MacBook Air and Football Manager, the perfect partnership?

[Painesopinion]

I'm going to buy a MacBook Air, mainly for general using: surfing the web, music, watching videos and other similar stuff.
Being an avid Football Manager player the ability to run my fav game is of course highly required.
I'd like to know other users experience with Football Manager 2013 and Air.
I have some doubts regarding the model to buy: will the basic 13" be enough for the game or would an upgrade (more RAM and i7 mainly) be advisable?

As I said, share your thoughts.

Thanks.

 

[dontlookback82]

I have the same concerns, I currently use a MacBook Pro '07 and am looking to upgrade.

 

[kodeman53]

More memory is always recommended.

Is FM a heavy CPU user? If it is, get the i7.

 

[Steve121178]

If you are buying a new MBA then you really ought to be going for the 8GB model anyway. But to answer your question, 4/8GB will be just fine for FM and don't waste money on the i7.

 

[Primus84]

If you are buying a new MBA then you really ought to be going for the 8GB model anyway. But to answer your question, 4/8GB will be just fine for FM and don't waste money on the i7.

FM is so CPU heavy that if you can afford it you will definitely benefit from the i7 CPU!

 

[haaX]

I posted this in another thread, so I'll just copy & paste. In short, FM + MBA is a match made in heaven. Even on the 11". As FM is extremely CPU intensive - get the i7 if you can afford it as the poster above said. Even though I haven't tested performance on i5 vs i7 it's all reason points to that. FM is all about processing.

Edit: Also get 8 GB of memory...

---
Just wanted to add my thoughts on how Football Manager 2013 is running on my MBA 11" i7/8GB as I myself tried googling how playable it was on the MBA 11".

Football Manager 2013 is a massively CPU intensive game, and on the MBA 2013 it's quite fast. You obviously won't get the full 9 hours, but it'll give you around 3-4 hours if you play it non stop. The machine also gets hot at times - not unplayable hot, but the fans speed up. Heat is a problem on any laptop running this game as far as I know. When it comes to watching the matches the animations are usually smooth, although when you're running low on battery the game gets slower - my guess is that some power saving mechanism is disabling the turbo boost of the CPU.

The biggest issue with gaming on the MBA 11" though is the screen resolution as the window gets pretty cramped. It's fully playable, although the 13" might be the better option both due to the significantly larger screen and the better battery capacity. For me the MBA 11" is perfect even though the screen is a tad cramped and the battery only gets you as far as it does.

One thing that might bother you (it did surely bother me) is that Football Manager 2013 in full screen mode doesn't support the native OS X full screen mode. This means that in order to do other stuff (e.g. swapping spaces) whilst the game is running the game is forced into windowed mode. The problem with the original windowed mode is that the minimum height of the window is 800 px, whilst the MBA has a height of 768 px.

To fix this you'll have to force a "--small_window option" when launching the game (Set launch option, add --small_window). You'll also have to press "maximize" window (green button) in order to resize the window to fit the screen so the bottom of the windows isn't off screen. You can also change some OS X settings in order to hide the top bar whilst playing (instructions on how to run it smooth here: http://community.sigames.com/showthr...=1#post8880711).

Summarized - the MBA plays almost perfect with the 11" and 100 % perfect on the 13". Game on!

 

[Painesopinion]

Thanks guys some wise tips here, I think I'll get an i7 - 8 GB model still unsure about the 128/256 choice, but this time won't be FM related.

 

[mdnz]

If it won't run well on the i5 it won't run well on the i7 either. Performance difference is like 10-20% at best.

 

[Primus84]

If it won't run well on the i5 it won't run well on the i7 either. Performance difference is like 10-20% at best.

20% is quite a large performance increase!

 

[mdnz]

20% is quite a large performance increase!

I said it's 20% at best. Usually you'll be lucky if you get 10% extra. My previous point still stands, if it doesn't run well on the i5 it won't run well on the i7. Also Football manager benefits alot from the GPU, while both the i5 and the i7 have the same identical GPU.

 

[Primus84]

I said it's 20% at best. Usually you'll be lucky if you get 10% extra. My previous point still stands, if it doesn't run well on the i5 it won't run well on the i7. Also Football manager benefits alot from the GPU, while both the i5 and the i7 have the same identical GPU.

I didn't say it wouldn't work on the i5, I said if he could afford it he should go for the i7. The i7 should provide a significant boost in game speed.

FM isn't really graphics intensive even with the new 3D match engine, the graphics isn't really an issue here.

 

[mdnz]

I didn't say it wouldn't work on the i5, I said if he could afford it he should go for the i7. The i7 should provide a significant boost in game speed.

FM isn't really graphics intensive even with the new 3D match engine, the graphics isn't really an issue here.

And this is where you are wrong because the performance of the CPUs dont differ that much.
If the OP needs real CPU power he shouldnt be looking for an MBA anyway.

The i5 and i7 are nearly identical except for the cache and a slight clock speed boost.

 

[Primus84]

And this is where you are wrong because the performance of the CPUs dont differ that much.
If the OP needs real CPU power he shouldnt be looking for an MBA anyway.

The i5 and i7 are nearly identical except for the cache and a slight clock speed boost.

Hmmm ok then, all those reviews where they benchmark the CPUs must be lying.

The i5 and i7 are absolutely suitable for running FM and the i7 will be appreciably faster.

----------

AnandTech (a highly respected tech site) had this to say:

"If you need more performance however, the 1.7GHz Core i7 upgrade (4650U) delivers. In most situations you get more than a 20% increase in performance"

http://www.anandtech.com/show/7113/2013-macbook-air-core-i5-4250u-vs-core-i7-4650u/5

 

[mdnz]

20% increase in a relativly slow ULV processor isnt gonna make a world of difference. Sure it helps but it's not worth the $200 premium if you ask me.

It basically means yes I want an ultrabook, but I have to compromise on CPU performance but Ill pay $200 extra for the rare times I need that small boost where it likely isnt even going to matter that much.

 

[Primus84]

20% increase in a relativly slow ULV processor isnt gonna make a world of difference. Sure it helps but it's not worth the $200 premium if you ask me.

It basically means yes I want an ultrabook, but I have to compromise on CPU performance but Ill pay $200 extra for the rare times I need that small boost where it likely isnt even going to matter that much.

If you look at the Haswell CPUs it's not a huge compromise like the original MacBook Air was. It's more than suitable for his needs and I'm not responding to you further because you're acting like a troll now.

 

[mdnz]

If you look at the Haswell CPUs it's not a huge compromise like the original MacBook Air was. It's more than suitable for his needs and I'm not responding to you further because you're acting like a troll now.

Wow that's cheap.
If someone makes a decent argument you call him a troll, super classy. Either way by this time the OP has probably made up his mind probably.

(PS look up the word relative in the dictionary)