11" MBA and OnLive gaming service...match made in heaven?

[fs454]

I'm a big gamer and have always written OnLive off as a good idea but impossible due to lag/input delay and the fact that it'll never look nearly as good as playing a game natively on you computer, but being bored tonight I found out that it costs nothing but a few minutes to sign up(no credit card)and get 30 minute trials of the games.

I tried Dirt 2, Metro 2033, and Unreal Tournament 3 and i was VERY surprised at how nice it looked and how well it dealt with input lag. The MBA is pretty potent for gaming in and of itself(I can run HL2, Portal, etc at maxed settings native resolution), but installing Windows and a bunch of 9+GB games on the smallish SSD isn't always viable.

Anyone looking to have some fun on their MBAs definitely give it a try. It's perfect for us considering that the only thing you need to store on your MBA is a 9.5MB application! I was going to partition and install Windows 7 and a few games but I'm gonna definitely hold off on that and buy a few games on this to see how it pans out, but my initial impression is that it's freaking awesome. It doesn't even really max the fan out. You just need a pretty solid connection; I'm on college wifi, though close to the router, and it all worked perfect.

 

[gman901]

Hey, I just noticed your post and I have the same set up as you with the MacBook Air 11". So, I was toying with the idea in picking up one of the new Alienware M11x R3's because they look like pretty sweet gaming machines for the money and using my Air for my all-purpose machine, but then I got an email today to buy the Dark Void game for $5 on Onlive. I thought I would try it out with this deal and see if Onlive was any better. I think I tried Onlive about 6-8 months ago when it just got WiFi, and it was laggy and the graphics were not so good. I was pleasantly surprised how much better the gameplay and graphics are now! I may use Onlive for some of the more graphically intensive games and play on the OSX partition through the App and go back to Windows and Steam for my other games that are not so intensive. I think Onlive and Steam make a good balance on the MacBook Air 11". I really like the option Onlive gives me and makes the Air an almost perfect gaming system if you can deal with playing some games in the "cloud." No need to look at the M11x now!