Civilization V Macbook Pro Early 2011

Reticent · Mar 18, 2011

Hey folks--

First off, my first post ever!

Second off, I have to say that I bought my new MacBook Pro and couldn't wait to tear open and play the new Civilization V. I've played civilization ever since the first iteration, and have always loved it. Until now.

Evidently, the new early 2011 macbook pros can't run civilization v (I can't vouch for the 13", though the box says that intel integrated GPUs are not supported). I can start up the game, I can run it all at the highest settings, but upon quitting the game I get a black screen that my computer just hangs on.

I took it into Apple's retail store and they logged the issue and eventually (for different reasons) replaced my computer. Yeah apple! :apple:

But, I had to eventually contact Aspyr. In a rather rude e-mail, they told me that the new GPUs were not supported and that the best I could do was to subscribe to the newsletter and just wait and see if an update would be released. Seriously?

So my advice: Don't buy civ v and try to play it on the new sandybridge macbook pros. Conversely, don't buy a sandybridge macbook pro just to play civ v. Thats an expensive lesson that I learned (though I do love my new laptop anyways).

Reticent · Mar 18, 2011

Update: Here's a thought

I don't know what others think about this, I'm not really that up on GPUs, honestly. However, here's a thought.

The black screen only occurs when I quit after the fans have been running for a long time and I've been playing for at least 20 minutes or so. If the 15" macbook pro is automatically switching between GPUs, is it possible that it is switching back prematurely to the under-par integrated GPU? Can I force the computer to only use the AMD Radeon HD6750M? Now, granted that's also an unsupported GPU for Civ V, but I'd think it's got to be able to run Civ V. I know its graphically intensive (much to my surprise)... but it's a better processor than those that are supported (isn't it?) so why couldn't it run it? Just a thought.

Has anyone tried this? Has anyone had any success, more importantly?

WillEH · Mar 18, 2011

Rome: Total War, runs like a kid in a sweet shop, it's sweet.

I'm still waiting to play Civilization, I will get it in a few weeks after I've burned all of Europe down.

Reticent · Mar 18, 2011

Rome

WillGH--

Happy Hunting in Rome! I love total war, and am excited about the prospect of the Shogun release. Apparently, it is sick! But definitely a solid game and I wish you the best of luck in your pursuits to win over the Senate.

I'm glad to see a fellow i7 user (though I see you've opted for the 8 gigs of RAM-- JEALOUS!). When/if you get Civ V, please let me know if you have any of the same issues or find a solution to what I'm describing.

Cheers!

doh123 · Mar 18, 2011

it should work fine....

The HD 3000 will not run Civ5 right, but a 6750 runs it fine. I've played a loooong marathon game thats over turn 1000 right now on my new 17" with a 6750 and it runs fine... I'm not sure why you'd have a problem.

I do manually set my 6750 on as the primary card before starting it though... I don't ever let it auto switch.

i use gfxCardStatus to control what is being used.

WillEH · Mar 18, 2011

Reticent said:
WillGH--

Happy Hunting in Rome! I love total war, and am excited about the prospect of the Shogun release. Apparently, it is sick! But definitely a solid game and I wish you the best of luck in your pursuits to win over the Senate.

I'm glad to see a fellow i7 user (though I see you've opted for the 8 gigs of RAM-- JEALOUS!). When/if you get Civ V, please let me know if you have any of the same issues or find a solution to what I'm describing.

Cheers!

You should be jealous, it's fantastic

Of course I'll check for you

Shogun is very good, I played the demo on my PC, but not out for mac =(

Reticent · Mar 18, 2011

Amazing

Doh123--

THANK YOU for the information! In my head it seemed to make sense, and though it is not a "supported" graphics card it just makes sense that it could run Civ V. However, it is so good to know that designating which graphics card should run the program could solve the problem.

Thank you for following up and I hope that you have much success in building and guiding your civilization to great success. I, too, love the Marathon games and have been known to lose months to a good Civilization game.

Cheers and thanks again!

Reticent · Mar 18, 2011

Switching GPU

Doh123--

I have to post again to tell you that turning off the GPU switching feature worked like a charm! I'm currently destroying all civs as the Germans on Marathon and my computer is not heating up or acting up at all like before. It's perfect!

That being said, I don't remember what third party software you suggested for determining which GPU is running. However, under the Energy Saver preference, you can actually choose to have the big bad 6750 running all the time by unchecking the "automatic switching" box. The third party software would be useful, I concede, if you wanted to conserve battery power and only use the integrated chip. Just thought I'd let you know that the option is out there not to use a third party solution to exclusively use the discrete GPU.

