How often do you play these games? I've decided to stick strictly with OS X since I don't do that much gaming (Simcity type games and ESO) and I've been satisfied with the OS X experience. Might want to give it a try first then decide if you need to drop the money for Windows 8.
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Playing WOW and Diablo III on Retina iMac 5K
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How often do you play these games? I've decided to stick strictly with OS X since I don't do that much gaming (Simcity type games and ESO) and I've been satisfied with the OS X experience. Might want to give it a try first then decide if you need to drop the money for Windows 8.
That's good advice. Besides, Diablo III isn't all that stressful for even OS X. It looks great on native resolution on my 2011. I'm sure it will be great on one of these newer systems with more powerful GPUs.
Of course I don't benchmark. If it looks great and plays without lag I'm fine.
Cheers,
I don't see any benefits to run games in Win instead of Os X, the only reason to run Windows it's if you want games that runs only on Windows, but consider that in Windows the res max is 4K (38xx).
WoW and Diablo 3 (all the Blizzards) runs great in 5K, no point to use Windows, even because the drivers are not well optimized yet and you risk bad behaviors like black screens and other problems.
WoW and Diablo 3 (all the Blizzards) runs great in 5K, no point to use Windows, even because the drivers are not well optimized yet and you risk bad behaviors like black screens and other problems.
It depends of the game...
Max Payne 3 and Bioshock 1&2 were my last tries on OS X: they run a lot faster on Windows, and with less bugs!!! For example, under Mac OS, I must turn down the wifi before playing Max Payne 3 or it won't launch (bought on the Mac App Store BTW).
On Bioshock 2, I must turn off active corners if I don't wan't to see my desktop in the middle of the game when I move my mouse...
Now, for me, if I wan't to play: reboot on Windows... Games are cheaper, turn faster and without bugs...
Maybe it's a driver problem, but so far with the M295X there's no improvements, only potential issues and less resolution.
I get things like that in OS X also with other games. Like scrolling the mouse toward the bottom and the tray popping up. Aside from the hassle of switching to windows I find a windows gaming experience to be better then OS X.
I'm sure things like that can be corrected by the devs (because not all games do it) but it just goes to show how Windows has better dev support. You can either bare with the issues, complain, and email the devs or do something about it and just use Windows. I typically just deal with it unless it actually effects the game.
Never had a single issue playing games in Windows 8.1 on my 5K. Diablo 3 runs perfectly there, and I can't play Saints Row 4 otherwise.
with 6.X they did a major change of the game engine of WoW, they switched to a full deferred rendering method. This was to improve dramatically the lighting quality of the game for new content. In addition they added new Level of detail techniques to improve max view distance.
Problem is MacOs OpenGL sucks on handling deferred engines by a large margin when compared to other platforms.
This killed the performance by about 30%, added frame stuttering and also reduced visual quality. With the upcoming 6.1 patch graphics will be downgraded for OSX to gain back some perfomance loss but we will never get back to old 5.4.X framerates and image quality.
Yes, it's totally worth to bootcamp for WoW because you can max it and have a smooth experience.
Problem is MacOs OpenGL sucks on handling deferred engines by a large margin when compared to other platforms.
This killed the performance by about 30%, added frame stuttering and also reduced visual quality. With the upcoming 6.1 patch graphics will be downgraded for OSX to gain back some perfomance loss but we will never get back to old 5.4.X framerates and image quality.
Yes, it's totally worth to bootcamp for WoW because you can max it and have a smooth experience.
So with the 6.1 I have to expect a decrease of the overall quality but a increase of performance ? I was happy with this actual 5K settings and framerate. I don't want to switch to Windows
But, are you sure about it ? with the M295X and last bootcamp drivers I have no performance or visual difference @ the same resolution between Win and Os X
6.1 introduces new graphical features OSX is not capable to run like HBAO+. You cannot have true antialias options on OSX and new dynamic lighting, and you have to deal with terrible LOD quality. Check the screenshots for a OSX to Windows comparison for the LOD difference on same settings (terrain on high).
You can fix this with a 20% fps loss, meaning if you are running at 60fps still you will lose a good deal of smoothness. You also make flying unbearable with tons of fps spikes and pauses which is even more evident when you turn.
You can fix this with a 20% fps loss, meaning if you are running at 60fps still you will lose a good deal of smoothness. You also make flying unbearable with tons of fps spikes and pauses which is even more evident when you turn.
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With the retina this thing it's not a problem, the HBAO+ it's only for nvidia so Os X and Win doesn't make difference and at 5K the antialias it's useless at this resolution, the image is super "crispy" anyway.
I've check yesterday in the PTR and I don't see any difference, if you have a 2013 model with the 780M It's another story, with the retina playing WoW in Windows it's worse (resolution for first)
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HBAO is, HBAO+ not, so for me this patch bring nothing new in the graphics engine, I got same performance and graphics quality of yesterday (fortunately).
I didn't get this question but if you are referring playing WoW at 1440p vs 5K it's an unfair comparison, 5K wins hands down and constant 60+ vs 40/60+ (with low shadows and water) it's not a big deal to pay for the 5K.
Well, in my opinion, of course
I mean 4k. the 680MX can probably max the game at 4k 60+fps, but i cannot test it as the 2012 imac does not support 4k. However my laptop with the 880M ( should be on same level of the 295X) can run the thing at 4k without breaking a sweat with maxed settings. Low shadows yeld a much lower quality the higher the resolution, it's quite evident on open areas.
The 880M is at least 20% less than M295X, I had an Alienware laptop with an overclocked 780M (at 1000MHz, so more than the 880M) and the performance are quite different, the only thing to say in favor of the nvidia card (my personal favorites overall) is the ability to run WoW in every effect very good, the AMD card suffer too much on shadows and water in WoW.
But aside of that, even 4K and 5K is a big jump in quality, the lightning of the shadow will change of course the graphics but not that much to justify a 50% or more of FPS loss, on and off it means 60+ to 15 fps in certain situations, reason because I will change this 5K with the first Retina iMac with a Nvidia card (probably 2016)
Yes, I know that, but I would like to see some numbers
You should search for Mac Pro's gaming benchmarks then
But to use a Mac Pro as a gaming machine it's a super waste of money
Take a look at this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G99vF2GB1VE
Consider a performance of 10 fps more, I recorded this video from WoW so without recording there's more performance, of course.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G99vF2GB1VE
Consider a performance of 10 fps more, I recorded this video from WoW so without recording there's more performance, of course.
Thank you!
P.S. Gaming will not be main reason why I will buy MP
When and if Apple will update the Thunderbolt Display with a 5K resolution I will consider the nMac Pro with base setting and an external Thunderbolt enclosure with a high end graphics card, it seems a good plattform for working and gaming
I actually tried WoW yesterday (latest patch) for the first time on my 5K iMac and was surprised the M290X could run it very smoothly in 5K resolution. I didn't expect it to run well at anything higher than 1440p, but there I was, running through Draenor in 5K without any lag or stutters, with AA turned on and settings set to high. The game almost looks weird in this resolution, to be honest. Oh, and I played the OS X version, not in bootcamp. I didn't test it in over-populated areas or raids, though, but everything I tried was really smooth.
I can only imagine what M295X can do, but the M290X is surprising me more and more every day.
Funny how you can play a game in 5K with no problems (though, admittedly, WoW is not super-demanding) and still have Mission Control lag
I can only imagine what M295X can do, but the M290X is surprising me more and more every day.
Funny how you can play a game in 5K with no problems (though, admittedly, WoW is not super-demanding) and still have Mission Control lag