Gaming performance on iMac 5k?

[tillsbury]

Bootcamp is fine if you want ultimate FPS, but it's a pain in the neck rebooting regularly. It depends on what you call "casual gaming". I play a fair number of games, although they're usually the less up-to-the-minute ones and not so graphically intensive. Half-life 2, Portal, Civ 5, AOE HD, Doom 3, Minecraft, and that sort of thing play perfectly smoothly in 5k on OSX (the AOE HD is in a parallels window running Windows 10, and so can't run higher than 4k but can do that in a window).

Once you've run games in 5k, though, you will be spoilt for lower resolutions...

 

[sharon22]

Running bootcamp for gaming doesn't fill...What other options are around...VMWare Fusion or Parallels...

I was disappointed last week when I went into the Apple store -- they had the Mac Pro Garbage Can running Parallels, so I played around with Windows, and just playing around was slow -- just opening a browser window was jerky. I can't imagine it being any good for gaming. But, I could be wrong... maybe it wasn't configured correctly.

 

[vir3l]

bootcamp is the way to go with games on mac. also, with full ssd rebooting and starting takes only a couple of seconds.

 

[yjchua95]

I was disappointed last week when I went into the Apple store -- they had the Mac Pro Garbage Can running Parallels, so I played around with Windows, and just playing around was slow -- just opening a browser window was jerky. I can't imagine it being any good for gaming. But, I could be wrong... maybe it wasn't configured correctly.

Well what did you expect, it's Parallels!

If you want a native performance, Boot Camp is always the way to go.

 

[Coufu]

Base riMac here. Boot camp Dota2 runs at a steady 60fps at 1440p, even in large team fights with lots of spells being thrown around.

5k it runs around 30-40fps while watching other games, but I didn't test it in a game because 1440p looks great anyway.

Also to the poster complaining about gaming in parallels, games always run horribly in parallels.

 

[Shivetya]

Really? Unbearable? You must not have used any really noisy PCs. For me it just swoosh of air. I don't play games, but if I run a Handbrake conversion, I put some music on and I can barely hear the fan. It's certainly not silent, but I sure wouldn't characterize it as being loud.

most "noisy" PCs can be hidden under the desk to minimize the noise.

 

[vir3l]

Base riMac here. Boot camp Dota2 runs at a steady 60fps at 1440p, even in large team fights with lots of spells being thrown around.

5k it runs around 30-40fps while watching other games, but I didn't test it in a game because 1440p looks great anyway.

Also to the poster complaining about gaming in parallels, games always run horribly in parallels.

have you tried wow in 4k under bootcamp with your base retina? after having returned my high end model I guess gaming performance will be about the same with i5/m290x (maybe 15% less, but still high) without the noise since less power is consumed and therfore less heat.

 

[Rocinante2000]

I just tried Project Cars, Windows 8.1.

R295m
i7
8GB
3TB

G27 Wheel

2560x1440'
Everything on high

58-72 FPS

Thats a little higher that my PC with 2x R270x in crossfire running same resolution on my 2650x1440 Monitor.

I am pretty impressed

 

[imacken]

bootcamp is the way to go with games on mac. also, with full ssd rebooting and starting takes only a couple of seconds.

A couple of seconds.... eh, no!
Anyway it's not the boot time that's the problem with going into Bootcamp, it's leaving the OS X environment and all that goes with it, email, messages, etc. etc.
If you want to be in a gaming vacuum, then yes, Bootcamp is a good option if you really need those extra few fps.

 

[Frozone9]

I just tried Project Cars, Windows 8.1.

R295m
i7
8GB
3TB

G27 Wheel

2560x1440'
Everything on high

58-72 FPS

Thats a little higher that my PC with 2x R270x in crossfire running same resolution on my 2650x1440 Monitor.

I am pretty impressed

I am playing Assetto Corsa on Win 7 and on high i get 58 to 80 fps in a race against 9 AI Cars. In 1080 I get never below 90 Fps. So I could go on ultra in some settings in 1080. But prefer 1440p of curse, but thinking of buying Oculus DK2.

I7, m295x and 24GB RAM

 

[Rocinante2000]

About to test FarCry 4. I will keep you posted

 

[ikaka]

About to test FarCry 4. I will keep you posted

1440p, High settings, runs like butter.
Only when driving fast I can see little stuttering, might be even driver related.

COD:AW 1440p, High -> runs like butter (finished campaign with 0 issues)

I am severely impressed by the graphics performance of the riMac, I certainly did not expect such results.

Please keep in mind R9 200 series was made to run at hot temperatures.
I've played for 2-3 hours at a time and never seen frame rate drop over time.

