FPS in WoW on iMac 24" alu? Disapointing so far.

[redsteven]

I'll admit that I didn't really read through this thread... but if you're still having problems I think you should just go straight to blizzard... make a post on their mac support forums.

I played WoW for over 2 years... and they must've had the mac support forum up for at least a year during that time... and I can tell you from my experience that I've never seen any other gaming company even come CLOSE to the support they provide their mac users with. They'll respond to almost every tech support post in less than 24 hours.... and you can often get multiple responses from them in the same day.

That, and there's a wealth of information there from other mac users' threads... and if you have a common problem, you might already be able to find a solution already there.

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/board.html?sid=1&forumId=11111

 

[theimp]

On my 24" iMac I have all the settings turned up to their highest while playing WoW. I am not a hardcore gamer or anything but I think I get awesome performance pretty consistently. My iMac is the white kind and I got it in October 06

 

[AppleWoW]

this user hasnt replied to this thread in a long time...it should be dropped unless someone else needs something out of this

 

[VTI1031]

well, it is interesting to see what kind of performance are getting with their imacs.. aluminium... and if they had to tweak/patch it differently to get better performance.

Probably ordering mine today or tomorrow and hoping to get it before christmas.. and hoping for WOW to work fine

 

[AppleWoW]

I had the exact same questions...I currently have a 20" iMac with the standard spec's. I get 50-60 FPS in shatt with all my addons..and thats with 1 gig of ram...(ss if needed)...also I plan on upgrading for things like FCP and cinema 4d. The 20" screen has less to render than the 24" so you should see a speed increase unless you get the 2.8...

 

[Nexuz]

hmm, I have the same framerate problem, just a bit worse.
i Turned everything down to minimum, and even with all addons off i still get 15-20 FPS standing still.
0-1 fps when enfeebled at Prince in kara, and other special effects from bosses like lurker (ssc), Gruul and many others. Should I install windows on this mac, or get a new pc just for wow? sounds absurd IMO.
I have a:
Modelname: MacBook
Model-id: MacBook2,1
Intel Core 2 Duo 2 GHz
Memory: 2 GB

I'm running Mac OS X v10.4.11

What do you think, should I install windows?

Here is a picture of the wow settings and FPS is visible:

 

[motulist]

hmm, I have the same framerate problem, just a bit worse.

That performance is way below what it should be. Are you sure you're not running any other programs at the same time? Open up activity monitor and select "show all processes." That'll let you see what's gobbling up your cpu power.

 

[yamabushi]

Drivers? Probably.

WoW runs fine on my white 20" iMac. I generally get above 45 fps with most graphics settings at max. Bad drivers have given me problems occasionally. Updates seem to have addressed most of the issues. Still not perfect. Good enough for casual gaming. I think both the Mac hardware and OS X are plenty powerful. Poor drivers and optimization are to blame for most issues.

That said, I do recall some reports of faulty graphics cards showing up in some Aluminum iMacs. Consult Apple for repair or replacement if you suspect a hardware problem with the graphics card.

 

[Demon Hunter]

Heya

I have installed the only game i play, World Of Warcraft, on my new alu iMac 24", but tbh, i not very satiesfied with the framerate compared to my PC setup, but i have heard a lot mention that it runs smoothly on their iMacs.

Maybe i have bigger demands, but i just wanna see if there is anything i could do to tweak WoW.

Screenshot of video settings:



And i mean, i have almost turned everything off, but still i got around 20-30FPS when playing. I can reach 75-80FPS in empty IF, but as soon as i go out, it drops to 20-30FPS. Imo, thats very sucky.

Im usually having around 100FPS on my old PC with a Geforce 7950GT, i know its better, but that much? I tried changing resolution on iMac, but it doesnt change the FPS that much, and looks bad.

So far im very dissapointed about the WoW performance, which is a old game with simple graphic.

Besides the low FPS. there is a constant stutter in the picturet. It look likes its skipping a frame or so 1-2 time pr. second. Even if im walking in IF with 80FPS, its not smooth, there is these short stutters a couple of time pr. sec. Its very easy to see on the cast bar which moves very uneven. My latency is around 30-35, so not a latency prob. either. I have tried turning off all addons, but no difference. It seems better if i play the game in a window, so does the FPS atually, but then the eyboard and mouse buttons aint configured to the wow setup :-S

WoW is the only game i play, so im really dissapointed that it performs so bad on my iMac so far. I just hope there is something wrong that can be fixed.

Tech Info:
Alu iMac, 24", 2.4ghz, 3gb ram

OP has Vertical Sync on. That's a great way to cut your FPS in half.

I am running WoW on a stock 24" 2.8 GHz iMac and it runs flawlessly.

L2Graphics Settings.

 

[Andrassy]

thats strange my friend played wow on a computer with about htose specs and had very few problems except in the typically laggy areas

 

[diamond.g]

WoW is a 3 year old game. If it can't run right on a 2007 iMac, then the end user is doing something wrong. The iMac is not to blame.

