Watched that guy's review. This is literally the dumbest, worst launch of anything, ever. At least the Titanic made it three-quarters of the way to America...
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Testing Google's New 'Stadia' Cloud Gaming Platform on a Mac
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I've been using it for the last two days. Absolutely no lag at all...this is on a 200mbps fibre connection though. Reddit community is positive too.
You are dreaming if you think google is gonna offer a free service without injecting their ads. Take a look at ALL Google services and it should be pretty clear what to anticipate.
People with Gigabit fiber lines are having lag issues.
"Because we all died in a car crash and this is actually Hell" was probably my favorite moment of that review.
[automerge]1574437200[/automerge]
Honestly the Mini + eGPU solution isn't a bad way to go if you are really dead-set on playing your games on a Mac desktop. The Mini is a great little machine these days, and an eGPU setup that'll get you good frames at 1080 or 1440p can be done for ~$500.
Still more money than a comparably powerful custom PC (especially since you have AMD processor options there), and yeah, no 4 or 5k monitor like the iMac. But if you're not also using the thing for content creation then I'd steer clear of the iMac anyway. Buy a much cheaper 1440p monitor that you'll be able to use with your next few machines. At the moment, Mini + eGPU looks to me like the best option for traditional Mac desktop gaming.
Last edited:
And this explains why 5G isn't going to be the holy grail people think.
It's irrelevant how fast the connection is at your end when the data will be routed through multiple switches by the time it reaches you or the server you're connecting to has to deal with thousands of other connections at the same time.
Totally agree! My mini + eGPU has been awesome for the games I play (although I do not have a 5K or 4K monitor).
I think that "review" were at least as horrible as the claim being made about Stadia – a lot of talk never getting to the point. Don't waste your time viewing it.
Don't take my word for it, but my friend have tested Stadia and seems to like it.
Last edited:
"Getting a new XBox every year" Who does that really? In case you did not know, the lifecycle of Playstation and Xbox is in around 4-5 years. As for the service, i think it depends a lot on what kind of games you are playing. If it is something PVP oriented this platform is a big no no.
"High end gaming systems" is a way-too-fair description based on what we now know.
It's the equivalent to running a PC on medium settings. Comparable games look worse than on PS4 Pro and Xbox One X. $10 a month is to run at 4K, which isn't 4K... it's upscaled 1080p -- and to select 1 free game per month. The free service comes next year, and it's limited to 1080p streaming.
nVidia GeForce Now works really well (and on Mac too), and throws the games up to ultra settings. Their rumored pricing structure, for after the beta, sucks... charging for hourly access.
This service has faults where it sold solutions to faults. Other services on WiFi struggle because of the inconsistent latency over the air. A wired connection keeps the ms response time rather stable. Google's solution was to make their controller wifi, where others use your keyboard and/or controller already linked to the hardware with a stable response time. Now they've got 2 possible latency problems... the controller, and the display.
I think it will take some time to fix all the server issues. Once more people sign. You will need more server power.
The article mentions the $9.99 price a few times, but it is my understanding that if you are ok with 1080P it is free. Seems unlikely it would deliver true 4K in real time anyway. If you happen to have a compatible controller, you can just use it. Google will likely improve the service. Hopefully to a point where it is reliable enough. Then you just got a free gaming PC. I don't see much to complain about here.
The argument has some sense to it: you didn't need to buy a computer capable of playing these games. So you can have a weak laptop and play high-end games. This problems are in the details though, most especially how fast you'll burn through your data caps.
[automerge]1574443588[/automerge]
I think the point was that the free tier hasn't launched yet.
Conceptually, I want Stadia (or another streaming service) to succeed. As Mac users, our game selection is absolutely horrid. Hell, even Skyrim that gets memed about running on a fridge isn't available for Macs. Minecraft Dungeons which doesn't look req heavy at all still isn't getting a Mac release. So we really need to root for these services to improve on fluidity, latency, stability, etc. And if anyone can do it, it'd be Google (or Amazon) with how much cloud infrastructure they have. Might be **** now, but I do hope it gets better. I really want to play Cyberpunk on my Mac without having to deal with bootcamp interrupting my workflow.
It's a great service for people with a great connection and a lousy service for people with a lousy connection.
I suspect a lot of these reviews were done on highly congested, locked down corporate networks.