"The important part to take away from all of this however is that these relationships occur across the entire range of temperatures a product is rated to operate under, and more importantly that all of these factors are taken into consideration in product planning. The 95C maximum operating temperature that most 28nm devices operate under is well understood by engineering teams, along with the impact to longevity, power consumption, and clockspeeds when operating both far from it and near it. In other words, there’s nothing inherently wrong with letting an ASIC go up to 95C so long as it’s appropriately planned for. And this, more than anything else, is what has changed for 290X and Hawaii."

http://www.anandtech.com/show/7457/the-radeon-r9-290x-review/5

 

[bulldogg80]

Witch settings exactly do you people have when playing FC4?
Have you people update to the latest ATI driver that was released today optimised for FC4? I have tried to update no luck it refuse to install the new display driver

 

[ikaka]

Witch settings exactly do you people have when playing FC4?
Have you people update to the latest ATI driver that was released today optimised for FC4? I have tried to update no luck it refuse to install the new display driver

I set it to High. Tried updating driver but it doesn't seem to work, even tried manually.

 

[Astelith]

It seems that WoW with the new expansion on mac have some problems with Shadows, Liquid and Sunshafts and SSAO, if put that on low or even disabling it the framerate will bump up and running even better than older patches.
I'm playing WoW with the Mid 2011 imac with core i7 3.4 24gb ram 512 SSD and 6770M (so the bad GPU) at 1440p at good/high (except the settings above) and I'm constantly over 40fps in PVE.

Can anyone with the i7 and 295x try to put everything but that effects on ultra and try to check the FPS at 5K ?

I'm about to sell my iMac for the 5K with i7 and 295x, and of course, I'm very curious about performance, I do Photo and Video but sometimes also WoW and Diablo.

 

[iczster]

1440p, High settings, runs like butter.
Only when driving fast I can see little stuttering, might be even driver related.

COD:AW 1440p, High -> runs like butter (finished campaign with 0 issues)

I am severely impressed by the graphics performance of the riMac, I certainly did not expect such results.

Please keep in mind R9 200 series was made to run at hot temperatures.
I've played for 2-3 hours at a time and never seen frame rate drop over time.

"The important part to take away from all of this however is that these relationships occur across the entire range of temperatures a product is rated to operate under, and more importantly that all of these factors are taken into consideration in product planning. The 95C maximum operating temperature that most 28nm devices operate under is well understood by engineering teams, along with the impact to longevity, power consumption, and clockspeeds when operating both far from it and near it. In other words, there’s nothing inherently wrong with letting an ASIC go up to 95C so long as it’s appropriately planned for. And this, more than anything else, is what has changed for 290X and Hawaii."

http://www.anandtech.com/show/7457/the-radeon-r9-290x-review/5

Thanks for the feedback, reassuring to know.

 

[bulldogg80]

I set it to High. Tried updating driver but it doesn't seem to work, even tried manually.

I also tried manually, no luck for me ether, If you or someone figured out how to install the new driver I should be more then happy If explaind how to do, People say it gives FC4 a real preformenc boost with the new drivers.

 

[ikaka]

Still no luck, although r9 m295x is listed in the driver.
That's a real shame since I am playing FarCry 4 these days

 

[bulldogg80]

Still no luck, although r9 m295x is listed in the driver.
That's a real shame since I am playing FarCry 4 these days

It must be someway to install the new driver

 

[jbuk1]

most "noisy" PCs can be hidden under the desk to minimize the noise.

You can put 60db where ever you want you're still going to hear it. (Maybe desktop graphics cards are quieter than last time I built a gaming PC in 2007 but I doubt it)

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I set it to High. Tried updating driver but it doesn't seem to work, even tried manually.

Which version of the driver are you guys on about?

My AMD drivers auto updated yesterday night to a new release no problems.

 

[ikaka]

You can put 60db where ever you want you're still going to hear it. (Maybe desktop graphics cards are quieter than last time I built a gaming PC in 2007 but I doubt it)

----------

Which version of the driver are you guys on about?

My AMD drivers auto updated yesterday night to a new release no problems.

Control Center might have auto updated, but check the driver version, it's still 14.20X when it should be 14.30X

 

[bulldogg80]

You can put 60db where ever you want you're still going to hear it. (Maybe desktop graphics cards are quieter than last time I built a gaming PC in 2007 but I doubt it)

----------

Which version of the driver are you guys on about?

My AMD drivers auto updated yesterday night to a new release no problems.

http://support.amd.com/en-us/kb-articles/Pages/AMDCatalyst14-11-2-BetaWINReleaseNotes.aspx


WIN-CAT14.11.2B
​​AMD Catalyst™ 14.11.2 Beta Driver for Windows® - Dragon Age: Inquisition and Far Cry 4!
This release enables peak driver performance optimization for AMD Radeon™ graphics users in Dragon Age: Inquisition and Far Cry 4. Please make sure to uninstall all previous versions of AMD Catalyst™ drivers before installing the AMD Catalyst™​ 14.11.2 Beta.
The AMD Catalyst™ 14.11.2 Beta Driver can be downloaded from the following links:

 

[abluehaze]

So, does no one have any fps numbers to share with us in WoW and D3 while at 2560x1440?

 

[jbuk1]

Control Center might have auto updated, but check the driver version, it's still 14.20X when it should be 14.30X

You're correct.

 

[pizzapappa]

I deleted catalyst to install the beta drivers but now I can't install either the beta or the "normal" driver. Had the same issue when I tried to update the drivers. It downloaded fine and the installation went through but the driver where never installed. Any ideas? Now I'm stuck with the generic display driver.