OS X Skyrim fps - I'm probably doing something wrong:)

[Proditor]

Evening fellas,

have a tiny issue with Skyrim (Cider) on mac. Got macbook pro 2,3 i7, 16gb ram, Nvidia 750m. The game itself is running quite ok, on lowest details. I mean, it's completely playable, but the fps just isn't perfect, and from what I've seen at others, they get much better fps with lower end macs.. Tried to reset PRAM and SMC.. I'd say it may have added few fps, but still isn't nowhere towards max.

If you guys have any suggestions, would be incredible. Skyrim updated to latest version, all official plug-ins installed. No non-official ones.

Take care!

 

[827538]

I play Skyrim maxed out on my rMBP... Just install it on Windows via bootcamp. Getting great FPS!

 

[monokitty]

Evening fellas,

have a tiny issue with Skyrim (Cider) on mac. Got macbook pro 2,3 i7, 16gb ram, Nvidia 750m. The game itself is running quite ok, on lowest details. I mean, it's completely playable, but the fps just isn't perfect, and from what I've seen at others, they get much better fps with lower end macs.. Tried to reset PRAM and SMC.. I'd say it may have added few fps, but still isn't nowhere towards max.

If you guys have any suggestions, would be incredible. Skyrim updated to latest version, all official plug-ins installed. No non-official ones.

Take care!

Skyrim never came out of the Mac. The copy you have was probably done by someone privately and is completely unoptimized and unsupported. Get the Windows copy - you won't be disappointed - best performance by far. The Cider 'Mac version' can't come anywhere close.

 

[Skylitfly]

I play Skyrim maxed out on my rMBP... Just install it on Windows via bootcamp. Getting great FPS!

Pretty much this. ^

Even thought I have the older GT 650M rMBP, I can run Skyrim on Ultra and getting decent playable fps. I highly recommend playing Skyrim through Bootcamp instead of some crappy cider port or whatever.

 

[827538]

Pretty much this. ^

Even thought I have the older GT 650M rMBP, I can run Skyrim on Ultra and getting decent playable fps. I highly recommend playing Skyrim through Bootcamp instead of some crappy cider port or whatever.

There's very little between the 650M and 750M aside from a small clock speed difference and 1GB GDDR5 vs 2GB GDDR5 and I don't think Skyrim will use more than 1GB. The architectures are the same.

This years Maxwell will be a big improvement. Just don't game in OSX, I used to play Civ 5 and some source based games - they all run far better under Windows. My Windows install wasn't even that big, like 13GB after I got rid of the crap and disabled page file and super fetch etc. SSD's FTW!

 

[mandoman]

I ran Skyrim Cider on an even older Early 2011 Macbook Pro (AMD Radeon HD 6490M) on Very High settings and had no problems with FPS. Only time I had problems was when I tried to use the official high texture graphics pack, than it stuttered something awful.

Here are some things I would check:

1) Make sure you are not accidentally switched over to your integrated (non-discreet) graphics card.
2) Make sure you are using latest Cider Wrapper (version is 7606).
3) Disable high texture graphics pack plugins if you have them turned on. It's been forever since I last played, but I think it consisted of 3 plugins.

Good luck.

 

[StelFoog]

...Just don't game in OSX, I used to play Civ 5 and some source based games - they all run far better under Windows...

Does Civ really run better on bootcamped(?) Windows rather than your Mac, I play Civ V quite a lot and for me it runs Ok on both systems but I get more FPS drops on Windows.

 

[berthaconners]

Just play on the 360. It's better. I promise.

 

[TheBeverage]

Just play on the 360. It's better. I promise.

Are you really suggesting he buy an entire (outdated) console for one game?

To the OP, I've found Cider and Wineskin both present less than acceptable performance with my 650M. The only way to get decent FPS in Skyrim, unfortunately, is through Boot Camp. Even Oblivion is a bit choppy with Wineskin, which was just baffling to me. Fortunately I finished Skyrim on a Windows machine years ago, but if I was to play through it again, I would have to install and boot directly into Windows. Parallels wouldn't cut it either, obviously. That's probably not what you want to hear (it wasn't what I wanted to hear either) but it's really the case here if you want smooth performance.

 

[827538]

Does Civ really run better on bootcamped(?) Windows rather than your Mac, I play Civ V quite a lot and for me it runs Ok on both systems but I get more FPS drops on Windows.

Seriously? I thought my OS X performance was fine... Until I installed it under bootcamp. FPS increased 2 to 3 times. OS X gaming involves running games in 'wrappers' and it butchers performance. Until native OpenGL gaming becomes mainstream (and it probably will thanks to Valve) gaming in Windows will always be a far better experience.

 

[berthaconners]

Are you really suggesting he buy an entire (outdated) console for one game?

To the OP, I've found Cider and Wineskin both present less than acceptable performance with my 650M. The only way to get decent FPS in Skyrim, unfortunately, is through Boot Camp. Even Oblivion is a bit choppy with Wineskin, which was just baffling to me. Fortunately I finished Skyrim on a Windows machine years ago, but if I was to play through it again, I would have to install and boot directly into Windows. Parallels wouldn't cut it either, obviously. That's probably not what you want to hear (it wasn't what I wanted to hear either) but it's really the case here if you want smooth performance.

I mean, yeah, they are kinda cheap now, and you dont have to worry about any of these problems....