Mac Graphical Performance Snafu

[woxel1]

Okay, I have an issue. A mac issue. There are two computers... let's call them Computer A and Computer B. Now Comp A is a 1.25 GHz iMac G4, with a GeForce FX 5200 - a card with 64 megs of DDR ram - and 512 megs of ram. Comp B is a 800 Mhz G4 iBook (with the ATI Mobility Radeon 9200 card) with only 32 megs of DDR ram and 256 megs of ram.

Now conceivably, if both computers are running UT2k4 (and Mac OS 10.3.5) with the same quality settings, Comp A should have some advantage over Comp B. My issue is that this is not the case. In fact it is quite the opposite. Comp A has been acting strangely at least since 10.3.3; before that awful update it had been running at incredible speeds (I never ran benchmarks before 10.3.4, but I can assure you there was a systemwide slowdown afterwards).

I have reset the PRAM, run a full defragment through Norton, repaired permissions, thrown out and reinstalled UT2k4... you name it! And still, I can't get Comp A out of the 10-15 FPS range on almost any map. Any suggestions on reclaiming performance?

[vraxtus]

Before I give you advice, what kind of FPS rates are you getting on your iBook?

And what systems are they running?

10.3.3 showed the best gaming performance so far.

[woxel1]

In the same room on a certain Deathmatch level, the iBook was gettng 30-40 while the iMac was getting 10-15. This was during a LAN game... from the perspective of the iBook, the iMac's character was running around the level perfectly smooth-like, but from the iMac's perspective it was Lag City. They're both running on the most recent systems, although the iBook doesn't have the latest version of UT2k4.

[vraxtus]

Originally Posted by woxel1

In the same room on a certain Deathmatch level, the iBook was gettng 30-40 while the iMac was getting 10-15. This was during a LAN game... from the perspective of the iBook, the iMac's character was running around the level perfectly smooth-like, but from the iMac's perspective it was Lag City. They're both running on the most recent systems, although the iBook doesn't have the latest version of UT2k4.

Are you sure they're running the exact same settings? Audio quality in UT2K4 actually eats up a significant amount of frames. Also, the game's autodetect may have selected different settings for the game on each computer, which you might have missed.

Also, you may want to check your processor settings. On highest performance, typically you'll gain 5-10% on general FPS rates for most games.

[Converted2Truth]

Backup everything you wanna keep on the iMac onto the ibook, format the hard drive and reinstall everything. Then run system update, and then install ut2004. You will notice increased system performance. Cheers,

[MacsRgr8]

????

Especially the fact that UT (2003 & 2004) loves an nVidia grfx card....

Either the iMac has some serious issues, or the iBook is in reality a PowerBook G4 1.5 GHz, 1.0 GB RAM, with a 5400 rpm disk and 128 MB VRAM Radeon 9700...?

[woxel1]

Is there anything to resetting nvram? Am I just confusing terms? There has to be something that can be fixed... It's just a graphical problem, right?

[applekid]

Considering how often we get complaints about having GeForce FX 5200, I'd say this just proves that the drivers are under-developed. Now, I could be wrong in the sense that the 9200 Mobility is indeed a better card than the FX 5200 (don't know what benchmarks say). But, I'd say it's still the 5200 or its drivers to blame.

[vraxtus]

Originally Posted by applekid

Considering how often we get complaints about having GeForce FX 5200, I'd say this just proves that the drivers are under-developed. Now, I could be wrong in the sense that the 9200 Mobility is indeed a better card than the FX 5200 (don't know what benchmarks say). But, I'd say it's still the 5200 or its drivers to blame.

Nope.

[woxel1]

Okay, let me rephrase my question/problem. Let's say a hypothetical mac running UT2k4 gets around the same frame rates no matter what quality settings are being used. Which component(s) are failing?

A) The Hard Drive
B) The DVD Drive
C) The Graphics Card
D) Something Else
E) None

[Poff]

Try a HDD-format. Welcome to Windows-world.

[bousozoku]

Originally Posted by woxel1

Okay, let me rephrase my question/problem. Let's say a hypothetical mac running UT2k4 gets around the same frame rates no matter what quality settings are being used. Which component(s) are failing?

A) The Hard Drive
B) The DVD Drive
C) The Graphics Card
D) Something Else
E) None

D: the processor.

UT2004 is mostly processor intensive. You should supply the fastest processor you can and the most RAM it can handle. A great graphics card is helpful but not as important as a strong CPU.