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How many of you have a separate gaming rig?

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Since around 2006 I have been gaming strictly on MBP's. I do so because I find that they can typically handle any game out at around the same with little trouble. And I don't mind playing the most demanding games at medium settings when I have to. I like to have one computer for all of my needs and portability.

On that note, how many of you have a mac that you may do some gaming on when you need to but have also built or bought your own gaming PC's?

Why or why not?
 
Me! Except it's my main computer right now. I'll buy a MBP when I can afford it, but currently borrow the 'household' MBP when I need it.

I have an '06 iMac, but don't use it.
 
ozreth said:
Do you find yourself always using your gaming rig and leaving your MBP in the dust (other than when you leave the house obviously)?
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It's the exact opposite, unless i'm in a real big gaming mood i'll stay on my mbp.
 
i've got the june 09 mbp with 512mb 9600gt card. i've been disappointed by its graphic power and have started building a rig. so far i have a case, PSU, and mobo. next up is the i7 930. i love my mac, and i've been using macs since i was a wee lad on my dad's quadra 900. they just don't game as well as i would like
 
Not yet - maybe...

When I was running my own one-man graphic design & illustration business I had to buy a new mac every 2-3 years anyway for Adobe CS performance and tax reasons. Of course they could handle my gaming needs too for that amount of time. I was never able to afford a Mac Pro though, since I always needed a laptop for client meetings and working at various agencies.

Right now I use my '08 15" mbp for gaming in Windows 7 under bootcamp, my '07 iMac is only for occasional Mac games since its ati 2600 hd gfx card is weaker than the mbps 8600m gt.

I have been employed now for almost half a year though, because I got a good offer for a job that I really enjoy. Obviously my macs don't get too much design usage anymore but more gaming usage in the evenings/weekends to relax. I'm currently thinking about giving the iMac to my girlfriend and getting a gaming pc. The combination gaming pc & mbp seems ideal now for me. I want to wait until the mac pro update though, I know I don't need one but like I said I have always wanted one, and now that I can afford it I could make that dream come true. Guess I need to see the update before I can decide if it's worth it to me.
 
chaosbunny said:
Not yet - maybe...

When I was running my own one-man graphic design & illustration business I had to buy a new mac every 2-3 years anyway for Adobe CS performance and tax reasons. Of course they could handle my gaming needs too for that amount of time. I was never able to afford a Mac Pro though, since I always needed a laptop for client meetings and working at various agencies.

Right now I use my '08 15" mbp for gaming in Windows 7 under bootcamp, my '07 iMac is only for occasional Mac games since its ati 2600 hd gfx card is weaker than the mbps 8600m gt.

I have been employed now for almost half a year though, because I got a good offer for a job that I really enjoy. Obviously my macs don't get too much design usage anymore but more gaming usage in the evenings/weekends to relax. I'm currently thinking about giving the iMac to my girlfriend and getting a gaming pc. The combination gaming pc & mbp seems ideal now for me. I want to wait until the mac pro update though, I know I don't need one but like I said I have always wanted one, and now that I can afford it I could make that dream come true. Guess I need to see the update before I can decide if it's worth it to me.
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Definitely sounds ideal. Although I was under the impression that even on Mac Pros you cannot change the processors and only a select few GPU's will work in them. If this is true and you plan to go the desktop and mbp duo then wouldnt it still be a better idea to maybe build your own PC for gaming?
 
ozreth said:
Definitely sounds ideal. Although I was under the impression that even on Mac Pros you cannot change the processors and only a select few GPU's will work in them. If this is true and you plan to go the desktop and mbp duo then wouldnt it still be a better idea to maybe build your own PC for gaming?
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Thanks for the voice of reason. 🙂

I think with a (higher end) single core Mac Pro I would be set processor wise for quite some time, and as far as I know you can put any gpu in a Mac Pro, but only use it in Windows if its not a Mac OS compatible card. I'd still use Mac OS on it of course, for design, video and 3D fun/side projects, but that's most certainly something the mbp can handle. It's kind of a logic vs. emotion thing - I've always wanted a Mac Pro but never could afford it, now I can afford it but somehow don't really need it anymore. I'll see what the update brings and decide then. The good thing is, I'm in no hurry.
 
I don't have a separate computer for gaming (I wish I did) at the moment but maybe in the future I'll have an iMac or something for gaming (I'm not much of a gamer, but I wish I was. I love games).
 
Once upon a time I had my 8500GT PC for gaming, but now even my imac can beat that. I plan on grabbing a gaming rig in the future but my interest for games seemed to have weaned of late, I hardly even play ps3 anymore! 😱
 
I was thinking about it for awhile, but after I got the new MBP I really can't care.
The only games I play atm is WoW, Torchlight and DiRT1 and they all run pretty good on the new MBP.
 
Only my DSi and my Macbook late 08 (soon to be 2010 pro). I sold my 360 Elite as I just don't have the time / interest for all the latest releases.

Between Torchlight, the Valve games, Civ 4, SC2, and then Diablo 3 (and maybe some WoW again in due course) I am more than catered for.
 
I have been a Mac user since 1988 and in Oct. 2007 I bought a Sager NP9261 top line gaming laptop (?? at 15 lbs ??) in order to play PC games. It had a Core™ 2 Extreme Processor X6800 @ 2.93GHz, 4Mb RAM, Nvidia GeForce GO 7950 GTX MXM IV Graphics with 512MB, and Win Vista. The video card expired around Dec. 2009 just after the extended warranty ran out.

In the spring of 2008 I bought a MBP 2.6 GHz, 4Mb RAM, in order to use BootCamp (Win Vista) for PC games also. It seemed to play about the same as the Sager.

This past April I bought an i7 MBP 2.67, 4Mb RAM to replace the Sager and with BootCamp (Win 7) is by far the best yet.

Here are the results of the Windows Performance index for comparison.

Sager 9261 5.2

MBP 2008 5.1

MBP 2010 5.9

I do all my non game computing in Mac OSX and use the BootCamp partitions only for PC games, the best of both worlds.
 
Absolutely.

I am in the process of completely building a new one from scratch to get back to current.

(Unemployment/ near homelessness makes it hard to stay current. Or to game at all)

The case, psu and video card are on the way right now. I'm going to put that together with an old CeleronD board for proof of concept stuff with the video card. Next chunk will be the board, processor and memory. Then I'll buy the SSD+Win7.

So within 60 days, I hope to have:

Core i7 980
12 GB Memory
Rampage III Extreme system board
CoolerMaster HAF X Chassis
CoolerMaster 1200 W PSU
5970 Video card to drive three LCDs as I've wanted to do WIDEscreen gaming for years.
Haven't decided on the SSD yet, leaning OCZ at the moment. Until a decent RAID card comes out that handles TRIM, I'll stick with one drive.

I use my Mini for all of my daily driving, listening to music, email, browsing, blowing cash on PC components, etc.

The gaming rig will be lit up for specific purposes such as blowing weekends when the weather is completely unmanageable. 😀 Once it's up and running, I can get back into playing with the guys I used to work with.

All of my files are on the Linux server I built, so I can afford to have minimal local storage in both systems. However, I am toying with throwing a couple TB in the gamer to be an initial backup of my file server in case of a catastrophic failure. I'm paring down the old crap that I've saved so that my offsite backups will be quicker and easier to maintain.
 
It's not exactly separate, but I built a hackintosh and also dual-boot Windows to play most of my games under. My other machine is a 2006 MacBook that I use for surfing, writing, and anything else I need when I'm booted into Windows on the desktop.
 
Negative. Had a few back in the day but I just don't have enough room anymore for it since I got to college. I just use my MB/MBP for all my gaming nowadays. MBP performs much better than expected. I play CSS on everything low anyways (used to it since I played competitively a while back). The only games I care about graphics wise would be SC2 and TF2 since they just look so good.

MBP is fine for running Valve games and Torchlight (wayyyy too addicting)
 
It's possible to be a gamer on a mac?😱

I've got a tri-core rig with a 4550 in it. It's not the best at gaming, but it's about as loud as a mac mini, with blu-ray, and about 1/2 the price.
 
Nope. I've got an assortment of consoles (ps3, wii, x360, ps2, psp, dsixl, snes, nes, genesis, dreamcast, saturn, tg-16), so I really don't need a separate PC gaming rig, even though I'd like one.

My computer gaming is strictly covered by Blizzard (WoW atm) and my new iMac covers that nicely.
 
I tried getting the best of both worlds (portability and decent gaming) with a Macbook Air, then a Macbook Pro. Neither could satisfy me in terms of aesthetics and game performance. I found the perfect notebook that has continued to meet my needs in all areas- see my sig.🙂
 
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