6770, the intel HD 3000 will also receive 512MB, but since you don't game on the HD 3000 if you have the 6750 or 6770 it doesn't really matter.

Thank you for noticing, I learned this from the Macbook Pro forum the other day anyway, but still, thank you. I am just about to start Diablo 3 now with my newly purchased early 11 highend 15". Hoping that the 6750 with 1GB will serve well.

edddeduck · May 15, 2012

ak47-whaaa said:
Sounds great I can't wait. I hope the patch helps with the multiplayer a bit more as well, I can rarely connect with others

The multiplayer issue is when you try and join a game that is hosted by a PC player who has not patched to the final patch. The Mac version is the same as the final PC patch 1.4.1 (also called 1.41). If you look for people using that PC version you should have less problems.

Edwin

Macbook Pro 15" 6750 vs Borderlands, Mafia 2, diablo 3, bioshock 2 etc.

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