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The MacBook and Half Life 2

Machead III

Machead III

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Nov 4, 2002
467
0
UK, France
Right, I want to clear all this up definitively.

What kind of performance can the MacBook really get out of Half Life 2?

Please post your specs, you experience in game (outside, inside, with flashlight, in busy areas etc.) and any tips you have for maximising performance (how can you squeeze the most fps out whilst keeping it as pretty as possible?).

I've heard everything from it being unplayable to it being lag free.

Personally I have ordered a 1.8Ghz (the extra 0.16Ghz would have made any difference to fps I don't think) and 2gigs of RAM. I've got HL2 and Ep1 on my Source account, and I really want to be able to play through them both without having lag ruin the experience. Is this possible, and if so, under what conditions?

Also videos, even video comparisons, would be great if anyone can be bothered.
 
not judging from personal experience. But from what i've read on these forums and seen on youtube, it can play quite smoothly. Just turn off auto-save as it will crash the game.
 
The YouTube vids don't provide many specs or settings.I think we could benefit from figuring out optimum configurations. Also, those videos are taken indoors or in areas where there's not much going on. For all I know, when the screen get's busy it really might not be playable.

The Ant Lion sections for instance, or water filled areas. Are they smooth?

And what's all this about peformance drops when the flashlight comes on? Was that an old, solved problem?
 
I wouldn't get your hopes up, shared videocards are absolutely awful. Such is th MacBook's weakest link.
 
I didn't try it myself, but my friend ran Half Life 2 on lowest settings/res and no lag what so ever:

Specs:
3.2 GHz Pentium 4
896 MB RAM
80 GB 4.200 rpm. HDD
Ati Radeon 9000 128 MB
17" screen @ 1280x800

So the MacBook should be able to do this like a sport, since the GMA/950 is better than the 9000.
 
Josias said:
since the GMA/950 is better than the 9000.
Click to expand...

Really?

This is semi-hopeful, but I'm sure there are hundreds of people here who have tried HL2 on their Mac mini's or MacBooks. I wish they'd just post their experiences!
 
Machead III said:
Really?

This is semi-hopeful, but I'm sure there are hundreds of people here who have tried HL2 on their Mac mini's or MacBooks. I wish they'd just post their experiences!
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm pretty sure it's also better than the 9200 the Mini used, and perhaps also the 9550 the iBooks used.

Though i don't have a source on this, I'm pretyy sure it is also better than the FX5200Go the 12" PB had.:)
 
As an aside, Half-Life 2 is such a great game. Look at how many people still base their computer buying decisions on how well the machine will run HL2. I mean the game is going to be 2 years old next month and it still has to be the most popular FPS. Valve has really done a great job.
 
Runs OK

Hey,

HL2 runs smoothly on my macbook with little trouble when all settings at minimum or close to, including sound. HL2 looks great anyways ;) I do experience mayor lag when the flashlight is on and in open spaces, but this shouldn't stop you from installing the game, I beat the whole thing on my macbook.

Specs:
Black Macbook
2,0ghz
1.25gb ram

My ram isn't dual channel so you might experience less lag. And I'm sure you're right about the processor, mine would have caused a random shutdown if it was running at full speed when I play.

HL2 episode one is also playable, but the beginning is a pain or at least it was for me, I had mayor lag issues there, greater than anywhere in HL2.

As pointed out before, autosave causes the game to crash. This is not just a macbook problem though and there is a fix for this. I'll post it when I've booted in windows.

P.S. when you're setting up boot camp make sure you reserve enough space for windows, at least 20 gig.
 
I've had an Intel iMac before, and ran HL2 on that, absolutely flawlessly. From what i hear it sounds like the MacBook will be fine for run through.

However, the flashlight problem does worry me a little. Is this due to the card's limitations, or is there a fix? How bad a performance hit does it inflict?

I beat Episode 1 on the iMac, and even on that there was lag at the start, just outside the citadel. Although the MacBook has twice the RAM the iMac had, and I'll be running it at half the resolution, with most settings right down, so I'm hopefull.

Steve Jobless said:
just wondering is there any difference between the several editions of half life 2?
Click to expand...

How do you mean?

There's ancient original Half Life 1, then Half Life 1: Source, which is the same game with improved physics. Then there's Half Life 2, which is being followed by three episodic installments, only the first of which has been released, which is Half Life 2: Episode 1.

There are various compilations about, but that's essentially it.

Half Life 2: Episode 1 is the best game I have ever played.
 
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