Diablo 3 and the new Retina MacBook Pro - my findings.

[WilliamG]

You turned anti aliasing off right?

As stated in original post, yes.

 

[yashi]

One thing I noticed is the performance on the osx is the same as bootcamp now. I installed them both when the game first came out, and was only able to play it under bootcamp. But lately I have noticed under osx, the performance is on par as under bootcamp. I think Blizzard had been improving it's mac support.

Note, mine is 2009 Macbook Pro 13", so 15fps (bootcamp and osx) is what I have been playing up to inferno.

Maybe a difference in video GPU performance under the two systems, but my experience as recently as the past few days has been much smoother in Windows than OSX. I'm playing on a 27" 2011 iMac with a 6970m.

 

[henrikrox]

So, if you believe what you read on many of these threads on Macrumors and review sites, you can run Diablo 3 at insane resolutions on the new MBP with Retina display.

My findings are quite the opposite, but I suppose it depends on how you define "smooth."

My preference is for games to run at 60fps. With Diablo 3, that's pretty much impossible at any normal resolution.

For reference, it's the base model MBP with Retina display:

2.3Ghz i7
8GB RAM
256GB SSD

First, I always turn v-sync on. This is perhaps a personal preference, but with v-sync off the screen tearing is quite distracting. V-sync set to off will increase the maximum frame-rate the game can achieve (in this case - anything over 60fps), but does not increase the minimum frame-rate.

All settings are set to highest except shadows, which are set to "Low," and anti-aliasing which is set to OFF. The resolution is 2048x1280.

Frame-rate? 30fps, and not even 30fps solid. For example, with a lot of spells flying through the air in Act II Nightmare, I was able to get the frame-rate to drop into the teens. You don't even have to be doing all that much to get the frame-rate to nosedive, either. On one of the quests in Act II, you go to see the emperor child, and then have to escape to the sewers. Just before the sewers, there are a few pots/benches/carriages that line the outside pathways, and destroying those causes a complete frame-rate dip.

All is not lost, though. For most of the time the game runs at a solid clip. 30fps is mostly attainable in most normal resolutions (1680x1050 and 2048x1280). 2880x1800 is not playable (to me) at any setting, since the framerate is in the teens with vsync on or off, and dips ever lower with action going on.

Anyway, this game does not run at 60fps under most circumstances (the ugly 1440x900 with shadows off is one case where it does hit 60). I personally find the jump between 20fps and 60-90fps quite jarring, so I'd rather have it "locked" to 30fps with occasional drops below that by setting vysnc to on.

As for me, I'm definitely disappointed in how Diablo 3 runs. Coming from my 2009 i7 iMac, I was hoping to improve somehow on that with this new laptop. My 2009 iMac runs Diablo 3 at a reasonably solid 30fps (with again, some occasional drops to the 20s) at 1920x1080 resolution, shadows off.

So there you go. I was truly hoping for 1680x1050 at a solid 60fps with most settings enabled, but that's simply not possible on this laptop. Maybe next year!


If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

You should take a visit to blizzard mac forums.

The performance after lion is so bad compared to windows.

 

[Fraaaa]

Low FX, if you want to increase frame rate. Why is everyone missing it?

I cannot believe you cannot get a better frame rate than I get on my MBA 13" on HD3000.

 

[henrikrox]

Low FX, if you want to increase frame rate. Why is everyone missing it?

I cannot believe you cannot get a better frame rate than I get on my MBA 13" on HD3000.

There is obviously something wrong with his findings. The RMBP runs circles around the mba, and then some.

And also, turning down shadows does more for the fps then low fx.

 

[GreyMatta]

I actually have been fairly impressed with the d3 performance. It is extremely playable, perhaps not in "like my triple-SLI gaming rig" terms -but for an extremely mobile laptop it's great.

This means it's now possible to hop on for 45 minutes here and there to play d3 with my son when traveling for business - that much more time with him, in my book.

I play in 1440x900, and get a consistent 40+ fps during most stuff. Intense fights I'm sure it slows down, but nothing where I've felt impeded yet at least.

I'm not sure why anyone would have thought 2880x1800 would perform well - for max settings at home on a 2550x1440 monitor, I need SLI'ed video cards rated at 200w/ea or so to get over 60fps during intense fights.

That said, I don't have more than an hour on it.

I think it will also only get better as blizzard releases high-dpi stuff, we'll see what comes up.

I am going to buy the base MBPR with 16GB Ram but before I do can you tell me if Diablo 3 looks OK at 1440x900 (can you tell its not at native res)

Cheers

 

[PeopleTheseDays]

Interesting findings, I definitely agree with your desire for 60 fps gaming. I LOL'd when everyone was so happy that TheVerge got 15-20 fps on D3.

I just checked out the laptop at BestBuy, not gaming, but just scrolling around websites, pretty laggy. The scaling to 1680 x 1050 and 1920 x 1200 are pretty well done though, extra space was there without obvious pixalation.

