MBA 13" Mid 2011 graphics issue

[MacbookAlex]

Hi all,

When gaming (American Truck Simulator) i get this problem:
The roads and some other things disappear.

It does this randomly, sometimes gameplay is fine and this doesn't happen. Though, at night in the game, it gets worse and the whole scenery flickers and distorts.

I realise that the specs of my mac are not quite up to the game's minimum required but have played this game fine on older macs under minimum requirement without this problem. Anyone know what could be causing this problem? am going to be away for two months soon and i really don't want to have to take my MBP along extra just to play games lol. And more importantly, is a damaged component inside my mac causing this? or is it just that this mac isn't up to it although some days there will not be this problem?

Thanks all,

Alex

 

[A_morl282]

Hi all,

When gaming (American Truck Simulator) i get this problem:
The roads and some other things disappear.
View attachment 706790

It does this randomly, sometimes gameplay is fine and this doesn't happen. Though, at night in the game, it gets worse and the whole scenery flickers and distorts.

I realise that the specs of my mac are not quite up to the game's minimum required but have played this game fine on older macs under minimum requirement without this problem. Anyone know what could be causing this problem? am going to be away for two months soon and i really don't want to have to take my MBP along extra just to play games lol. And more importantly, is a damaged component inside my mac causing this? or is it just that this mac isn't up to it although some days there will not be this problem?

Thanks all,

Alex

Alex,

Hi again. I'm guessing the settings are on the lowest? Is this an on and off thing or is it happening all the time when you're playing? It looks like you have some missing textures- which GPU does your MBA have? It's defo not a hardware issue so you don't need to worry about that. Don't take my word for it (i'm not an expert on this stuff) but it could be that you just need to downgrade to an older version of ATS for it to be able to work properly (see this thread: https://steamcommunity.com/app/270880/discussions/0/412446292767816757/)
Either that or the MBA simply can't render the textures fast enough at times maybe when it gets too hot and so they just disappear. What kind of fps are you getting when this happens? If its a decent fps (20-24 for mbp I'm guessing) then it's a problem with the compatibility of the version of ATS with your GPU. If its lagging massively when this is happening its an issue with your spec not being good enough. I understand most of this will just be stating the obvious but I'm doing my best to help lol

 

[gustavopi]

Hi! My guess: it's a combination of low speed GPU with poor game coding. This game is 2016, and I doubt they tested in your GPU class (Intel HD 3000). I did work with this GPU in a PC and liked the overall response, but is really out-of-date. Usually, the game will be extremely slow in your Mac, and might happens it became unable to finish rendering the screen, the engine should finish a minimum of 3D depth before consider the frame done, but it is not working in your case. In a newer GPU, this problem probably will not happen or will be one frame between a lot, hard to be perceived - they will not come back to the code to make it work in old GPUs if is working "well" for most of customers.

You might try to make it better by following "A_morl" advice but will require you a dedication - think before you proceed. My advice is to play older games that are fun and will work right. Game industry is not interested in make hardware flexible games, they want to bring you to newer hardware.

 

[MacbookAlex]

Alex,

Hi again. I'm guessing the settings are on the lowest? Is this an on and off thing or is it happening all the time when you're playing? It looks like you have some missing textures- which GPU does your MBA have? It's defo not a hardware issue so you don't need to worry about that. Don't take my word for it (i'm not an expert on this stuff) but it could be that you just need to downgrade to an older version of ATS for it to be able to work properly (see this thread: https://steamcommunity.com/app/270880/discussions/0/412446292767816757/)
Either that or the MBA simply can't render the textures fast enough at times maybe when it gets too hot and so they just disappear. What kind of fps are you getting when this happens? If its a decent fps (20-24 for mbp I'm guessing) then it's a problem with the compatibility of the version of ATS with your GPU. If its lagging massively when this is happening its an issue with your spec not being good enough. I understand most of this will just be stating the obvious but I'm doing my best to help lol

[doublepost=1499119883][/doublepost]Hi Archie!

Thanks again for getting back to me and providing me with so much info. Believe it or not after ages of googling I finally found a solution which works for both ATS and ETS2 which is to find and open the config. Files for each game and edit them so the "textures" line is reduced from 128 to 32 (which the MBA can actually read and load in game lol) it works great now and surprisingly for this mac there's not even any lag!

Only bad thing now is how hot it gets. Downloaded SMC Fan Control.

I will be away this summer for almost 2 months and really want to take just the Air with me. Do u think that that's a good idea- to run ATS and ETS2 every day on the Air as it gets so hot? Bc knowing me when I'm not studying I'll be setting aside at least a few hours a day of holidays to game lol and over two months that will probably put a fair amount of strain on it and have never played these kind of games on my Air before let alone for two months lol. This MBA is still going strong in 2017 and i really don't want to damage components from the heat caused by the gaming bc there's no way I'm rushing out to spend another £1000 on another MBA for a long time!!!! Lol

I might try downgrading the version and putting textures back to 128 to see if it works on an older version bc this solution of adjusting textures is kind of iffy lol

Thanks Archie,

Alex
[doublepost=1499119983][/doublepost]

Hi! My guess: it's a combination of low speed GPU with poor game coding. This game is 2016, and I doubt they tested in your GPU class (Intel HD 3000). I did work with this GPU in a PC and liked the overall response, but is really out-of-date. Usually, the game will be extremely slow in your Mac, and might happens it became unable to finish rendering the screen, the engine should finish a minimum of 3D depth before consider the frame done, but it is not working in your case. In a newer GPU, this problem probably will not happen or will be one frame between a lot, hard to be perceived - they will not come back to the code to make it work in old GPUs if is working "well" for most of customers.