Thanks for the confirmation that using the discrete GPU would work... you've saved my Civilization life and once again SCREW aspyr!

Cheers!

doh123 · Mar 18, 2011

Reticent said:
Doh123--

I have to post again to tell you that turning off the GPU switching feature worked like a charm! I'm currently destroying all civs as the Germans on Marathon and my computer is not heating up or acting up at all like before. It's perfect!

That being said, I don't remember what third party software you suggested for determining which GPU is running. However, under the Energy Saver preference, you can actually choose to have the big bad 6750 running all the time by unchecking the "automatic switching" box. The third party software would be useful, I concede, if you wanted to conserve battery power and only use the integrated chip. Just thought I'd let you know that the option is out there not to use a third party solution to exclusively use the discrete GPU.

Thanks for the confirmation that using the discrete GPU would work... you've saved my Civilization life and once again SCREW aspyr!

Cheers!

gfxCardStatus is free... and quick and easy cuz it runs on the top menu bar. You can also force it on the Intel which is good because the auto is so buggy (like you've seen) and many poorly written apps will turn it on for no reason. Just launch X11 and run all command line xterm and it'll switch on... just cuz X11 links to OpenGL. It doesn't go by what its actually using, just what it may possibly use. I'd really recommend putting gfxCardStatus on your machine.

Reticent · Mar 18, 2011

Potential Problems?

I get the gist of what your saying, though forcing anything to open on the command line I must admit is way beyond what I know how to do. I'm willing to just take your word for it, but before I do, I'm a little curious as to whether there are any drawbacks to doing this?

I'm not too worried about overheating or anything, I can tell when my computer is getting hot. I'm more worried about whether it should be switching for a good reason (other than conserving battery power). Is it saving the life of the GPUs or some lame reason like that? Or am I perfectly safe in installing that application and just switching as I see fit?

Just throwing it out there, and it's possible there's already a thread on this. I upgraded from a black macbook that didn't have two GPUs so this whole idea is new to me.

Cheers!

doh123 · Mar 18, 2011

switching it manually won't hurt anything.... no command line anything needed either, I was just giving an example of Apple's automatic method not working very well.

gfxCardStatus is very easy to use, and won't hurt a thing. Forcing it to stay on the Intel is useful for multiple purposes... saving battery power when an app is poorly made and switches on the GPU for no reason... or running an app that will use the GPU and switches it on, but the Intel would do good enough and still save power and create less heat.

i leave mine on intel only all the time... until i want to do something that *needs* more power then i switch it to the radeon only... but most things, even things that would turn on the 6750, i don't let it turn on. everything runs cooler and more efficient, and uses less power... so that will all help the life the machine. It only takes 2 clicks to switch GPUs.

Reticent · Mar 19, 2011

Sold!

Alright, I'm going for it! Thanks so much for explaining it and convincing me!

WillEH · Mar 19, 2011

Reticent said:
Alright, I'm going for it! Thanks so much for explaining it and convincing me!

Dare devil!

euphoria47 · Mar 20, 2011

doh123 said:
gfxCardStatus is free... and quick and easy cuz it runs on the top menu bar. You can also force it on the Intel which is good because the auto is so buggy (like you've seen) and many poorly written apps will turn it on for no reason. Just launch X11 and run all command line xterm and it'll switch on... just cuz X11 links to OpenGL. It doesn't go by what its actually using, just what it may possibly use. I'd really recommend putting gfxCardStatus on your machine.

Wow! How in the hell have I had my computer 6 months and not know about this! Starcraft on my mid-2010 is now playable on discrete-only, at 1680x1050, high settings. Apple claims that the switching is seamless, but what I think was happening to me during gameplay, whenever there was a "lull" in gpu activity, it switched down to intel, then however many seconds later, it would have to switch back to the 330m. The game was forever glitching and having split-second freezeups, which would only go away on really low settings. Now those issues are gone. I never thought to switch it to discrete only. I really like the option of integrated only, for use for day to day stuff.

All my games are performing at much higher FPS now.

PatrickCocoa · Mar 20, 2011

Win over the Senate?

Reticent said:
WillGH--But definitely a solid game and I wish you the best of luck in your pursuits to win over the Senate.

Win over the Senate? You mean march into the Senate at the head of a legion of troops, proscribe those who dared oppose me, and take what's rightfully mine?

That kind of win over the Senate?

