Driving Sim game on MacBook Pro v PC or Upgrade GPU on Mac Pro classic 5.1?

[Melbourne Park]

My main Macs are a MacPro twin CPU 5.1 2012, and a MacBook Pro 2.9 i7 4 core with a 500Gb drive and a Radeon Pro 560 Type: GPU with :
4GB of ram:
Radeon Pro 560:
Chipset Model: Radeon Pro 560
Type: GPU
Bus: PCIe
PCIe Lane Width: x8
VRAM (Total): 4096 MB
Vendor: ATI (0x1002)
Device ID: 0x67ef
Revision ID: 0x00c0
ROM Revision: 113-C980AJ-927
Automatic Graphics Switching: Supported
gMux Version: 4.0.29 [3.2.8]
EFI Driver Version: 01.00.927
Metal: Supported

Many people put GPUs into their MacPros like an nVidia 1070 etc, but this process seems fraught with issues.

Many more people buy a PC and have a fast graphics card in it, with few Gaming issues besides having a billion choices, and a various reliability issues I assume.

I only want to have some fun running a Windoze driving Sim game.

How quick would the MacPro operate at in a Sim game compared to a MacPro with a pretty difficult to operate GPU card like an nVidia GTX 1070 Founders edition or a GTX 970?

 

[Samuelsan2001]

My main Macs are a MacPro twin CPU 5.1 2012, and a MacBook Pro 2.9 i7 4 core with a 500Gb drive and a Radeon Pro 560 Type: GPU with :
4GB of ram:
Radeon Pro 560:
Chipset Model: Radeon Pro 560
Type: GPU
Bus: PCIe
PCIe Lane Width: x8
VRAM (Total): 4096 MB
Vendor: ATI (0x1002)
Device ID: 0x67ef
Revision ID: 0x00c0
ROM Revision: 113-C980AJ-927
Automatic Graphics Switching: Supported
gMux Version: 4.0.29 [3.2.8]
EFI Driver Version: 01.00.927
Metal: Supported

Many people put GPUs into their MacPros like an nVidia 1070 etc, but this process seems fraught with issues.

Many more people buy a PC and have a fast graphics card in it, with few Gaming issues besides having a billion choices, and a various reliability issues I assume.

I only want to have some fun running a Windoze driving Sim game.

How quick would the MacPro operate at in a Sim game compared to a MacPro with a pretty difficult to operate GPU card like an nVidia GTX 1070 Founders edition or a GTX 970?

No one can answer this question you haven’t told us the game, every game works differently with different graphics cards and operating systems. Just look up the tech spec requirements of the game and if your computers can run it download it and play it. It’s not rocket science it sounds casual so you won’t care to much about ultra settings or milliseconds in online gaming you should be fine. No reason not to just stick an AMD card in your Mac Pro if you do need a graphics upgrade though. Are they quite as good as some of the Nvidia cards?? no they aren’t but the vega 64 is the 6th fastest card you can buy in most benchmarks and anything faster are all 1080 variants or the Titan.

 

[leman]

The Radeon Pro 560 is basically equivalent (or slightly faster than) to Nvidia GTX 960M. So check some benchmarks for your game and then you should be able to decide whether its enough power for you or not.

 

[Melbourne Park]

The Radeon Pro 560 is basically equivalent (or slightly faster than) to Nvidia GTX 960M. So check some benchmarks for your game and then you should be able to decide whether its enough power for you or not.

Oh wow that fast ... its actually possible to connect a GPU via the Thunderbolt connection to the Powerbook and get full GPU performance, but I think the cost of the GPU dock is as much as a Pc!!!

I have checked Assetto Corsa and many people run it with 680 cards on 4 threaded CPUs. They also run 1080 cards though ... mostly because they want all the driving sim graphic features, and mainly because they want to watch it all on 4K monitors.

I intent to watch it on a 50" Plasma, and being in Australia my frame rate is 25 or 50, so, it might cope alright. Probably worth putting windows on and trying it. Not sure if a Mac TV and my WiFI would cope though ... I guess they should for the quality of the TV. If not, would have do go the HDMI route, which would mean buying a costly Thunderbolt to HDMI adapter.

 

[leman]

Oh wow that fast ...

I would say that its too fast, its lower range as far as gaming laptops go, but its enough to play most games unless your demands are high. So far, I haven't found a single game that the 460 Pro couldn't handle.

 

[2IS]

Oh wow that fast ... its actually possible to connect a GPU via the Thunderbolt connection to the Powerbook and get full GPU performance, but I think the cost of the GPU dock is as much as a Pc!!!

I have checked Assetto Corsa and many people run it with 680 cards on 4 threaded CPUs. They also run 1080 cards though ... mostly because they want all the driving sim graphic features, and mainly because they want to watch it all on 4K monitors.

I intent to watch it on a 50" Plasma, and being in Australia my frame rate is 25 or 50, so, it might cope alright. Probably worth putting windows on and trying it. Not sure if a Mac TV and my WiFI would cope though ... I guess they should for the quality of the TV. If not, would have do go the HDMI route, which would mean buying a costly Thunderbolt to HDMI adapter.

AC is not terribly demanding by PC gaming standards. Honestly if you want to game, windows is the way to go. It’s the main reason my desktop is a custom windows build

 

[Melbourne Park]

AC is not terribly demanding by PC gaming standards. Honestly if you want to game, windows is the way to go. It’s the main reason my desktop is a custom windows build

Yes, I certainly agree. But I have wondered whether to buy a PC or a PS4. I intend getting the PS4. But if I can run some driving sims on Windows on my notebook, well great. I have a 2010 5.1 MacPro too, with win10 on it, but I am unsure about the difficulty of better cards for that. Its confusing for me. A faster card that would run a PC game well, despite the bottlenecks in Apples old memory etc on the MacPro 5.1 classic, and also do video stuff, might appeal as having another computer in my office would not very good. Hackintosh actually appeals though for all that ...