 

[Acidsplat]

Game performance is much better in Windows a majority of the time.
One of the reasons for this is a lot of developers do not make native Mac ports.

Instead, they package it with the Cider dynamic translation layer, to make the game think it's running on Windows. It also causes a significant performance hit, except in older games like Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.

I've tested The Sims 3 on Mac OS X, a game that uses the Cider emulation, and it runs pretty badly compared to the same settings on Windows. It choked on the resolution, while it ran in Windows beautifully.

I'm not sure if Diablo III is using a translation layer, but if it is, it's a major factor for bad performance. From the games I've played, DirectX performs a lot better than OpenGL, at least with the current NVIDIA drivers.

 

[pacman7331]

Unless there is something wrong with RMBP it should be performing on Par with these stats:

Set on graphics Ultra in windows:


[X] M14x R2
Intel Core i7 3720QM 2.6GHz
GeForce GT 650M (745MHz), 1024MB (1000MHz) Turbo bis 835 MHz, ForceWare 296.16
8192MB RAM
59.3 ~*47*fps *** *Hide Comparison


http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GT-650M.71887.0.html


Only problem is I cannot see at what resolution they a playing. Probably not over 1920. More likely around 1440.

3 Things should be understood:

Playing at retina resolution is a not a fair test.
Diablo 3 is not yet retina optimized
Windows is ALWAYS better for games than OS X.

 

[thomaskc]

The main reason why windows usually will be faster is because of the differences in DirectX and OpenGL. 99% of all modern games is running / optimised for DirectX which is a Microsoft product. Since Apple doesn't / won't / can't (who knows) support DX, it uses OpenGL to take care of things instead, which is less of a priority for most developers these days.

Anyway, has anyone actually tested these same settings under windows7? would be interested to hear.

----------

Unless there is something wrong with RMBP it should be performing on Par with these stats:

Set on graphics Ultra in windows:


[X] M14x R2
Intel Core i7 3720QM 2.6GHz
GeForce GT 650M (745MHz), 1024MB (1000MHz) Turbo bis 835 MHz, ForceWare 296.16
8192MB RAM
59.3 ~*47*fps *** *Hide Comparison


http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GT-650M.71887.0.html


Only problem is I cannot see at what resolution they a playing. Probably not over 1920. More likely around 1440.

3 Things should be understood:

Playing at retina resolution is a not a fair test.
Diablo 3 is not yet retina optimized
Windows is ALWAYS better for games than OS X.

the m14x has a native resolution at 1366x768 which is why it can pull those frame rates while still having it look good.

Now the MBPR with a native of 2880x something.. scaling down to 1366x768 would make it looks... strait up horrible. (would still be great to see for testing purposes).

 

[pHeNom]

Devs for Diablo3 is yet to release a patch to support the new retina display. Give it a couple more weeks and it'll be here. Same as other programs to develop support for the new high res screen.

 

[pacman7331]

the m14x has a native resolution at 1366x768 which is why it can pull those frame rates while still having it look good.

Now the MBPR with a native of 2880x something.. scaling down to 1366x768 would make it looks... strait up horrible. (would still be great to see for testing purposes).

I dont see why it would look horrible by any means. Nonetheless the 1366 x 768 isnt a far step down from 1440 x 900. So frame rates should be comperable.

I look forward to someone doing a professional gaming review on this laptop sometime...

 

[King Shady]

To everyone gaming on the new RMBP, especially on D3 - crank the res to 2048 x 1280; the game still looks extremely crisp and sharp and I get consistent 50+fps with everything maxed and shadows on medium. I was surprised by how good it looks at this res, and it runs freakin beautifully. I tried 1440 also, and it runs at a consistent 70-80fps at that res, but looks blurry. 2048 x 1280 is the way to go

 

[henrikrox]

Hm its weird that people are saying the games are blurry at 1440x900.

Looking at my mba and rmbp, they look exactly the same when playing games at 1440x900 on both. Just a bitter better colors and viewing angles on the rmbp.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrbNFSanv2E

User there also says 1440x900 looks great. So i dunno. Weird.

Mind me, im playing in windows, so is the youtube link. Got a weird feeling that osx ****s something up when not running native res in d3.

 

[thomaskc]

I dont see why it would look horrible by any means. Nonetheless the 1366 x 768 isnt a far step down from 1440 x 900. So frame rates should be comperable.

I look forward to someone doing a professional gaming review on this laptop sometime...

If you do not understand, read this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_resolution

This is what everyone is referring to. and because someone feels it looks great in modern warfare 3, doesn't mean that there isn't scaling and that non native resolutions are not crap! for anything not a simple shooter. People are asking because they may use it to make a living from, and doing graphics, non native resolutions is just not an option.

 

[b0ris]

Dont worry about fps in HEll mode.

When you get into inferno, 99% of your gamin time will be farmin the Auction House, and you wont need any fps to play.

 

[importraverxx]

Dont worry about fps in HEll mode.

When you get into inferno, 99% of your gamin time will be farmin the Auction House, and you wont need any fps to play.

