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macguy360

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Feb 23, 2011
836
510
I have the $1399 model and while it is great for using fcpx and other productivity tasks, it is pretty bad at games. I tried playing WoW at native resolution and at fair graphics settings the fps was 22 in the starting blood elf area on average.

If i dropped the settings to low and minimum and the fps went up. If you are wanting to game on the 2015 13" rmbp, you should be aware that the iris pro 6100 is still not quite up to par. I would suggest waiting for the refresh of the 15" models.
 

ZBoater

macrumors G3
Jul 2, 2007
8,498
1,325
Sunny Florida
Im confused. Your post title says "games", but in your post you only mention WoW. So is it WoW only that doesn't play nice with the rMBP or is it games in general?
 

steveyo

macrumors regular
Feb 2, 2015
105
3
you bought the wrong laptop if your primary focus was for playing video games.

The upcoming macbook pro 15" will likely not be very good at gaming either
 

KenAFSPC

macrumors 6502a
Sep 12, 2012
633
46
The Intel Iris Graphics 6100 in the 2015 13" rMBP is poorly suited for 3D games at higher resolutions. The 13" rMBP is not a laptop you buy to play games.

Intel's next-generation Skylake CPUs, which should ship late this year or early next-year in volume (and ship in all rMBPs by mid-2016), will be Intel's first mobile processors that provide acceptable performance for high-resolution gaming. Skylake-based products will deliver up to 4 times the gaming (3D) performance of the Intel Iris Graphics 6100 in the 2015 13" rMBP.
 

nanogirl21

macrumors 6502a
Sep 20, 2011
758
92
Midwest United States
I have the $1399 model and while it is great for using fcpx and other productivity tasks, it is pretty bad at games. I tried playing WoW at native resolution and at fair graphics settings the fps was 22 in the starting blood elf area on average.

If i dropped the settings to low and minimum and the fps went up. If you are wanting to game on the 2015 13" rmbp, you should be aware that the iris pro 6100 is still not quite up to par. I would suggest waiting for the refresh of the 15" models.

I play a MMORPG game called Second Life. It runs perfectly on a 2014 13" rMBP. My graphics are set to medium and looks very nice. I usually have iTunes and several Firefox windows open when I am playing. I can have the graphics turned all the way up and still not have any issues. The loading/rezzing time is super fast and I have zero feedback/lag. I can have physics, shadows, and terrain turned on without any issues either. On my Windows device this isn't even possible. Heck, I had to turn graphics down the low and then manually turn off features that's included in the low setting just for things to not be gray and choppy. The new graphic card in the new 13" is supposed to be better than the previous one. I have 8 GB ram (thinking of upping to 16 GB but I don't 100% think it is necessary). My laptop isn't primarily for MMORPG games, but it works just fine when I do want to play. Maybe you should reevaluate what is important to you and see if Apple computers are your best option for gaming if that is your primary focus.
 

tylerwatt12

macrumors regular
Jan 9, 2013
115
18
I have the $1399 model and while it is great for using fcpx and other productivity tasks, it is pretty bad at games. I tried playing WoW at native resolution and at fair graphics settings the fps was 22 in the starting blood elf area on average.

If i dropped the settings to low and minimum and the fps went up. If you are wanting to game on the 2015 13" rmbp, you should be aware that the iris pro 6100 is still not quite up to par. I would suggest waiting for the refresh of the 15" models.

Was this in windows or OS X? Either way, turn off scaling, and run a lower resolution, and you should get much better frame rates

In windows, make it 100% scaling, and run it at 1280x800 or 1440x900

Or run retinaDisplayMenu and set it to 1280x800 or 1440x900 (non HiDPI)

Only the fastest desktop cards can run games at native 2560x1600
 

azure247

macrumors 6502
Sep 9, 2008
255
25
Never understood the thrill of playing games on a laptop.

But the problem is you are trying to play games at retina resolution.

Lower the res will solve your problem. Try 1920x1080
 

Freyqq

macrumors 601
Dec 13, 2004
4,038
181
Your problem is gaming at native resolution. Never game at native resolution on a retina display. That goes for any laptop, even the 15" version with the GPU. Drop it down to 1440x900, and it'll run great.
 

taelan28

macrumors regular
Jan 15, 2014
130
6
I tried Bioshock at max settings and it was chopperific at 5-10fps. I play LOL on occasion. It can handle max settings at native rez at 30fps quite well. I drop it down to 1050p or something like that and low graphics settings and I get a solid 60fps. They've changed LoL over time to be less graphically intensive, yet artistically better. Just slash the settings. A Retina resolution is NOT the resolution a laptop, or any modest PC should be playing.