 

[apfhex]

WoW is a 3 year old game. If it can't run right on a 2007 iMac, then the end user is doing something wrong.

The Burning Crusade expansion is not 3 years old, and it has improved graphics/poorer performance than the original content. Hell, it's enough to burn out a X1900XT... but still, you point is valid, a machine newer than the game shouldn't have problems running it playably.

 

[Nexuz]

well I make sure i only have wow running, when i play, and TS when i'm in raid. and i have looked at my CPU consumption when playing wow, and it changes from 50% to 90%, and no interfering programs.

It must be the drivers that are problematic, if not the grafic card in the MacBook is to blame.
But before patch 2.3 i played WoW smoothly, with a steady fps around 30, wich was enough to not having major problems in raids...

Where can i get new upgrades for my graficcard drivers? I have the integrated intel 950.

 

[diamond.g]

Where can i get new upgrades for my graficcard drivers? I have the integrated intel 950.

From Apple, good luck with that.

 

[muaddib420]

just got my 20inch aluminum iMac with HD 2600 this weekend and started a toon in Burning Crusade (i deleted a lvl 60 priest a couple of years ago after getting bored). i must say, the BC plays it pretty smoothly at native res with some stuff turned down a bit. but i'm getting some "jitters" when i am running. doesn't seem to be a framerate problem, more like a graphical "bug." anyone else get this and found any solutions? it's not a huge problem, just kinda annoying. TIA.

 

[D.av1d]

WoW is a 3 year old game. If it can't run right on a 2007 iMac, then the end user is doing something wrong. The iMac is not to blame.

Yikes...I completely disagree with you.

I have a first gen, white 20" iMac with 256 ATI video card (I forget which one it is as I'm on vacation with a crappy macbook) and I CANNOT play WoW in full screen. I refuse to play this '3' year old game in x1 multi sample. So I play it in windowed mode, I actually like it better so I can see who's talking on vent and such. But I can understand why MY iMac would be slow in WoW...but if it's slow on current iMac models...then it's something wrong with the hardware.
Nuff said.

*as a side note, up until last patch, If I ported myself to Shatt...Id have to wait a good three minutes (in windowed mode) to see my character appear and have the graphics load to be able to walk (choppily). Talk about embarrassing when you're going to Shatt to get an enchant and they have to wait for you cause of your slow compy, lol. >_<
But since the patch, it runs a lot faster. Nothing near lightning, but now I don't have to port, have dinner, and come back to a loaded Shatt

 

[Guchi]

Okay, 20" Alu imac here.

Im getting perfectly fine full detail No AA 30fpsish in **** on MacOS

In WinXP i will be blunt, the leopard drivers are junk, don't trust any bench done with them.

Instead get up to date windows drivers, force install them and enjoy.

The 20" at least runs UT3, Source based stuff in native res at good framerates. But only if you give the video card some love.

Remember the iMac has a 2600XT mobility, not a desktop PRO, so tweaking is required for best results, not to mention the basic leopard bootcamp drivers are old and sucky.

 

[miller218]

How much memory do you have in your iMac? **** used to behave the same for me with only 1 GB. I was getting about .2 Frames per second when I'd fly into Shatt and it would take a good 20 seconds to catch up to normal. With 2 GB it is a major improvement, it gets a little choppy, maybe down to 20 FPS.

I have heard full screen, windowed mode gives an improvement to regular full screen WoW.

Yikes...I completely disagree with you.

I have a first gen, white 20" iMac with 256 ATI video card (I forget which one it is as I'm on vacation with a crappy macbook) and I CANNOT play WoW in full screen. I refuse to play this '3' year old game in x1 multi sample. So I play it in windowed mode, I actually like it better so I can see who's talking on vent and such. But I can understand why MY iMac would be slow in WoW...but if it's slow on current iMac models...then it's something wrong with the hardware.
Nuff said.

*as a side note, up until last patch, If I ported myself to Shatt...Id have to wait a good three minutes (in windowed mode) to see my character appear and have the graphics load to be able to walk (choppily). Talk about embarrassing when you're going to Shatt to get an enchant and they have to wait for you cause of your slow compy, lol. >_<
But since the patch, it runs a lot faster. Nothing near lightning, but now I don't have to port, have dinner, and come back to a loaded Shatt

 

[miller218]

I certainly hope Apple and ATI/AMD are working on improving the drivers. I'd be disappointed if they consider this acceptable.

Okay, 20" Alu imac here.

Im getting perfectly fine full detail No AA 30fpsish in **** on MacOS

In WinXP i will be blunt, the leopard drivers are junk, don't trust any bench done with them.

Instead get up to date windows drivers, force install them and enjoy.

The 20" at least runs UT3, Source based stuff in native res at good framerates. But only if you give the video card some love.

Remember the iMac has a 2600XT mobility, not a desktop PRO, so tweaking is required for best results, not to mention the basic leopard bootcamp drivers are old and sucky.

 

[muaddib420]

I certainly hope Apple and ATI/AMD are working on improving the drivers. I'd be disappointed if they consider this acceptable.

that's a big gripe of mine about gaming in OS X is the lack of third party and beta vid card drivers. i'm used to gaming in Windows, where you could find all kinds of tweaks and drivers to squeeze out (sometimes significantly more) performance.

i've been debating whether to just bite the bullet and install XP on my new iMac to see if i can get some better WoW performance. (plus, i want to play UT3).

 

[diamond.g]

that's a big gripe of mine about gaming in OS X is the lack of third party and beta vid card drivers. i'm used to gaming in Windows, where you could find all kinds of tweaks and drivers to squeeze out (sometimes significantly more) performance.

i've been debating whether to just bite the bullet and install XP on my new iMac to see if i can get some better WoW performance. (plus, i want to play UT3).

Sadly Apple doesn't benefit from those tweaks. Most here believe that the Mac Platform is so stable due to all drivers having to come from Apple. Throw third party into the mix and the landscape could end up just like Windows.

Of course no third party drivers also means no new video cards unless Apple sanctions them, or the Apple drivers get hacked.

 

[D.av1d]

How much memory do you have in your iMac? **** used to behave the same for me with only 1 GB. I was getting about .2 Frames per second when I'd fly into Shatt and it would take a good 20 seconds to catch up to normal. With 2 GB it is a major improvement, it gets a little choppy, maybe down to 20 FPS.

I have heard full screen, windowed mode gives an improvement to regular full screen WoW.

I have 1GB ram on my iMac.

I'm debating on wether to get more ram for the iMac, or just get a new iMac altogether and get an additional 1GB stick.

As for windowed mode, It's far better than full screen mode (performance wise). It's sort of sad that I can only play the game in windowed mode, though. The frame rate is just way to choppy, even in low detail instances. :\
Id hate to say it, but Id rather a PC for games. And again, it's sad to say that when it's only a few weeks until 2008 and are still discussing "mac can't play games well', also with the video cards being the best Apple can offer for the iMac models, it's such a disappointment.
Sigh!

 

[SiliBear]

I have a new 24inch iMac and it currently plays WoW flawlessly. I typically see framerates as low as 35-40 FPS in Shatt but as high as 120 FPS outside the city on high resolution. The game runs perfectly fine in OSX on the iMac - much better than it did on my year-old Dell XPS machine under Win XP.

A while back though, I experienced some of the same issues a few of the posters here brought up, namely reduced framerates generally and a heavy "clipping" of the video when either flying on a gryphan or when inside Shattrath (both of which happened after a patch). Both "issues" have since been resolved to my complete satisfaction.

The general framerate sluggishness was fixed by updating some of the various mods I use to play the game. An old version of ItemRack in particular caused a bunch of errors that seemed to slow my machine down - I can't explain why it would though. Once my UIMods were eventually updated, framerates went up considerably.

The video clipping and choppiness while in Shattrath was fixed simply by adding more RAM. I bought the iMac with 1gig of RAM from the Apple store with the intention of replacing it with a full 4gigs from an aftermarket online supplier since their memory is 25% of the cost Apple charges for it. I had read somewhere that the video card does a lot of data swapping with "extra" computer memory and is able to "get by with less video memory" because it frequently shares resources with the CPU RAM. Someone far more technical than I am could speak to this. The day that I replaced my stock 1gig of memory with 4gigs, this problem went away completely.

I can only guess that since Shatt is a primary place for most people on the server to conduct business and to log in and out from, that it seems reasonable that this Blizzard server node would be sending lots more information to your computer than somewhere significantly less populated. If your video card shares memory space with your CPU, stuff can get backed up and video framerates would be affected. The additional memory made this issue disappear immediately.

 

[Guchi]

I'm running with 2gb on mine, and like I said **** runs fine for me, however like my Macbook I suspect running wow in WinXP with up to date driver would prolly yeild much better results.

On my Pokey little 2ghz Macbook, I see a 30-50% increase in framerates vs MacOS in WOW, thats with the pokey intel 950gma video. Havent installed WOW in windows since im happy with it in macos however judging by the respectable 85FPS in lost coast stress test im guessing the card works nicely in winXP and sucks like hell in MacOS, I blame ATI's Drivers myself

I would say, the Imac for games in windowsXP is fine, in MacOs however.....

 

[aussie_geek]

WoW Frame rates on imac's suck. Period. I have one of the later ones at work and have tried my best to get good frame rates. i can max out between 20 - 30 fps tweaking all the settings.

My advice would be to get a new gfx card for your pc and play your games on that.

I have recently bought a pc gaming box with a core2 duo 3ghz and a Nvidia 8800gtx. I am running it on a 24 inch benq @ 1920 x 1200. I get between 80 - 140 fps in all areas with maxed out settings across the board. This beats my Mac Pro hands down.

Gaming sucks on the Mac. It always will. I have tried to stay loyal through the years but after caving in and buying a PC for games I will never look back. No more having to turn down settings so you can play games at decent frame rates.


aussie_geek