LOL! True that, I get pretty solid FPS running the Full 2880 Resolution in the Auction House.

 

[mzjin]

As others have said when you can't actually get 60 FPS then enabling vsync will lower the amount of FPS you get in order for it to sync to screen refreshes (more frames will be dropped). I hate vsync as it causes a delay on the output and thus seemingly input lag but that is just me.

??

That is just you. Vsync does not such thing. Everybody plays everything with Vsync, usually without it on, it's intolerable for anything fast paced like an FPS, strategy game, or Action RPG.

----------

If you do not understand, read this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_resolution

This is what everyone is referring to. and because someone feels it looks great in modern warfare 3, doesn't mean that there isn't scaling and that non native resolutions are not crap! for anything not a simple shooter. People are asking because they may use it to make a living from, and doing graphics, non native resolutions is just not an option.

Non-native looks FINE in most cases especially in games.

Diablo 3 is not about the pretty sharp pictures, it's about the feel of the game. I turn my Core i7 6970M iMac settings down to 1920x1200 in order to get 60FPS with VSYNC on. Anything less than 60 FPS is completely intolerable in Diablo 3.

----------

The main reason why windows usually will be faster is because of the differences in DirectX and OpenGL. 99% of all modern games is running / optimised for DirectX which is a Microsoft product. Since Apple doesn't / won't / can't (who knows) support DX, it uses OpenGL to take care of things instead, which is less of a priority for most developers these days.

Anyway, has anyone actually tested these same settings under windows7? would be interested to hear.

----------



the m14x has a native resolution at 1366x768 which is why it can pull those frame rates while still having it look good.

Now the MBPR with a native of 2880x something.. scaling down to 1366x768 would make it looks... strait up horrible. (would still be great to see for testing purposes).

The M14x has the trashiest screen in existence, it may as well be a tarted up and slow desktop as the screen is not that I would tolerate on anything more than a $200 netbook.

 

[Marrakas]

Just wanted to mention that the framerate has improved significantly after the latest patch of Diablo3. It went from stuttering alot during fights or outdoor enviroment to completely smooth everywhere.

All settings maxed (except shadows) and 1920x1080 on external monitor.

 

[mzjin]

Maybe a difference in video GPU performance under the two systems, but my experience as recently as the past few days has been much smoother in Windows than OSX. I'm playing on a 27" 2011 iMac with a 6970m.

Yes, he is false. Completely false.

I have Diablo 3 installed in both my OSX and Windows Partitions and the same exact settings yield a 20-30% performance improvement in Windows.

Do not bother testing D3 performance in OSX. It is awful.

 

[J.L.Photography]

Yes, he is false. Completely false.

I have Diablo 3 installed in both my OSX and Windows Partitions and the same exact settings yield a 20-30% performance improvement in Windows.

Do not bother testing D3 performance in OSX. It is awful.

i think D3 is much more intensive on the computer than World of Warcraft... would you say ill be able to run WoW smoothly on "high" or "ultra" settings at normal resolution on OSX? i dont know how to setup windows on the mac (when it gets here)

 

[Marrakas]

Wow maxed out runs slower for me than D3.
D3 performance on mac after latest patch is as good as any windows computer I´ve seen.

 

[Tombs]

This thread is f)*&king bonkers, why buy a rmbp to play Diablo 3? Go and get yourself a proper gaming rig, say like the Samsung Series 7 gamer, which will play DB 3 at full max settings (plus any other game you care to throw at it) much cheaper and has better hardware under the skin.....although the skin isnt nice to look at comapred to a rmbp..

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Wow maxed out runs slower for me than D3.
D3 performance on mac after latest patch is as good as any windows computer I´ve seen.

You must be in a time machine for the macs then.....and then back for the good "ole" windows gaming machines of today

 

[Marrakas]

This thread is f)*&king bonkers, why buy a rmbp to play Diablo 3? Go and get yourself a proper gaming rig, say like the Samsung Series 7 gamer, which will play DB 3 at full max settings (plus any other game you care to throw at it) much cheaper and has better hardware under the skin.....although the skin isnt nice to look at comapred to a rmbp..

I doubt anyone here bought it just to play Diablo3. But when you want a mac for other stuff, does it hurt that it runs the game great? Yes I could get an awesome Alienware for $3000, but would it be convenient for other stuff than sitting on my desk? Not really.

 

[Dammit Cubs]

This thread is f)*&king bonkers, why buy a rmbp to play Diablo 3? Go and get yourself a proper gaming rig, say like the Samsung Series 7 gamer, which will play DB 3 at full max settings (plus any other game you care to throw at it) much cheaper and has better hardware under the skin.....although the skin isnt nice to look at comapred to a rmbp..

Most people didn't buy a retina macbook pro just to play D3. Most people consider than a luxury bonus they are getting. It's not like Macbooks are well known for gaming but this is the first time in a laptop where we can actually play modern games. Just to shorten the divide between pc gaming and mac gaming.

That is all. If you can't see why we are so interested, then you clearly missed it.