*Edit* Oh yea. Those modest LoL settings keeps the heat down and the fan lower. I've played TF2 at mid settings and I thought my Macbook was going to take off. It caused so much heat on my lets I started sweating and it actually caused some amount of burning pain.
 

geoelectric

macrumors 6502
May 19, 2008
376
66
The Intel Iris Graphics 6100 in the 2015 13" rMBP is poorly suited for 3D games at higher resolutions. The 13" rMBP is not a laptop you buy to play games.

Intel's next-generation Skylake CPUs, which should ship late this year or early next-year in volume (and ship in all rMBPs by mid-2016), will be Intel's first mobile processors that provide acceptable performance for high-resolution gaming. Skylake-based products will deliver up to 4 times the gaming (3D) performance of the Intel Iris Graphics 6100 in the 2015 13" rMBP.

What's the basis for the 4x estimate?

I'm looking at architectural specs, such as here and elsewhere:

http://wccftech.com/intel-skylake-p...features-72-execution-units-128-mb-edram-llc/

http://www.kitguru.net/components/c...ions-of-intel-skylakes-graphics-cores-emerge/

Note that the gt4e is only for the quad cores. The dual cores have a gt3e. gt3e without onboard RAM == Intel Iris 6100. gt3e with onboard RAM == Intel Iris Pro 5200.

In other words, it looks an awful lot like the GPU is going to be the same or very similar for the rMBP 13", unless you think they're going to bump up to the same integrated GPU+RAM as the current rMBP 15".
 

KenAFSPC

macrumors 6502a
Sep 12, 2012
633
46
What's the basis for the 4x estimate?
I was thinking the Iris 6100 had 24 EUs and I was accounting for the jump to 72 EUs plus architectural improvements, eDRAM, higher clock speeds, and superior memory bandwidth (DDR4).

The 45W SKL-H quad-core configuration for mobile is available with GT4e and DDR4. If the next-generation 13" rMBP ships with SKL-U, and those SKUs are correct, and there's no GT4e or DDR4, then we'll be lucky to get a 25% improvement.
 
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magbarn

macrumors 68030
Oct 25, 2008
2,995
2,365
If you haven't done so already set up bootcamp as Wow usually runs quite a bit faster in windows vs osx. Detail settings are also important along with resolution. Put it this way, it takes around 150-200+ watts for a high end desktop card like a geforce 970 or an AMD 290x to drive the resolution of the rMBP let alone an integrated GPU with a measly 28 watt power budget. Another big restriction is the piss poor memory bandwidth of DDR3/4 that an integrated GPU like the Iris 6100 vs GDDR5 found on high end desktop graphics cards. I call shens on Intel's claims (if what the poster above said is true) that Skylake GPU is going to be 4x faster.

In short, get a Xbox one or PS4 or a dedicated gaming laptop/desktop if you want to game.

I play games on my MBA just fine. The rez advice is good. Playing games on a MacBook is just fine. Most of them anyway.

I say the minority of modern 2014/2015 games at low 720p resolution with the majority of quality settings turned down. The Iris GPU is fine for playing graphical easy games that are 3 years old plus. Try a recent game like Shadow of Mordor, Battlefield 4, and Dragon Age Inquisition with decent settings/resolution (>720p) on a 6100 and enjoy the 15 fps slide show.
 
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inhalexhale1

macrumors 65816
Jul 17, 2011
1,101
745
PA
Why would you buy a Mac for games?

That's not the right question or attitude. Macs can be fine for casual gaming, at decent settings.

The better question is why would you buy THAT Mac for gaming at such high resolutions.

OP you're best bet is getting the low end 15" pro and using an external GPU via thunderbolt for games. Of course, that is if you HAVE to use a MacBook but want great gaming performance at home. You could also buy the one with a dedicated GPU, but still don't expect native resolution and max settings.

A much cheaper option is a maxed 27" iMac. Non-retina, otherwise you'll complain when you can't game at 5k on ultra #
 

sebott

macrumors newbie
Mar 16, 2015
3
0
Poland
Wanted to create a new thread, but I will use this one: anyone tried Dota 2 on 2015 Macbook Pro? It's the only game I play and I'd like to know how MBPr 13 handles it (under OSX).
 

magicMac

macrumors 65816
Apr 13, 2010
1,012
427
UK
the problem is that the games are too demanding for the graphics they produce. If they were wrote more efficiently...
 

Barna Biro

macrumors 6502a
Sep 25, 2011
653
33
Zug, Switzerland
In case you're not planning on playing games on the go then take a look at: http://www.villageinstruments.com/tiki-index.php?page=ViDock I've been using ViDock for the past 1.5 years and it's really decent. I have a GTX 760 in the case ( connected to my late 2012 13" rMBP ) and I can run all the games I play on very high / extreme settings with more than decent FPS ( I also used to play some WoW, D3, SC2, Dota 2, Heroes of the Storm, Battlefield 4, etc. ).

