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Macbook Pro + World of Warcraft?

L

lisharts

macrumors member
Original poster
Aug 3, 2010
64
0
Hi,

I'm ordering a Macbook Pro next week and I'm curious as to which is going to be the best setup. I plan to play World of Warcraft on it (as well as use it for my work). Ideally I'd have liked the 13" because I prefer the smaller size but out of these setups which would be best?

13-inch: 2.4GHz with SSD (would the 2.66GHz make a significant difference?)

or

Baseline 15-inch: 2.4GHz

I don't mind running the game on medium settings, although I'd prefer not to run it on it's lowest. I would be using it for raiding 10 and 25 mans. I'd expect 25fps min in most situations, but would like more.

Is this achievable on the 13"? I just don't want to order one and find I'm disappointed, given the cost.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks. :)
 
the 15" hands down.

The 13" only have an integrated 320m gpu where the 15" has a dedicated 330m gpu. also even the slowest i5 in the 15" is a lot faster than the fastest old core2 in the 13". WoW may seem old but it has pretty rough system requirements when things get packed.
 
If you're going to play the game on OSX, get the 15". If you plan on using bootcamp, the GPU in the 13" is fine for World of Warcraft.
 
i play wow on my 13 mbp with the graphics set really quite high (for what i expected it to be able to run) and runs fine. only times i've had trouble is in dalaran and my fps drops to 20 but most of the time its at 70 (vanillia) 50-60 (tbc).

only prob i find is the chat on the 13 seems large or small....its weird. but if your s casual you shouldnt really have an issue on a 13 and just save the money and get a 22" monitor :)
 
I find that the 13" runs WoW just fine. I just left the setting as is when I first ran the game, since I believe it optimizes the configs towards your computer's specs. I get fairly good DPS, and my brother plays in large raids on it just fine. I only play WoW occasionally, so the 13" is enough for me, but I do find the screen estate kind of cramped at times with all the unit frames and addons.

Basically, if you can afford the 15", get that, if not, the 13" will do.
 
Great advice guys. I've been back and forth on it for a while now, I think I might spend a little more and get the 15". I prefer the size of the 13" but would honestly rather it have a bit more kick.

I might try and make more out of it as a work machine too, as if I'm spending that sort of money I may as well.

Is the high res screen worth the upgrade?
 
lisharts said:
Is the high res screen worth the upgrade?
Click to expand...

I have the high-res screen.

The good points:

- You can fit a lot more on the screen. It's a significant difference.
- Anti-glare coating is beautiful. I could never deal with a glossy display.
- It just looks nicer than the regular display. I love the aluminum border. This is of course personal opinion. :)

The bad point:

- Without scaling, many UI elements, fonts, and so on will be smaller by default. If your eyes aren't that good, you may find this annoying. In many apps you can bump the font size up but in some situations it's not as feasible.

I for one love mine, but you have to take that issue into account. To give you an idea, the screen dimensions (1680x1050) of my 15" high res MBP are the same as the older white 20" iMac also on my desk at work. That makes for much smaller pixels!
 
Well, school just started and I bought my MBP for college. I got the High-res screen. I personally love it. I like that I can have to windows open at the same time. I will be doing research on safari on the left, and typing my paper in pages on the right side of the screen. It is so useful.

I got the glossy display because I don't use my Mac outside and would rather have richer colors. Like someone else said, the text is smaller, so if you are really worried about that you should check it out at an Apple store. I don't mind it though.

You shouldn't have trouble with WoW on the 15". I don't play, but I can run StarCraft 2 on mostly high with the new graphics update just fine.
 
15" for sure. Don't bother with the 13".

I raid weekly 25 man ICC on my 15" MBP and it runs ~30fps during raids very well at medium-high detail.

The only complaint I have is that it is a little slow when fist logging into Dalaran compared to my old Mac Pro. I suspect this is due to the slower hard disk in the notebook. It may improve slightly with a 7200rpm drive.
 
