iMac G4 (USB 2.0, 1.25GHz) playing WoW

[tayloralmond]

A friend of mine is an avid WoW fan and tells me there's "just no way" that I could play WoW on my old iMac G4. I'm hoping to prove him wrong. I've already read that the latest expansion pack "requires" a G5 processor. Is this actually a "requirement" or is it just a recommendation? To save you time, here's my stats on the iMac:

iMac G4 17" (running 10.5.8)
1.25GHz
2GB of RAM
500GB 7200RPM HDD
nVidia GeForce FX5200 Ultra (64MB DDR)
Superdrive
USB 2.0

My old iMac is about as maxed out as it can be (for its age). I'm sure I'll have to turn down the graphics quite a bit, but I think it'll work. Does anyone have any experience with this machine and WoW? Any FPS stats? Thanks for the help everyone.

 

[MacHamster68]

if its a requirement then its a requirement usually , but older WOW's will work
its just with everything nowadays they just cant be bothered to develop things that will run on older hardware , but you can always try maybe with lower settings

 

[zen.state]

I have heard of people running WoW on even slower systems. One friend I have used to play on a Digital Audio tower with a G4 1.2 upgrade. Think about 1GB RAM. He plays on a dual 1.25 MDD now but got by okay with the other mac.

As mentioned above just lower settings like colour depth and resolution.

 

[drewdle]

A friend of mine is an avid WoW fan and tells me there's "just no way" that I could play WoW on my old iMac G4. I'm hoping to prove him wrong. I've already read that the latest expansion pack "requires" a G5 processor. Is this actually a "requirement" or is it just a recommendation? To save you time, here's my stats on the iMac:

iMac G4 17" (running 10.5.8)
1.25GHz
2GB of RAM
500GB 7200RPM HDD
nVidia GeForce FX5200 Ultra (64MB DDR)
Superdrive
USB 2.0

My old iMac is about as maxed out as it can be (for its age). I'm sure I'll have to turn down the graphics quite a bit, but I think it'll work. Does anyone have any experience with this machine and WoW? Any FPS stats? Thanks for the help everyone.

I've seen WOW played on a Mini G4 (1.42Ghz) with 32Mb graphics memory and 512Mb of system memory, so I'm sure that given your RAM and graphics chipset you should manage. Maybe stick a fan under it or something? Make sure your thermal paste is up to snuff (you have two thermal joints in your machine, I think).

 

[CubeHacker]

I have the same exact mac, and I've tried WoW on it, just for fun.

Yes it runs, but no it doesn't run all that well. You can run at native resolution, but most options will be turned down, especially view distance set to minimum. I can take a screenshot of my options menu if you are curious. Running around in most old world zones with little to no other players around nets a framerate of 15-20fps. Most newer zones will run worse than that. And you can forget about raiding

But yes, it is playable for some casual leveling.

 

[applefan1997]

My family used to run it on an 800MHz iMac G4. It didn't seem all that fast, but it wa suseable.