Reticent · Mar 22, 2011

10.6.7

Alright. So. 10.6.7 seems to have entirely fixed my problems. I installed gfxCardStatus and switch to the discrete for Civ V. I still froze a few times. So after 10.6.7 that doesn't happen anymore.

I'd be interested in hearing if people still have problems. But a few machines returned, a firmware update later, and I can finally run Civ V no worries! Woooo!

DoNoHarm · Mar 24, 2011

I have a 2.66 Ghz MBP i bought in Jan 2010 (256mb gfx card). I'm noticing that the game is "jumpy" all the time, even when using the discrete card. Is this just how it is? I mean the motion of all the units, moving the screen around, etc. is just jumpy. Like 2-4 frames per second. Is this normal?

Reticent · Mar 24, 2011

Hmmm

I can't say that I've experienced that problem. Is your graphics card supported? And what settings do you have it on? Maybe if you increase the graphics setting in-game it might help?

That's really frustrating, I'm sorry to hear you're having that problem...

Ieo · Mar 24, 2011

Has anyone tried Civ 5 on the intel HD 3000 since the 10.6.7 update? Somebody in another thread did some digging and found some driver updates apparently.

I looked on some civ forums and apparently as current as tuesday an aspyr rep was quoted saying they're still working on an HD 3000 fix.

Reticent · Mar 24, 2011

Hd 3000

I will try it now.

(edit)

Ok so I can start it up using the integrated chip. It plays the opening cutscene fine. After that, the boxes come up where text would normally be (such as single player, multi-player, etc.). However, there is no text. You can still click the buttons, but there is no text to tell you what you are clicking.

I'd say that the integrated chip just isn't up to it, unless aspyr will step up their game and release some kind of patch. On Civ V's box, however, it does say that integrated GPUs are not supported. That's one reason why I bought the 15" MBP because I was tired of having only one integrated GPU in my 13" MB.

Hope that's helpful.

Ieo · Mar 24, 2011

Reticent said:
I will try it now.

(edit)

Ok so I can start it up using the integrated chip. It plays the opening cutscene fine. After that, the boxes come up where text would normally be (such as single player, multi-player, etc.). However, there is no text. You can still click the buttons, but there is no text to tell you what you are clicking.

I'd say that the integrated chip just isn't up to it, unless aspyr will step up their game and release some kind of patch. On Civ V's box, however, it does say that integrated GPUs are not supported. That's one reason why I bought the 15" MBP because I was tired of having only one integrated GPU in my 13" MB.

Hope that's helpful.

Nah, that was the same problem before the 10.6.7 patch (no text). The HD 3000 should have enough power to run the game on low, it's just not currently supported. Aspyr is working on a fix right now apparently, but they're not sure if it's possible.

Reticent · Mar 24, 2011

Hd 3000

It's possible, and if they say they are then more power to them!

I'm just saying that it doesn't work now after the 10.6.7 update and the box says no integrated GPUs are supported.

I hope they make it work! That'd make things easier on my machine as well. Let's keep our fingers crossed.

maverick86 · Mar 24, 2011

The only way I've gotten Civ V to work with the HD3000 (on my 13" MBP) is through bootcamp. It'd be nice to run in OS X but until they fix it (if they do) I'll be happy with the ability to just play the game somehow.

Ieo · Mar 24, 2011

From what I read in that forum, Aspyr is sort of sitting on their hands waiting for the PC patch to be completed before they can port it, so they're working on mac-specific problems like HD 3000 compatibility.

I'm crossing my fingers....I bought the 2011 13" knowing I don't need graphics power too much, but I had hopes I could at least play a little casual Starcraft II & Civ 5.....Starcraft works like a charm at least.

Reticent · Mar 24, 2011

Hd 3000

Just to attempt to give some finality to aspyr's viewpoint, this is what I got in response from them when I was having trouble that was caused by switching to the HD 3000.

From Aspyr's e-mail:

"Thank you for providing us with the requested information. Unfortunately, we were unable to replicate the reported issue of the game exit causing a black screen freeze of your computer. Your video card is not supported for Civilization V. Our developers are currently assessing potential compatibility with the newest Mac hardware updates. We can only suggest subscribing to our newsletter to be kept informed of any updates or playing on a supported machine.

http://www.aspyr.com/news/newsletter_signup

http://www.aspyr.com/product/game_specs/125"

That's what I got. So it's possible they're trying to get it to work. It's possible they're just waiting for the PC patch and then port it. It's possible they're just not going to do it. We just don't know. Frustrating, I know...

Civilization V Macbook Pro Early 2011

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