 

[Naimfan]

Just get a pc.

 

[Melbourne Park]

Just get a pc.

Well ... to buy a GTX 1070 card in Australia, costs $US 463 - or more. To buy an external box to run the same performance card at 1531 Gaming sped and 1721 boost, with a 450Watt power supply, various output ports as well i.e.:

"Gigabyte AORUS GTX 1070 Gaming Box, includes GV-N1070IXOC-8GD Graphics Card, 450W 80 Plus Gold Power Supply, 1x Thunderbolt 3.0, 3x USB3.0, 1x QC3.0, RGB Fusion, 1531 Gaming, 1721 boost":

costs $US599.

There's a low end one too, a RX580, for $US368
Gigabyte RX 580 Aorus 8GB Graphics Card, Gaming Mode: 1340 Mhz , $US 367.60

And a higher end 1080 for $US689
Gigabyte AORUS GTX 1080 Gaming Box, Thunderbolt 3, 3xUSB3.0, RGB Fusion, Boost: Gaming Mode: 1733 MHz/ Base: 1607 MHz, Boost: OC Mode: 1771 MHz/ Base: 1632 MHz , $US688.64

So for $160, one can get both a 1070 card and the equivalence of a computer. Note though: there's a 10% loss in GPU performance evidently due to the Thunderbolt 3 connection.

But I cannot get a PC for $160. Let alone one with a four core i7. And with a keyboard and track pad. And a (small) monitor. OK some hate the keyboard, but hey, this might even work. I guess I should add the cost of a Thunderbolt to HDMI or USB converter to be more accurate ...

These game box things have several video outlets too including a single HDMI for each, plus a fast charge USB outlet, plus three USB 3 outlets. Not sure what those USB outlets would do though ...

Of course, I have no idea if this card would be compatible with Mac OS!!!

 

[Melbourne Park]

Bought PS4. Bought a wheel and chair rig, pressure brakes etc. Got to close to A+ racing mostly Japanese drives on GT Sport. Then the brakes failed on my setup failed. Haven't sent it away yet - under warranty it seems. Good fun while it lasted ...

 

[venom600]

Bought PS4. Bought a wheel and chair rig, pressure brakes etc. Got to close to A+ racing mostly Japanese drives on GT Sport. Then the brakes failed on my setup failed. Haven't sent it away yet - under warranty it seems. Good fun while it lasted ...

That was going to be my suggestion. ACC just came out for PS4 and you can get some SERIOUS wheels and pedals for it now that can cost into the thousands if you are that serious about it. The PS5 should be even better, and compared to a new graphics card or new PC, it'll be a bargain.

 

[Melbourne Park]

The advantage with the Playstation is that you not only simulate driving, but you can race on line with a lot of people. While you meet all sorts out there, the A level standard is good fun. High A level and A+ drivers though don't like to get beaten, as their level drops if they get beaten. So that is not so much fun. The solution is to have different driver names and go for good fun and fair racing. A racing identity depends on an email address so you can have many racing identities.

If one spends a lot more money, then a PC driving sim is what the top guys race. Even some F1 guys Verstappen do that sort of racing on line. I imagine his home sim would be above average. I bought Fanatec gear and my kit wheel was missing a rubber O ring and perhaps it was also faulty ( I bought a "Porsche" wheel by Fanatic which was far far superior and quite gorgeous to use, and it made me instantly half a second a lap faster too), the cheaper brake pedal kit had a faulty thread and the more costly three pedal unit had a motherboard failure. I also found my radioing platform had some flex which really does slow one down. An alloy kit you assemble yourself would have been better because they are dead rigid. The seat which came with my setup though was excellent. All warranted but I just stopped. I need to send them back. But I was racing too much and my wife started to get annoyed, despite my semi retirement.

I was 65 last year. I was almost A+ standard, but the brake kit started playing up and when it was diagnosed as faulty I had dropped down from A+ by a fair bit (I was a week of races from being A+). I stopped racing. and the best qualifying time I did was 24th in the world, but typically I was from 250 to 350 place.

Sony moved the server for my normal races (there is a different league which I never entered which used the Australian server) but the server used to move around from country to country I think - Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia etc etc. But then Sony put it permanently in Japan and the time lag hurt racing from Melbourne. In traffic I was not as competitive against a Japanese, as they knew where I was precisely, but I was chasing shadows. So the game deteriorated a lot for me, then the pedals failed and I stopped. I'm unsure if Sony ever resolved the issue. I know that Canadians find it tough racing South Americans - or maybe the reverse is true. Server position is a weakness in close games, and I am unsure if the issue has been resolved.''

Another sad thing is that while a RX 580 card is cheaper now than back then, there doesn't seem to be another faster card that works as well. The faster ones all seem to have issues (and many are fan noise related).

I suspect that with the 5,1, the sweet spot in macOS is 10.14x. But it won't run today's faster GPUs. You need Catalina for those it seems to me (the AMD 5700s etc.). It's a huge shame IMO that Apple don't allow Catalina to have real support. Going down the Opencore route seems the only longer term option, and I suspect that the guys who've made that possible may drop the platform in a few years time as the machines diminish in relative performance. So really, its a great era now, but who knows if it will still be supported by the classic mac pro gurus who are keeping things going for free at the moment.