You might try to make it better by following "A_morl" advice but will require you a dedication - think before you proceed. My advice is to play older games that are fun and will work right. Game industry is not interested in make hardware flexible games, they want to bring you to newer hardware.

Thanks for the reply!

Yeah, looks like they are leaving us in the past lol, but as have said above, I found a seemingly good fix on google.
Fingers crossed it will work for a while lol


Cheers,

Alex

 

[A_morl282]

[doublepost=1499119883][/doublepost]
Hi Archie!

Thanks again for getting back to me and providing me with so much info. Believe it or not after ages of googling I finally found a solution which works for both ATS and ETS2 which is to find and open the config. Files for each game and edit them so the "textures" line is reduced from 128 to 32 (which the MBA can actually read and load in game lol) it works great now and surprisingly for this mac there's not even any lag!

Only bad thing now is how hot it gets. Downloaded SMC Fan Control.

I will be away this summer for almost 2 months and really want to take just the Air with me. Do u think that that's a good idea- to run ATS and ETS2 every day on the Air as it gets so hot? Bc knowing me when I'm not studying I'll be setting aside at least a few hours a day of holidays to game lol and over two months that will probably put a fair amount of strain on it and have never played these kind of games on my Air before let alone for two months lol. This MBA is still going strong in 2017 and i really don't want to damage components from the heat caused by the gaming bc there's no way I'm rushing out to spend another £1000 on another MBA for a long time!!!! Lol

I might try downgrading the version and putting textures back to 128 to see if it works on an older version bc this solution of adjusting textures is kind of iffy lol

Thanks Archie,

Alex
[doublepost=1499119983][/doublepost]
Thanks for the reply!

Yeah, looks like they are leaving us in the past lol, but as have said above, I found a seemingly good fix on google.
Fingers crossed it will work for a while lol


Cheers,

Alex

Alex,

So long as you use it on a surface that it's able to get lots of air on (like a table or hard worktop) not something like your lap, it should be okay. You shouldn't need to adjust the fan rpms unless it gets way too hot as the SMC should be able to do this for you. I did have SMC fan control on my old mbp and it did help a lot. Glad you found a fix- what was it? I'm guessing the problem will have been caused by the intel hd3000 series not working well/not being compatible with the game.
Cheers,

Archie

 

[MacbookAlex]

Alex,

So long as you use it on a surface that it's able to get lots of air on (like a table or hard worktop) not something like your lap, it should be okay. You shouldn't need to adjust the fan rpms unless it gets way too hot as the SMC should be able to do this for you. I did have SMC fan control on my old mbp and it did help a lot. Glad you found a fix- what was it? I'm guessing the problem will have been caused by the intel hd3000 series not working well/not being compatible with the game.
Cheers,

Archie

Last time I used a Mac on my lap whilst running a game I almost burnt through it lol

The fix is to go into the config. file for the game and alter the texture script from "128" to "32" so that it is low enough for the MBA to actually read ("64" is still not low enough I'm afraid). I found this fix on someones Youtube video, and they claim that SCS who made the games actually accepted that this was a known problem with the Intel HD 3000 and their games, they said that they were working on it ,but years later, no one has heard anything more about it

Hopefully, this fix should keep making it work, at least until im back to the UK. Enjoy that new Macbook Pro lol, too bad they got rid of the good old light up Apple (i'm old fashioned)

Alex

 

[A_morl282]

Last time I used a Mac on my lap whilst running a game I almost burnt through it lol

The fix is to go into the config. file for the game and alter the texture script from "128" to "32" so that it is low enough for the MBA to actually read ("64" is still not low enough I'm afraid). I found this fix on someones Youtube video, and they claim that SCS who made the games actually accepted that this was a known problem with the Intel HD 3000 and their games, they said that they were working on it ,but years later, no one has heard anything more about it

Hopefully, this fix should keep making it work, at least until im back to the UK. Enjoy that new Macbook Pro lol, too bad they got rid of the good old light up Apple (i'm old fashioned)

Alex

That's annoying, sounds like SCS gave up on that... Fix sounds good- just bear in mind the game will only work on that computer for a certain amount of time between now and some point in the future because they will constantly release updates
I liked the light up apple logo too, but the haptic trackpad and the new keyboard are definitely top points of the new mbp imo. Not forgetting the display which is undoubtedly the best laptop display I've ever seen. Anyway hope i've helped a bit and it works okay.

 

[MacbookAlex]

That's annoying, sounds like SCS gave up on that... Fix sounds good- just bear in mind the game will only work on that computer for a certain amount of time between now and some point in the future because they will constantly release updates
I liked the light up apple logo too, but the haptic trackpad and the new keyboard are definitely top points of the new mbp imo. Not forgetting the display which is undoubtedly the best laptop display I've ever seen. Anyway hope i've helped a bit and it works okay.

You've been very helpful Archie. Luckily with ATS and ETS2, you can downgrade by right clicking on "properties" and going to "betas" and selecting the version you want, plus I have auto update turned off, so it looks like this fix might just be an awesome permanent one lol.

You're making me jealous of the new MBPs lol although tbh, Apple's quality is so good with Macs that mine are doing fine years on and are pretty much like new except the odd scratches and slight dings here and there. My next Macbook Pro will probably be the 2040 with inbuilt robot ha ha!

Mind you though, it is so tempting to upgrade my Air because I really feel that Apple will soon silently kill the Air family off because everything about the Air is now in this weird new 'Macbook' (the one that comes in rose gold) and its got a retina display as well, so there's really not much more need to manufacture Macbook Airs, and the latest 2017 MBA's specs are really quite unbelievable ........and the turboboost lol

Anyways, thanks for all ur advice,

Alex