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Gaming on a MacBook Air: Your game

C

Chillaz

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Nov 2, 2010
29
0
I remember when I was buying the MBA 2011, I was a little curious if it could play some of the games I play once in a while, however when I got it today and installed everything, and played League Of Legends on it. I was very pleased with the result, it runs perfectly on medium - high settings, just unbox the vertical sync as that's pointless anyway.

I was thinking if we could make a thread where people would post what games their MBA could run on what settings, as this could give other people a pretty good idea of what it's capable of.

League of Legends:
Runs smooth on medium-high settings, keep shadow quality down.
(Yes, you can play LoL on a Mac)
 
Good to know! Do you have any other games you could try out as well? Looking at games like Dragon Age I & II, Civ IV & V, Two Worlds II, Splinter Cell, etc. Everyone seems to be testing out WoW and CoD, which is fine, but it would be nice to see some other games being tested as well. Thanks!
 
As a MBA 2010 owner (maxed out 13"), I'd love to know how something like PaultheTall's port of NBA2k11 runs. At present, I get a "solid" mid-20s fps with all superfluous stuff off, everything set to low except player detail, which is at medium. Playable, but not fabulous.
 
The games i see people speculate about almost exclusively are wow and sc2 :-/
Id really like to know how tf2 runs though
 
I've got a 13" i7 256 and I've only played a couple games but here's what I've got so far.

OSX (Lion):
Red Alert 3 Uprising (Native resolution) - fine on medium, unplayable on high

Windows 7 (Professional):
Civ V (Native resolution) - played on medium, but I haven't finished a game to know how it handles refreshing the entire map
 
heat & noise

Hi Pdbender,
i'm very tempted to upgrade, but for the final decision i'm looking for additional information.
How are the heat and noise levels while gaming? I understood you have the fastest macbook air with the i7.
ty
regards
 
holterzoff said:
Hi Pdbender,
i'm very tempted to upgrade, but for the final decision i'm looking for additional information.
How are the heat and noise levels while gaming? I understood you have the fastest macbook air with the i7.
ty
regards
Click to expand...

Well, the fans spun up all the way, I'm not sure how to check their RPM or the temperature on a Mac (this is my first one) but I can say that I don't like like having it on my lap for too long. That being said, it's nothing compared to my brother's Dell Precision M4500. The fans aren't too noisy though, I like playing with music in the background, and when I have the sound level at 3-4 dots I can't hear them.

As a side note, it sounds the same when I'm playing Netflix as when I'm gaming.

Hope that's helpful, if there's anything else let me know.
 
XX55XX said:
That looks awful. Especially considering that multiplayer stresses the hardware even more. Guess I'll need something else for a mobile BF3-oriented machine.
Click to expand...

oh definitely. remember the air has the integrated graphics. It will take quite a few years to get near the standard needed for BF3. If youre looking to play the latest games, you really need a 15" pro at least
 
i play heroes of might and magic 3 with the help of wineskin.

that game will never get old
 
Matthew9559 said:
Has anyone tried Torchlight?
Click to expand...

Tried Torchlight on my 11" Core i7 w/4GB and it runs extremely well at native resolution on high details. I am very impressed with how smooth it runs and overall I am impressed with the gaming performance on the new MBA considering it is an Intel HD 3000.

Update: Just tested out Deathspank, and it doesn't run 100% smooth all the time, but it's very playable. There is no way to change the detail settings from what I can see, so the best way to improve performance is to disable VSYNC and lower the resolution a bit.
 
Last edited:
under windows 7 x64 home premium, I've ran:

Left 4 Dead 2: High with a few things on medium

Starcraft 2: Medium in multiplayer (tried 1v1 and 4v4)

CSS: High settings

Crysis Warhead: Mostly medium

All games played fluently @ native resolution

Only had my MBA for a day, so I'll have more coming soon! I love this little machine.

Edit: forgot to mention that I bought the 2010 version. Intel 3000 can suck it.
 
Last edited:
Chillaz said:
I remember when I was buying the MBA 2011, I was a little curious if it could play some of the games I play once in a while, however when I got it today and installed everything, and played League Of Legends on it. I was very pleased with the result, it runs perfectly on medium - high settings, just unbox the vertical sync as that's pointless anyway.

I was thinking if we could make a thread where people would post what games their MBA could run on what settings, as this could give other people a pretty good idea of what it's capable of.

League of Legends:
Runs smooth on medium-high settings, keep shadow quality down.
(Yes, you can play LoL on a Mac)
Click to expand...

Can you tell me how much FPS do you get in-outside of fights with : all settings max and shadows on low or none?
And which model (11"/13", cpu ram etc) do you have?
 
ovrlrd said:
Tried Torchlight on my 11" Core i7 w/4GB and it runs extremely well at native resolution on high details. I am very impressed with how smooth it runs and overall I am impressed with the gaming performance on the new MBA considering it is an Intel HD 3000.

Update: Just tested out Deathspank, and it doesn't run 100% smooth all the time, but it's very playable. There is no way to change the detail settings from what I can see, so the best way to improve performance is to disable VSYNC and lower the resolution a bit.
Click to expand...

Glad to hear. Thanks!
 
Pdbender said:
Well, the fans spun up all the way, I'm not sure how to check their RPM or the temperature on a Mac (this is my first one) but I can say that I don't like like having it on my lap for too long. That being said, it's nothing compared to my brother's Dell Precision M4500. The fans aren't too noisy though, I like playing with music in the background, and when I have the sound level at 3-4 dots I can't hear them.

As a side note, it sounds the same when I'm playing Netflix as when I'm gaming.

Hope that's helpful, if there's anything else let me know.
Click to expand...
Google "iStat Nano Apple" and that should provide a link to the iStat Nano widget on the Downloads section of Apple's site. It provides temperatures, fan speeds, and other tidbits of info. It's free, too.
 
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