Thanks. I'm not a fan of windows really, and don't have a copy to install even if I was. :) So it would be under osx for sure.

I'm sort of tempted by the SSD, but I feel myself making this more and more expensive by the second lol.
 
The SSD will be beautiful... if you ever make use of it. Really, if you don't close programs, the speed increase it gives you doesn't make any difference. And adding $400 to the cost of the mac so toons appear more quickly in dalaran isn't the best idea if you're trying to save money.
 
thejadedmonkey said:
The SSD will be beautiful... if you ever make use of it. Really, if you don't close programs, the speed increase it gives you doesn't make any difference. And adding $400 to the cost of the mac so toons appear more quickly in dalaran isn't the best idea if you're trying to save money.
Click to expand...

Well the only way I could justify it is if I delay ordering my imac and hook up this mbp to my monior for the month so I can work from it. I'm keen to get a laptop because I really want to be able to work and game on the go. Also I'd like to move around the house more when working. I've had a bit of a stressy month and I just think the freedom would be great.

My biggest fear is ordering one and being disappointed in the performance, which is silly I guess as I have a feeling I will love it regardless.
 
You all say if you're going to play the game in OSX its terrible...
But with the latest graphics update, OSX has been measured at having better fps, etc then windows Direct X :rolleyes:
 
Macsavvytech said:
You all say if you're going to play the game in OSX its terrible...
But with the latest graphics update, OSX has been measured at having better fps, etc then windows Direct X :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

You're going to have to provide proof for that statement. Using the exact same settings in both OSs, Starcraft 2 and Team Fortress 2 (only games I've bothered testing) still run miles better in Win 7 over OS X on my MBP. Also, what exactly do you mean by "etc" ?
 
Macsavvytech said:
You all say if you're going to play the game in OSX its terrible...
But with the latest graphics update, OSX has been measured at having better fps, etc then windows Direct X :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Stop spreading ridiculous misinformation. This is an outright lie and makes you look really foolish.
 
Does anyone with the baseline 15" raid? If so would you be able to tell me what settings you use to raid and roughly how many fps you get in ICC 10 man?

I was looking at the 15" with the SSD but if I start spending that I might as well get the i7, which would just be too much. :(

Will the baseline 15" be ok with illustrator, photoshop, flash and most importantly indesign?
 
I have the 15" but i7, high rez and 8g ram with ssd and everything cranked up.

No slowdown in raids what so ever. Need to test Cataclysm beta (which i have on imac) to see if there is slowdowns but overall an amazing machine.
 
Sounds good, I'll have to settle for slightly less but from what I'm reading here it seems like I will be able to play WoW fairly well on the i5 so that's great.

I got the beta too, sadly my old mac is all but dead so I've been forced to load it up on an old PC which is just really awful. Looking forward to testing it on my MBP next weekend! :)
 
mikeo007 said:
Stop spreading ridiculous misinformation. This is an outright lie and makes you look really foolish.
Click to expand...
actually im slightly wrong...
Bu Ahhh t! i do get better performance of games on Mac OSX.
There is a new standard of Open GL however that when adopted by apple will provide better graphics then Windows Direct X
I was slightly tired when i wrote my previous post
 
Macsavvytech said:
actually im slightly wrong...
Bu Ahhh t! i do get better performance of games on Mac OSX.
There is a new standard of Open GL however that when adopted by apple will provide better graphics then Windows Direct X
I was slightly tired when i wrote my previous post
Click to expand...

and when are you suggesting this might become available? :)
 
Macsavvytech said:
i do get better performance of games on Mac OSX.
Click to expand...

I find that very hard to believe.


Macsavvytech said:
There is a new standard of Open GL however that when adopted by apple will provide better graphics then Windows Direct X
Click to expand...
Only if developers take extreme advantage of it, which if history is to give us insight, will never really happen on OS X. OpenGL 4.1 (which I believe is what you're referring to) was also a tad disappointing to developers and is still catching up to DX11.
 
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