I've been using my Stadia since yesterday and it's been great. I have an 80Mbit FTTC connection and in about the 4 hours total I've played, there hasn't been a hitch. Honestly. The latency with the controller (which is a good controller IMO), feels no different to my PS4. I have had absolutely no issues playing Destiny 2.
I've been using my Stadia since yesterday and it's been great. I have an 80Mbit FTTC connection and in about the 4 hours total I've played, there hasn't been a hitch. Honestly. The latency with the controller (which is a good controller IMO), feels no different to my PS4. I have had absolutely no issues playing Destiny 2.
Frankly, I'm just weary of everything being subscription-based these days. It seems like everyone jumped on that train to get you to pay them in monthly installments to use their product or service instead of just buying it outright. And even IF it's "more economical" for someone to pay $10/month to run games on Google's high-end servers than to invest in a gaming PC or console? They're still just throwing all that money down a hole with nothing to show for it whenever they stop paying.
With almost all things financial, there's more to making a smart decision than finding the lowest possible cost. I'd hate to be paying $60 each for games like Red Dead Redemption 2, to use on Google's Stadia service, and then be left with no way to use them as soon as I quit paying Google's monthly fee. (Heck, what if Google discontinues it on you?)
I also agree that trying to stream game content in 4K is futile. Most gamers I know still run 1080p resolution displays because the frame-rates on modern 3D games aren't usually as high or consistent, even playing them locally with new-ish video cards, as when you drop them down to 1080p. 4K doesn't really offer any advantages except maybe viewing movie cut-scenes in between levels of actual game play.
With almost all things financial, there's more to making a smart decision than finding the lowest possible cost. I'd hate to be paying $60 each for games like Red Dead Redemption 2, to use on Google's Stadia service, and then be left with no way to use them as soon as I quit paying Google's monthly fee. (Heck, what if Google discontinues it on you?)
I also agree that trying to stream game content in 4K is futile. Most gamers I know still run 1080p resolution displays because the frame-rates on modern 3D games aren't usually as high or consistent, even playing them locally with new-ish video cards, as when you drop them down to 1080p. 4K doesn't really offer any advantages except maybe viewing movie cut-scenes in between levels of actual game play.
The "gamers" you know most not have GPUs since 1080p is very CPU-dependent. "Newish" video cards from the last several years have no problems running current titles at 2K and 4K. Your comment about no advantages of 4K leads me to believe you've never gamed at 4K.
Uh, the gamers I know are ALL using cards like the Radeon 1060, 1070 or 1080 or recent nVidia equivalents.
I'll just leave this link here as a pretty recently written article about 1080 vs 4K gaming:
https://www.wepc.com/tips/1080p-vs-4k-gaming/
"Using a monitor with a 1080p resolution is still the standard for gaming these days. In fact, professional eSports gamers prefer gaming on a 1080p monitor.
When referencing the professional eSports scene, players are deciding to go for 1080p over 4K for several different reasons which vary from higher FPS, overall monitor size, and general feel. Large 4k monitors sound great, but in general, require more computational power and (as silly as it sounds) give your eyes more work to do. This isn't a problem when you're gaming on a hobby level, but when your a professional gamer, everything makes a difference."
I'll just leave this link here as a pretty recently written article about 1080 vs 4K gaming:
https://www.wepc.com/tips/1080p-vs-4k-gaming/
"Using a monitor with a 1080p resolution is still the standard for gaming these days. In fact, professional eSports gamers prefer gaming on a 1080p monitor.
When referencing the professional eSports scene, players are deciding to go for 1080p over 4K for several different reasons which vary from higher FPS, overall monitor size, and general feel. Large 4k monitors sound great, but in general, require more computational power and (as silly as it sounds) give your eyes more work to do. This isn't a problem when you're gaming on a hobby level, but when your a professional gamer, everything makes a difference."
eSports gamers use things like the Intel i9 9900K because they can get 150+ FPS with the CPU alone. FPS isn't one of the reasons they game at 1080p, it's the only reason. The GTX 1080 can play most games just fine at 4K and exceedingly well at 2K. 1080p barely even uses current GPUs and is a very CPU-dependent resolution. 2K as the current sweet spot for general gaming. 1080p is atrocious. Do you even game on PC?
Only issue with that argument is if you have fast enough internet for stadia, then game downloads take maybe 30 minutes max. Non issue.
As for people arguing that google can "figure out" the latency issues. You cannot "solve" latency, it is a constant, a guarantee, you cannot somehow just stop it from being a problem.
Last edited: