Starcraft 2: Mac OS X Lion VS Windows 7 64-bit

[seong]

I've had my Macbook Pro for about a year and four months to be precise, and I was starting to wonder how my Macbook Pro 13" 2009 with 8GB RAM will handle Starcraft 2 under different operating systems.
It's pretty impressive. I don't know if it's the way Lion and Snow Leopard handles GPU and RAM, but certainly the fps of Starcraft 2 on Lion is similar to that of Windows.

Left: Mac OS X Lion
Right: Windows 7 Untimate 64-bit

 

[Pressure]

Mac OS X Lion (10.7) includes an updated library for OpenGL.

 

[seong]

Mac OS X Lion (10.7) includes an updated library for OpenGL.

Thanks for the info Now, I really don't see a point in installing Windows just for gaming.

 

[gnagy]

Yeah, it seems to run rather well. I full-screened it on my 27" display in "windowed" mode. Fast forwarded to a marine roach battle (One I use for benchmark), and it does not drop below 59 fps, and it definitely used to on Snow Leopard. It would drop down to 48-54 before. So there seems to be a noticeable speed bump.

http://www3.picturepush.com/photo/a/6149416/img/Anonymous/Screen-Shot-2011-07-22-at-4.28.46-AM.png

 

[seong]

Yeah, it seems to run rather well. I full-screened it on my 27" display in "windowed" mode. Fast forwarded to a marine roach battle (One I use for benchmark), and it does not drop below 59 fps, and it definitely used to on Snow Leopard. It would drop down to 48-54 before. So there seems to be a noticeable speed bump.

http://www3.picturepush.com/photo/a/6149416/img/Anonymous/Screen-Shot-2011-07-22-at-4.28.46-AM.png

wow. That pic looks amazing! great quality.

 

[Skyfluks]

How do you guys manage to get starcraft 2 running on 10.7 without any color bugs? There are already many issues about the colors that are not representing correctly, such as health bars, units, shield bars etc. Anything i missed that would fix this? You can help out on this thread then if you like:

http://eu.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/2417932390

i hope you guys can help!
Thanks in advance.

 

[mark28]

Can you compare memory managment for Starcraft 2 in OS X and Windows 7?

I really feel that OS X Lion is really eating ram a lot.

 

[50548]

Seems like the only reason for some people to run Windows on their Macs is disappearing fast...BareFeats had already confirmed that Mac games are quickly closing the FPS gap with Windows. Now where are those DirectX fanboys?

 

[gnagy]

How do you guys manage to get starcraft 2 running on 10.7 without any color bugs? There are already many issues about the colors that are not representing correctly, such as health bars, units, shield bars etc. Anything i missed that would fix this? You can help out on this thread then if you like:

http://eu.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/2417932390

i hope you guys can help!
Thanks in advance.

I just ran SC2 again to make sure the colors of the health bars are correct. Everything seems to be fine, and I didn't do anything special. I just installed Lion and started the game up.

I read the threads on the SC2 forum, and it seems to be happening to people that are using the Intel HD Graphics 3000. I think you'll just have to wait for an update from Apple or Blizzard. My iMac has an AMD Radion 6970M.

 

[polbit]

Same here, I run SCII on my MBP and Lion, and no issues whatsoever.

 

[SaccoSVD]

You guys, come on!

Seems like the only reason for some people to run Windows on their Macs is disappearing fast...BareFeats had already confirmed that Mac games are quickly closing the FPS gap with Windows. Now where are those DirectX fanboys?

Clearly those images shows the shaders are set to LOW in the options. (on all tests) Just look at the SCV mineral, no glow.

Sure! if you have the shaders OFF then the FPS are pretty much similar (1-5 FPS in windws 7 would be the difference)

Try turning the shaders on and you'll see the FPS going all the way to the toilette in OSX

In a MBP 17inch early 2011 (i7 2.2ghz 8gb RAM) OSX 10.6.8

Crossfire Map as terran just at the beginning of the game on all tests.

Tweaked variables.txt on both machines.

Shaders OFF.

OSX: 57 - 60 fps

Win: 60 - 65 fps

----

Shaders ON

OSX: 25 - 30 fps

Win: 57 - 60 fps

Sure! the game doesn't look bad with shaders off, but it looks stunning with shaders on.

 

[star-affinity]

Why don't you write what settings you had in the games on both OS's when you did the test?

Anyway, my experience with Starcraft 2 — and generally when it comes to the same game in OS X vs. Windows — is that the Mac version of a game runs about the same as the Windows version (frame rate wise) on the same hardware and settings when it's not being pushed. But — as soon as there's a lot of action going on (or many polygons in the view at the same time) the OS X version of the game usually drops quite a lot more in frame rate than the Windows version.

It's really quite sad, but I guess that's what you get when both Microsoft (Direct3D) and the driver developers are optimizing for gaming in Windows. I'm not saying it's hopeless to game in OS X, but I'd really like to see the performance in OS X be on par with Windows.

Maybe if the games start to require 10.7 where there's a new ”OpenGL stack” things will run better? I hear that the game Rage runs pretty well on OS X, and the require 10.7.

 

[Serban]

so any updates? i think apple should improve their drivers in 10.9