That being said, it of course has some cons too: you can't really carry it around and you'll also need a Thunderbolt adapter so that you can hook it up to your notebook; you'll not get 100% GPU power / performance due to how the entire setup works, but it sure beats the integrated GPU; the entire setup could get on the expensive side ( except if you already own a decent GPU that you can shove into the ViDock; I can understand that many people wouldn't want to spend another nice amount of money on 3rd party hardware so that they can run some games decently on a not so cheap notebook ); starting it up properly can be tricky at first, but you'll get used to it ( in essence - at least in my case - i need to plug the adapter in right after I choose the OS to boot into and the screen goes black - NOTE: I've only really used it under bootcamp, Windows 7 / 8.1; not sure about OSX to be honest, but I'd anyway only run games under Windows because OSX versions are rarely well-optimized ); if your Thunderbolt port is kinda loose, then small movements could disconnect the eGPU from the notebook... this will usually result into a system crash and you'll have to restart ( performing the same actions as at the very first boot - otherwise you'd end up running the integrated GPU after the restart ).

PS: WoW saw quite a non-trivial update with the most recent expansion; I'm especially referring to the higher definition graphics that were added, this also implies that the system requirements for the game have been upped quite a bit... because of the increased rendering requirements, the most recent version of the game is no longer very playable / pleasant on systems that don't have a decent / dedicated GPU ( not saying the 6100 isn't "decent", but we can all agree that it wasn't designed for gaming ).

It would make life much easier if Intel would allow manufacturers to market stuff like this: https://www.change.org/p/intel-allo...-allow-the-sale-of-affordable-egpu-enclosures but who knows when will this happen ( if ever )...

SilverStone%20(13).jpg


I was initially hoping to get the T004 Silverstone but then it became clear that I might need to wait until the end of time... that's when I decided to give ViDock a shot and also because I didn't feel like going for a "do it yourself" eGPU solution - buying all the individual components from N sources and putting the entire thing together from scratch.
 
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geoelectric

macrumors 6502
May 19, 2008
376
66
Actually, WoW's system requirements didn't really go up. They optimized the engine when they bumped the quality. Any given quality setting takes around the same power but looks a fair bit better.
 

leman

macrumors Core
Oct 14, 2008
19,497
19,632
I tried playing WoW at native resolution and at fair graphics settings the fps was 22 in the starting blood elf area on average.

Your demands are very unrealistic. You can't expect retina Macs to be competent gaming machines at their native resolutions. But I am actually really impressed that 6100 can do 22 fps @WoW at native resolution! It means that it should manage close to 60fps at 1280x800 (resolution you are supposed to be using). This is an incredible progress in integrated GPUs.
 

danistyping

macrumors regular
Dec 8, 2009
181
100
Boston, MA
I'm happy with it so far...obviously not running most games at a ridiculous 2560 x 1600....that is way too many pixels for an integrated card to push. You will get great clarity at a lower setting.

Sim City - 1080p, all settings medium, AA off, super smooth

Diablo 3 - 1080p, settings med/hi, aa off, only slight lags when the screen is loaded with enemies
 

tusctodd

macrumors member
Dec 22, 2009
35
2
I have the $1399 model and while it is great for using fcpx and other productivity tasks, it is pretty bad at games. I tried playing WoW at native resolution and at fair graphics settings the fps was 22 in the starting blood elf area on average.

If i dropped the settings to low and minimum and the fps went up. If you are wanting to game on the 2015 13" rmbp, you should be aware that the iris pro 6100 is still not quite up to par. I would suggest waiting for the refresh of the 15" models.

Hook it up to an external video card via the thunderbolt2 port and it can run almost ALL games at native resolution, max video settings and 60fps.
 

linkgx1

macrumors 68000
Oct 12, 2011
1,771
460
That's not the right question or attitude. Macs can be fine for casual gaming, at decent settings.

The better question is why would you buy THAT Mac for gaming at such high resolutions.

OP you're best bet is getting the low end 15" pro and using an external GPU via thunderbolt for games. Of course, that is if you HAVE to use a MacBook but want great gaming performance at home. You could also buy the one with a dedicated GPU, but still don't expect native resolution and max settings.

A much cheaper option is a maxed 27" iMac. Non-retina, otherwise you'll complain when you can't game at 5k on ultra #

How is that not the right question or attitude? Because someone tells the truth about gaming on Macs?

Gaming on a Mac is like buying a Windows phone and expecting to have a great app experience compared to the iPhone.

At the end of the day, Macs have their expertise and it's not games. A Windows device is FAR superior as a gaming machine. Even then, laptops are sketchy choices for games anyways. Casual games maybe, but getting past that gets really expensive fast.
 
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